Two of the world’s most visible private space companies are shifting their attention and resources to moon missions even as both continue to speak about longer term ambitions to Mars and beyond. For many years, the public identity of SpaceX has been fused with settling humans on Mars. Its founder and CEO Elon Musk has...
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February 10, 2026February 10, 2026Science & Tech
What explains the SpaceX, Blue Origin moonward pivot? | Explained
Two of the world’s most visible private space companies are shifting their attention and resources to moon missions even as both continue to speak about longer term ambitions to Mars and beyond. For many years, the public identity of SpaceX has been fused with settling humans on Mars. Its founder and CEO Elon Musk has...
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February 10, 2026February 10, 2026Science & Tech
The Hall-mark on diamond
Did you know that there was a time in history when diamonds were believed to exist only in India? The hardest natural material on Earth, diamonds were first discovered in India nearly 3,000 years ago. For more than a millennia, India remained the only source of diamonds for the world, a monopoly that the country...
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February 9, 2026February 9, 2026Science & Tech
On gravity’s role in the earth’s journey through space
A fresh year has just started, and we are already a month old. Year endings and startings are always occasions to ponder. Here in IIT Kanpur, where some of us teach, the first week of January is always hectic. A new semester just started, students are back after winter breaks, and people are rushing through...
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February 9, 2026February 9, 2026Science & Tech
ISRO identifies site for Chandrayaan-4 lander
The Chandrayaan-4 Mission is at least two years away, but the ISRO has identified a location in the South Polar region of the Moon to land its lander. The Union Government has approved the Chandrayaan-4 mission, designed as a lunar sample-return mission, and it will be India’s most complex lunar endeavour yet. “We are targeting...
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February 9, 2026February 9, 2026Science & Tech
New dragonfly species discovered in Kerala, named Lyriothemis keralensis
Researchers have discovered a new species of dragonfly from Kerala and named it Lyriothemis keralensis, recognising the State’s exceptional biodiversity. The species was recorded from Varapetty near Kothamangalam in Ernakulam district, where it inhabits vegetated pools and irrigation canals within well shaded pineapple and rubber plantations. The study was conducted by Dattaprasad Sawant of the...
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February 9, 2026February 9, 2026Science & Tech
New AI method helps identify which dinosaur made which footprints
Footprints are among the most common kind of dinosaur fossils. Sometimes scientists find a single, lonely footprint. Sometimes they come across a chaotic jumble of tracks resembling a dance floor, sort of a dinosaur discotheque. But identifying which dinosaur left which track has been notoriously difficult. Researchers have now developed a method harnessing artificial intelligence...
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February 9, 2026February 9, 2026Science & Tech
Leo D’Souza, Mangaluru’s Mendel who worked to transform cashew industry
On January 20, 2026, Rev. Dr. Leo D’Souza, a Jesuit scientist based in Mangaluru, died aged 93. Dr. D’Souza, fondly known as Fr Leo, trained in the 1960s at the Max Planck Institute for Plant Breeding Research in Cologne, working alongside stalwarts in the field such as Ingo Potrykus, Joseph Straub, and Sudhir Kumar Sopory....
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February 9, 2026February 9, 2026Science & Tech
SpaceX shifting focus from Mars to moon, Musk says
SpaceX is putting its longstanding focus of sending humans to Mars on the back burner to prioritise establishing a settlement on the Moon, founder Elon Musk said Sunday (February 8, 2026). The South Africa-born billionaire’s space company has found massive success as a NASA contractor, but critics have for years panned Mr. Musk’s Mars colonisation...
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February 9, 2026February 9, 2026Science & Tech
Are taxes on cigarettes adequate to deter consumers in India?
One puff of a cigarette, within seconds, infuses the human bloodstream (via the lungs) with nicotine, the acutely addictive and carcinogenic chemical in tobacco. Nicotine binds to the brain’s cellular receptors, sparking the dopaminergic reward system to keep smokers hooked. And then there are additives in cigarettes, such as menthol, which gets nicotine to linger...
