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Indian satellite to monitor
greenhouse gases How smells conjure strong memories
THIS UNIVERSE *
South African find gives clue to dinosaur evolution |
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Indian satellite to monitor
greenhouse gases As part of its contribution to the global efforts aimed at mitigating the process of climate change, India is planning to build and launch a dedicated satellite designed to monitor the emission of greenhouse gases such as methane and carbon dioxide. Sources in the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) point out that the satellite, which will be basically a remote sensing space platform, will be placed into the polar orbit. This satellite, whose technical details including the kind of instruments it would carry are yet to be worked out, will make India one of the few countries in the world to have such an advanced space system to study dynamics of global climate change. India’s Ministry of Environment and Forests will be actively associated with this satellite project. Prior to this, sometime next year, it is planned to launch a 50-kg. micro satellite for carrying out atmospheric research. This satellite will be developed in tie up with Space Flight Laboratory at the University of Toronto Institute of Aerospace studies in Canada. In particular, this nano satellites will carry a payload specifically designed to facilitate the measurement of aerosols in the atmosphere. According to Jairam Ramesh, India’s Minister of State for Environment and Forests, “India cannot depend on others to tell what is happening in or country.” Further, Ramesh has suggested that India should try to get data from Japan’s GOSAT and European ENVISAT space systems , both of which are designed to monitor the conditions leading to the process of the global climate change. Meanwhile, ISRO is preparing for the launch of Indo-French climate research satellite Megha Tropiques sometime next year. This satellite features payloads for studying the life cycle of convective systems and get an insight into their role in the associated energy and moisture budget of the atmosphere in tropical regions. Megha Tropiques, will be launched by means of the four stage Indian space workhorse PSLV (Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle), into 867-km high orbit at an inclination of 20 degrees with respect to equatorial plane. Meanwhile, Ministry of Environment and Forests will join hands with ISRO to set up a National Institute for Climate and Environment (NICE) in Bangalore. “Our aim is to build a world class institute which will take up long term projects relating to the impact of climate change on various aspects of the economy of which agriculture and water will form the most important areas to begin with,” observed Ramesh. He also revealed that the setting of NICE would mean that India has taken a big step forward in creating a nucleus for long term research in the important area of climatic change. And as part of this multi- disciplinary endeavour, a well conceived programme will be launched by ISRO to monitor snow cover over the Himalayan glaciers and its impact on the water resources of northern India. It is planned to put in place automated stations over the Himalayan ranges covering Himachal Pradesh, Uttarkhand, Sikkim and Arunachal Pradesh. Further, the Indian space agency will also create a network of monitoring stations aimed at getting a better insight into the absorption of green house gases by the forest cover spread across the country, measuring seal level along the coastal zones as well as studying biologically rich eco systems like Western Ghats and north eastern region of the country. |
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How smells conjure strong memories The aroma of Grandmother’s fresh-baked cookies etch themselves into the brain’s emotional memory, but so does a whiff of rotten fish, Israeli scientists said in a finding that might help in treating trauma patients. They said bad smells make the biggest first impression— which is likely an evolutionary defence mechanism—but early pleasant scents also make an imprint on the brain. “We found that the first pairing or association between an object and a smell had a distinct signature in the brain,” even in adults, Yaara Yeshurun of the Weizmann Institute of Science in Israel, whose study appears in the journal Current Biology, said in a statement. “This ‘etching’ of initial door memories in the brain was equal for good and bad smells, yet was unique to door.” To test smell-related memories, the researchers presented a group of volunteers with a set of objects, and then associated each with a smell and a sound. Some of the smells and sounds were pleasant, such as a pear or a guitar, and others were unpleasant, such as a dead fish or the screech of a power drill. A week later, they asked people to recall the objects and found people tended to remember the unpleasant associations best, whether they were smells or sounds. Next, they did similar experiments while people’s brains were being scanned using functional magnetic resonance imaging or fMRI. In these experiments, they noticed that a part of the hippocampus and amygdala lit up when smells were first associated with a new object, but not sounds. Much more study is needed, but they said the findings could lead to better ways to help improve memories, or even offer better ways to help erase early, traumatic memories.
— Reuters. |
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THIS UNIVERSE If neither the railway tracks nor the wheels of the trains are magnetised to attract each other, then why does the train not fall off the railway tracks when travelling at a high speed? It is because of the shape of the edged wheels and the gravity of the great mass of the train.
Is there any truth about what we read on the Internet, newspapers etc, that something catastrophic will happen in 2012? Right in the beginning let me assure you that there is absolutely no scientific evidence to support this malicious and criminal rumour. So called prediction is based on nothing credible. The objective is to make enormous amount of money. Irony is that people are prepared to pay a lot to be frightened, particularly if the story line and its execution is done professionally. This is certainly possible. The reason is that you can make dramatic and exciting movies about events that might depict disasters, destruction, floods and fires, perhaps also blood and cruelty. Present day media technology involving extreme technical virtuosity in image making and sound effects is being used to great advantage. I am not saying that terrible things can never happen. We are all used to earthquakes, volcanoes, floods and tsunamis. We also have the marks on the moon and also our earth when large asteroids or comets collided with these bodies. Such things have happened. For example it is believed that disappearance of dinosaurs about 60 million years ago might have been due to such a collision. But no one could have predicted it. In any case not humans, because we had not been even thought of at that time! We do now have an active program to track large asteroids and comets and there does not seem to be any object moving on a collision course to target the earth during next fifty years. There is one object with a diameter of two football fields that might go by us some thousands of kilometres away a couple of times and we should know about twenty years ahead of time if its orbit was perturbed in a dangerous direction. In that case we might be in a position to send up a vehicle to do something about it. The present scaremongers are at best just that. Some astrologers are also amongst them. So do not worry and if some horror movies do come your way do not waste your money seeing them — at least do not let them frighten you. I heard that there is no conduction of heat in space. If so, then why do we feel heat of the sun although the sun is also in space? Please study your books. Even without that you should know that heat is also transferred by radiation. Just sit in the sun on a summer day.
Readers wanting to ask Prof Yash Pal a question can e-mail him at palyash.pal@gmail.com |
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Trends JOHANNESBURG: A huge dinosaur discovered in South Africa is a previously unknown species that sheds light on the evolution of the largest creatures ever to walk the earth, a scientist said Wednesday. Adam Yates, a paleontologist at Johannesburg’s Wits University, said the seven-meter-long Aardonyx Celestae occupied a “very significant position in the family tree of dinosaurs.” U.S. science group seeks cooperation with Cuba
HAVANA: A group led by the head of the United States’ biggest science organization is in Cuba this week to discuss ways to rekindle scientific cooperation as U.S.-Cuba relations slowly improve under U.S. President Barack Obama. Nobel Prize-winning scientist Peter Agre, president of the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS), told Reuters on Wednesday the group had met with government officials and Cuban scientists, all of them enthusiastic about doing science together.
Why can’t chimps talk? It’s more than just genes
WASHINGTON: Why can humans talk and chimps cannot? Researchers have another clue and it lies not simply in the genetic code, but in how the genes function. Humans and chimpanzees share most of their DNA. Estimates on the percentage range from 98.5 percent to 95 percent. Scientists study the differences to find the keys to what distinguishes humans.
Soviet H-bomb scientist Ginzburg dies
MOSCOW: Vitaly Ginzburg, a Russian physicist who survived Stalin’s purges by working on the Soviet atomic bomb project and later won the Nobel Prize for physics, died in Moscow late on Sunday after a long illness. He was 93. Ginzburg won the 2003 Nobel physics prize for developing the theory behind superconductors, materials which allow electricity to pass without resistance at very low temperatures. He shared the prize with British-American Anthony Leggett and Russian-born U.S. scientist Alexei Abrikosov. —
Reuters |
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