The story so far: The Department of Biotechnology (DBT) recently said that the exercise to sequence 10,000 Indian human genomes and create a database under the Centre-backed Genome India Project is about two-thirds complete. About 7,000 Indian genomes have already been sequenced of which, 3,000 are available for public access by researchers. The proponents of...
Tag: Science
Science quiz on holiday spots for the really, really brave
CCMB scientists identify rare gene behind Indian girl’s red hair
Indians typically have black hair, with grey appearing as a natural part of ageing. But red hair? The colour more commonly associated with Europeans has now been identified in a rare case in India, intriguing scientists at the CSIR-Centre for Cellular and Molecular Biology (CCMB) in Hyderabad. Their study was prompted by a striking case...
370 billion crickets are farmed for food every year; scientists have found they may feel pain
You’re cooking dinner, distracted, and your hand brushes a hot pan. Nerve signals race to your spinal cord and back to yank your arm away in a fraction of a second, with no thought required. Then comes the pain. A sharp, spreading sting gives way to a pulsing ache, and you cradle your hand and...
New UFO files offer no answers – but something is happening in the skies
The US Government has released a new trove of documents on various cases of “Unidentified Anomalous Phenomena” (UAPs) – many of which would have been described in the past as Unidentified Flying Objects or UFOs – including photos, videos and reports of unexplained events sighted in the sky and in space. The files detail “unresolved...
Blue Origin rocket explodes on launch pad during engine-firing test
A rocket belonging to Jeff Bezos’ Blue Origin exploded during a test at the launch pad on Thursday (May 28, 2026) night, shaking nearby homes and briefly painting the sky orange. Blue Origin said its New Glenn rocket exploded during an engine-firing test being conducted ahead of a satellite launch planned for next week. No...
Space Wrap: A blockbuster month for India’s private sector
May was a blockbuster month for Indian space startups as they made a significant impression not just in India but also globally. Bengaluru based space startup GalaxEye successfully launched Mission Drishti, the world’s first OptoSAR satellite aboard a Falcon 9 by SpaceX from Vandenberg, California. India’s largest privately developed earth observation satellite, Mission Drishti, is...
SpaceX’s Starship rockets grounded pending investigation after test flight
SpaceX Starship launches are on hold pending an investigation into last week’s test flight. The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) announced on Wednesday (May 27, 2026) that the hour-long spaceflight resulted in a mishap based on the performance of the mega rocket’s first-stage booster. Minutes after Starship blasted off from Texas on May 22, the booster...
NASA lays out moon base plans with landers, buggies and drones
National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) is already ordering landers, rovers and drones for a sprawling moon base, less than two months after the Artemis II’s record-breaking lunar flyaround. The space agency outlined the first phase of its moon base plans on Tuesday (May 26,2026), awarding hundreds of millions of dollars in contracts to four...
