In the 1960s Ed Dwight was the first Black astronaut candidate — but he never got his chance to go to the Moon. He said he’s now living out that once-denied dream vicariously through Victor Glover, who is set to make history on the Artemis 2 Moon mission that could take off as soon as...
Tag: Science
Early screen use stunts vital social, sensory growth of kids, experts warn
Be it our phones, tablets or our laptops — everyday, we interact with various digital devices designed to make our lives easier. Especially since the pandemic, even children have been exposed to this electric world at a very young age. Earlier, parents would desperately brandish toys to distract crying children, now they tamp down tantrums...
‘I’m really proud’: Victor Glover — first Black astronaut candidate reflects on historic Moon mission
In the 1960s Ed Dwight was the first Black astronaut candidate — but he never got his chance to go to the Moon. He said he’s now living out that once-denied dream vicariously through Victor Glover, who is set to make history on the Artemis 2 Moon mission that could take off as soon as...
Bacteria produce a torque that can drive microscopic machines
Escherichia coli bacteria are the workhorse of microbiology labs. These bacteria move through fluids by spinning their flagella — a clump of tails driven by a molecular motor in the cell walls. Because the flagella spin one way, the body spins the other to keep it from tumbling as it moves forward. For decades, physicists...
Photobiology: speeding up enzyme reactions in microbes using light
We know photosynthesis is a feature of plants which absorb sunlight and use the energy to convert atmospheric CO2into glucose. While sunlight peaks in the 400-700 nm region (of wavelengths), scientists have shone ultraviolet radiation (well below 400 nm) on plants and found that this opens new avenues in enzyme engineering and drugs through photocatalysis...
Before refrigeration, how did seafarers preserve food on long voyages?
— Prabhakar Jonnalagadda A: To preserve a food item meant to remove moisture, increase acidity and/or to use natural preservatives. Meats and fish would be hung over fires before departure as the smoke deposited antimicrobial compounds into the flesh. Then, sailors would pack meat in wooden barrels with dry salt. Fish, especially cod, was dried...
‘Cloning’ hurdle skirted to make perfect copy of quantum state
Quantum physics has a rule called the no-cloning theorem that prevents you from making a perfect copy of an unknown quantum state. It has shaped everything from quantum cryptography to quantum computing, and researchers have largely accepted it as an inalienable constraint. Copying data in classical computing is trivial. We routinely copy files to the...
Qdenga: a vaccine for dengue but not a silver bullet
India’s long wait for a dengue vaccine may finally be coming to an end. Takeda’s tetravalent dengue vaccine, TAK-003 (called ‘Qdenga’), recently received clearance from the Subject Expert Committee (SEC) under the Drugs Controller General of India (DCGI) for use among individuals aged 4 to 60 years. This marks a significant milestone in the country’s...
Artemis II, the international space race, and what is at stake for the U.S.
The NASA Artemis II mission is set to launch no earlier than April 1, 2026. If the lift-off is successful, the giant rocket will send humans to near the moon for the first time in more than half a century. In so doing, it will make an important milestone for the U.S. space programme. Its...
What is quantum entanglement?
Scientists have shown that helium atoms can be entangled through their movement. A team from Australia and the U.S. collided clouds of helium atoms together to create pairs that shared a single quantum state. The achievement showed that even ‘heavy’ particles could follow the same strange quantum physics rules that scientists have mostly observed so...
