Tag: Science

The dictionary of life has a new update. A DNA sequence that signals cells in almost all other organisms to stop synthesising proteins instead encodes a rare amino acid in some archaea, according to a study published in Science in November. Archaea are microbes that resemble bacteria in shape and size but are biologically distinct....

A “wolf supermoon” is a nickname that combines two distinct ideas: a wolf moon and a supermoon. The January 2026 wolf supermoon occurred late last week, reaching the peak of its brightness on January 2 evening (IST). ‘Wolf moon’ is a traditional name for the first full moon that happens in January. In fact many...

GUWAHATI A study published in the Indian Journal of History of Science a few months ago has challenged long-held beliefs about the origins of mineral acids, suggesting that ancient Indian scholars may have understood and used them centuries before similar knowledge appeared in Europe or the Arab world. For decades, historians believed that Arab alchemists developed mineral...

The story so far: Climate change is real, and for India to continue meeting domestic food demands, agriculture needs to cope with the increasing unpredictability of the weather, declining soil health, and growing air pollution. What is climate-resilient agriculture? Climate-resilient agriculture uses a range of biotechnology and complementary technologies to guide farming practices and reduce...

A: Your smartphone knows which way is up due to its accelerometer. It’s a chip whose parts shift slightly when the phone accelerates or when gravity acts along a particular direction. The phone’s software reads the accelerometer’s measurements along the x, y, and z directions and figures out which side is pointing towards the earth....

The Greenland shark can live up to 500 years. The kind of longevity that probably has something to do with its home: cold, dark depths of the North Atlantic Ocean and Arctic Ocean. Scientists have been studying the sharks’ biology — from its slow metabolism to cellular repair — to find answers for healthy ageing...

In October 2020, when the world was beginning to come out of a global lockdown, a spacecraft more than 3 lakh km away performed a pogo-stick jump on a small asteroid called Bennu and collected samples of its surface. The craft, part of NASA’s OSIRIS REx, then launched itself away from the asteroid and towards...

Researchers from the University of Guelph in Canada have reported an astonishing discovery: that the number of chromosome sets in their bodies’ cells seems to be linked to the rate at which the species’ mitochondrial genome evolves. This is unusual because mitochondrial DNA sits in a separate genome from the chromosomes in the nucleus and...

Science quiz: Chemistry’s foul fellows Visual: Name the molecule depicted by this ball-and-stick model. It’s responsible for vinegar’s odour and imparts its sour taste. START THE QUIZ 1 / 6 | Name the molecule depicted by this ball-and-stick model. It’s responsible for vinegar’s odour and imparts its sour taste.

Medical researchers have traditionally viewed ulcerative colitis as a disorder driven by an overactive immune response or damage to the gut’s epithelial barrier. But a new study has argued that the disease may actually start earlier, when a normally hidden layer of immune cells just beneath the gut lining begins to become thinner. Specifically, the...