While the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) has not come out with any firm dates as to when it plans to accomplish the launches it was scheduled to undertake this year which includes the first uncrewed mission of Gaganyaan (G1), April saw the space agency executing the second Integrated Air Drop Test (IADT-02) for the...
Tag: Science
Science Quiz on explorers who undertook ‘impossible’ expeditions
Name this Norwegian adventurer, who set out on April 28, 1947, on the infamous Kon-Tiki expedition, since considered to be racially motivated, to the Polynesian islands. Published – April 30, 2026 05:05 pm IST Read Comments Copy link Email Facebook Twitter Telegram LinkedIn WhatsApp Reddit
A short video helps science reporting, but not India’s newsroom realities
Lara Marie Berger, Anna Kerkhof, and Nikola Noske, ‘Improving science literacy in the newsroom: Experimental evidence’, PNAS Nexus Science journalism is an endlessly fascinating enterprise. Being good at it doesn’t take more than being a ‘decent’ writer (as they say), a good journalist, and navigating science and science communication with a good journalist’s sensibilities. That...
How decentralising therapy can help bridge India’s treatment gap
India continues to face a large mental health treatment gap, with nearly 85% of individuals with common mental disorders receiving no formal care. However, over the past decade, access to antidepressant medication, especially drugs called selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors (SSRIs), has improved, marking an important shift toward making treatment more available. This expansion is important...
The ingredients of India’s biopharma ambitions
The COVID-19 pandemic was a watershed moment for our country. While the pharmaceutical sector was robust, it lacked the capacity to produce specialised molecular components at scale. At the start of 2020, nearly all of the 20-plus reagents and enzymes required for making the vaccine kits were imported. Supplies were also vulnerable as the countries...
Why does a loud vehicle passing nearby make the heart pound?
The pounding is a neurological reflex as well as due to a physical effect. When we are startled by a sound, the reflex can be activated within 150 ms, which is faster than acting due to conscious thought. This is because the sound travels from the cochlea through the brainstem to the amygdala, which treats...
Why science and scientists must learn to celebrate their failures
Failure is part and parcel of research but many scientists consider discussing it in a scientific forum to be taboo. Laboratories are littered with unfinished experiments and inconclusive facts and theories that failed to stand the test of study. However, when science is being communicated — whether to funding bodies, professional journals or audiences —...
As calculations catch up, muon anomaly nearly vanishes
The particle physics rulebook, called the Standard Model, predicts the properties of most subatomic particles with such precision that those few properties found to differ in experiments have frustrated physicists. This is why they’re keenly looking for cracks in the Model — parts where it can be updated — that could cover the anomalous findings...
Light pollution threatens world’s darkest skies in the Atacama
It takes a moment for the eyes to adjust. A faint spark appears in the darkness; then another, brighter one. Soon, stars, planets and entire constellations emerge. Before long, a whole galaxy stretches across the sky, visible to the naked eye. In Chile’s Atacama Desert, the night sky feels infinite. Considered the driest place on...
Enhanced CAR-T therapy clears solid tumours by finding ‘faint’ targets
Chimeric antigen receptor (CAR) T-cell therapy, an approach that modifies a patient’s own immune cells to hunt down cancer, has transformed treatment for blood cancers such as leukaemia and lymphoma. But the same strategy has struggled when applied to solid tumours such as kidney or ovarian cancer. One of the biggest obstacles is antigen heterogeneity....
