General Awareness

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY - August 2015

Aug 2015

Nov 07, 2019

Solar Project Developers Free To Build Additional Capacity If Supply Commitments Are Met: MNRE

Solar project developers will be free to take a call on setting up of additional power generation facilities if the energy supply commitments are met. A clarification to this effect was issued by the Ministry of New and Renewable Energy.
This decision is expected to give relief to solar power project developers.
As long as the solar PV power plant is in accordance with the contracted AC (alternating current) capacity and meets the range of energy supply based on capacity utilisation factor requirements, the design and installation of solar capacity on the DC (direct current) side should be left to the generator or developer.

Climate Crisis: 11,000 Scientists Warn Of 'Untold Suffering'

The world's people face "untold suffering due to the climate crisis" unless there are major transformations to global society, according to a stark warning from more than 11,000 scientists.
The climate crisis has arrived and is accelerating faster than most scientists expected. It is more severe than anticipated, threatening natural ecosystems and the fate of humanity.
The statement is published in the journal BioScience on the 40th anniversary of the first world climate conference, which was held in Geneva in 1979. The statement was a collaboration of dozens of scientists and endorsed by further 11,000 from 153 nations.

Nov 06, 2019

Smart Tech Hacked Using Laser

Researchers at the University of Michigan and Japan's University of Electro-Communications have discovered they can use lasers to silently "speak" to any computer that receives voice commands, which included smartphones, smart speakers like Amazon Echo, and Google Home, and Facebook's Portal video chat devices.
The attack can easily pass through a window, when the device's owner isn't home to notice a telltale flashing speck of light or the device's responses.

Voyager Finds Extra Layers in Solar System

Nasa's Voyager 2 probe exited our solar system nearly a year ago, becoming the second spacecraft to ever enter interstellar space. Voyager 2 completed the set of data. Scientists shared their findings via five papers published in 'Nature Astronomy'.
The analyses indicate that there are mysterious extra layers between our solar system's bubble and interstellar space.
Voyager 2 detected winds — flows of charged gas particles that come from the sun — leaking from the solar system.
Just beyond the solar system's edge, these solar winds interact with interstellar winds: gas, dust, and charged particles flowing through space from supernova explosions millions of years ago.
The new boundary layers suggest there are stages in the transition from our solar bubble to the space beyond that scientists did not previously understand.
On November 5, 2018, Voyager 2 left what's known as the "heliosphere", a giant bubble of charged particles flowing out from the sun that sheathes our solar system.
In doing so, the probe crossed a boundary area called the "heliopause". In that area, the edge of our solar system's bubble, solar winds meet a flow of interstellar wind and fold back on themselves.
Both Voyager probes measured changes in the intensity of cosmic rays as they crossed the heliopause, along with the transition between magnetic fields inside and outside the bubble.
But because so much of the transition from our solar system to the space beyond is marked by changes in plasma (a hot ionized gas that's the most abundant state of matter in the universe), Voyager 1's damaged instrument had difficulty measuring it.
Now, the new measurements from Voyager 2 indicate that the boundaries between our solar system and interstellar space may not be as simple as once thought.

Artificial Leaf to Suck Carbon Dioxide

Scientists have created an "artificial leaf " that could turn carbon dioxide into fuel. The new technology was inspired by the way plants use photosynthesis to turn carbon dioxide into glucose and oxygen.
The artificial leaf mimics this process — with the help of a cheap red powder called cuprous oxide — and produces methanol and oxygen.
The methanol can be collected and used as fuel by heating the solution so the water evaporates, according to the paper published in Nature Energy.
This technology has achieved the solar to fuel efficiency about 10%. This is already larger than the natural photosynthesis (about one per cent). The next step is to partner with industry companies to scale it up with a system engineering of flow cell for the production of liquid fuels. More efficient artificial leaves can be developed along the lines with industry partners.

Nov 05, 2019

Light-based 'Tractor Beam' Assembles Materials at the Nanoscale

Researchers at the University of Washington have developed a method that could make reproducible manufacturing at the nanoscale possible.
The team adapted a light-based technology employed widely in biology -- known as optical traps or optical tweezers -- to operate in a water-free liquid environment of carbon-rich organic solvents, thereby enabling new potential applications.
As the team reports in a paper published October 30, 2019 in the journal Nature Communications, the optical tweezers act as a light-based "tractor beam" that can assemble nanoscale semiconductor materials precisely into larger structures.
Unlike the tractor beams of science fiction, which grab spaceships, the team employs the optical tweezers to trap materials that are nearly one billion times shorter than a meter.

Voyager 2 Reaches Interstellar Space

Researchers at the University of Iowa report that the spacecraft Voyager 2 has entered the interstellar medium (ISM), the region of space outside the bubble-shaped boundary produced by wind streaming outward from the sun.
Voyager 2, thus, becomes the second human-made object to journey out of our sun's influence, following Voyager 1's solar exit in 2012.
In a new study, the researchers confirm Voyager 2's passage on Nov. 5, 2018, into the ISM by noting a definitive jump in plasma density detected by an Iowa-led plasma wave instrument on the spacecraft.
The marked increase in plasma density is evidence of Voyager 2 journeying from the hot, lower-density plasma characteristic of the solar wind to the cool, higher-density plasma of interstellar space.
It's also similar to the plasma density jump experienced by Voyager 1 when it crossed into interstellar space.

Nov 04, 2019

IIT Kharagpur Researchers Use Wet Clothes At Dhobi Ghat To Generate Electricity

Researchers at Indian Institute of Technology (IIT), Kharagpur, Mechanical department here have generated electricity from clothes drying in natural ambience.
The research was done at a 'dhobi ghat' using 50 wet clothes with a surface area of 3,000 square meters which was put for drying by washermen in a remote village.
The clothes were connected to a commercial super-capacitor. In the process, the researchers were able to reliably charge up to around 10 volts in almost 24 hours. This stored energy is enough to glow a white LED for more than 1 hour.

Nov 03, 2019

Astrosat Views Star Formation In Jellyfish Galaxies

Observations of a jelly fish galaxy, JW100, by Astrosat using its Ultraviolet Imaging Telescope have thrown up interesting puzzles. These puzzles involve star formation in hostile environments containing X-ray-emitting hot plasma.
JW100 is located far away in the galaxy cluster Abell 2626. A recent work describes this analysis and poses the puzzle, vouching for the power of multiwavelength astronomy. The measurements made by the UVIT have been crucial for this work, which is to be published in The Astrophysical Journal.

Four Guinness World Records to be Slated During The 5th India International Science Festival

As many as four Guinness World Records will be attempted during the course of the 5th India International Science Festival (IISF) beginning in Kolkata on November 5, 2019.
On the opening day of the four-day mega event, the largest astrophysics lesson and assembly of spectroscopes will be attempted with the participation of over 1,750 students.
The largest electronics lesson and assembly of optical media communication units at a single location will be attempted the next day (November 6, 2019) with the participation of over 950 students.
The record attempt for most people assembling Radio kits simultaneously will be attempted on November 7, 2019 with the participation of over 400 students.
The largest human image of a human chromosome will be attempted to be formed on the final day, November 8, 2019 with the participation of over 400 students' own exploration in the world of Science and Technology.

Machine Learning-Based Model to Determine If Skin Cancer Has Spread

Using the expression of 17 key genes (messenger RNAs), it is now possible to distinguish primary and metastatic cutaneous melanoma, which is the most common type of skin cancer. While 11 of the 17 genes have already been reported by other studies for cutaneous melanoma, it is for the first time that the potential role of remaining six genomic signatures in classifying samples as either primary or metastatic skin cutaneous cancer has been made.
The 17 genomic signatures, which were identified by a team led by Prof. Gajendra P.S. Raghava from the Indraprastha Institute of Information Technology (IIIT), New Delhi, have high accuracy — over 89% — in discriminating metastatic from primary skin melanoma. These signatures also have high sensitivity (in case tumour is metastatic), and high specificity (in case the tumour is primary). The results were published in the journal Scientific Reports.

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