The map has become more important than the territory. And the mapmakers are increasingly burning the territory to keep the map warm. The SpaceX IPO on June 12 ended with Elon Musk becoming the world’s first trillionnaire — a word that still invites a red underline on Google Docs. That word has become because money...
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June 17, 2026June 17, 2026Science & Tech
Science Snapshots: June 21, 2026
New seismic hazard spotted in Japan’s 2011 quake Following the 2011 earthquake, 15 minutes after the main shock, the ground across Japan shifted east by up to 6 mm. Using satellite data, scientists have now found this movement was triggered by ScS waves, seismic waves that travel down from the earthquake source, bounce off the...
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June 17, 2026June 17, 2026Science & Tech
What a ‘super’ El Niño would mean for India’s monsoon
The United States’ National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) confirmed this month that an El Niño has formed in the equatorial Pacific, and placed the odds at about 63% that it will strengthen into a “very strong” — colloquially, a “super” — event by the northern winter. India’s June rainfall, until 16th June, is roughly...
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June 17, 2026June 17, 2026Science & Tech
Why do recessive traits from older generations suddenly resurface in one individual?
— Deva Narayanan A: Genes work in pairs. Every person inherits two copies of most genes, one from each parent. Some gene variants, called dominant alleles, express themselves even when only one copy is present. Others, called recessive alleles, express themselves when a person inherits both copies. Someone with one recessive allele alongside a dominant...
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June 17, 2026June 17, 2026Health, Science & Tech
Drug-resistant malaria poses growing challenge to treatment and elimination efforts
Although the incidence of malaria fell by nearly a quarter between 2000 and 2015, the trend has reversed over the past decade, with global incidence rising by 8.5% since 2015. Experts say the growing threat of resistance to anti-malarial medicines could complicate efforts to eliminate the disease and reverse gains. India currently holds about 1.4%...
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June 17, 2026June 17, 2026Health, Science & Tech
The case for banning paraquat in India
When 36-year-old Meenamma swallowed a small amount of herbicide after a fight with her husband, she did not expect it to kill her. “She just wanted me to realise how deeply she had been hurt,” recalled her husband, Venu. “She thought we would take her to a hospital and treat it.” What neither Meenamma nor...
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June 17, 2026June 17, 2026Science & Tech
The universe’s expansion is still accelerating, researchers say
Taking a fresh look at data involving a type of exploding stars, a team of researchers says it has confirmed the notion that the universe is expanding at an accelerated rate – the very observation that led to the identification in the 1990s of an enigmatic cosmic force called dark energy. The study’s results rebut...
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June 17, 2026June 17, 2026Science & Tech
Science Quiz: Of things that are, or ought to be, black
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June 16, 2026June 16, 2026Science & Tech
The U.S. govt. policy is to systematically cut off any source of income to Cuba: Mitchell Valdes-Sosa
The Cuban healthcare and biotechnology sectors — crown jewels of the country’s revolution — today find themselves at breaking point thanks to the U.S. campaign of economic strangulation, which has moved beyond trade restrictions to a direct assault on human services. Washington has also intensified pressure on the Global South to dismantle Cuban medical missions,...
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June 15, 2026June 15, 2026Environment, Science & Tech
Heatwaves and ozone together increase India’s cardiac deaths: study
While surface ozone — a pollutant harmful to the heart and lungs — already exceeds safe limits across much of India in the hot pre-monsoon months, a new study finds that heatwaves push it to still higher levels, thus adding several hundred deaths to a far larger toll that the study links to ozone across...
