Tag: Science

There have been a number of news reports recently about a startup in Bengaluru called Vimag Labs that has reportedly replaced rare-earth magnets in motors with so-called “virtual” magnets. One such report quoted Manish Seth, the start-up’s CEO, as saying: “We remove permanent magnets, replace them with copper coils, and then through software, we generate...

As spring approaches in the hyper-biodiverse Himalayas, birds that are accustomed to cooler climes migrate to the north. This is driven not just by temperature or precipitation alone, but also the availability of prey: arthropods (insects and spiders). But climate change is altering the rhythm of this dynamic. Scientists at the Centre for Ecological Sciences,...

Conventional bombs explode on or near a target surface, with the explosion and fragments, e.g. shrapnel, rendering the bomb’s damage. But when a target is buried deep under a mountain, the soil and rock mass surrounding it can absorb enough of the blast’s energy to keep the target from being damaged too much. This is...

The view that artificial intelligence (AI) can pose an existential threat to humankind using technologies like nuclear weapons has been around for some years now. Last year, after examining such threats and risks, one study from the Rand Corporation, a global policy think-tank, argued that such risks could not be ruled out. The study also...

“I believe that this nation should commit itself to achieving the goal, before this decade is out, of landing a man on the moon and returning him safely to the earth. U.S. President John F. Kennedy on May 25, 1961 Setting foot on the moon marked the fulfilment of a desire that had probably lasted...

An interesting review by G. Allen et al. in Scientific Reports (16,18690: 2026)reports on how orangutans, which are still present in the Sebangu forest in Central Kalimantan region in Indonesia, treat themselves by mixing saliva with the leaves of a plant botanists that call dracaena (a member of the asparagus family) and applying the mixture...

Astronomers have discovered a faint, elusive planet orbiting a young star after more than a decade of cosmic hide-and-seek. In an unusual twist, two groups working independently detected the cold gas giant a few days apart late last year using different telescopes. It’s the dimmest planet ever directly imaged from earth, scientists said. A Scottish...

In the middle of 2023, a study conducted by the HuthLab at the University of Texas sent shockwaves through the realms of neuroscience and technology. For the first time, the thoughts and impressions of people unable to communicate with the outside world were translated into continuous natural language, using a combination of artificial intelligence (AI) and brain...

You were probably taught in high school that new neurons, or brain cells, are not born during adulthood. That it stops during your childhood. The actual picture has been more complicated: scientists have been debating among themselves for a long time as to when neurogenesis stops, although most of them believed it was possible in...