india launched 20 satellites in 26 minutes and made...
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India launched 20 satellites in 26 minutes and made history
The Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) just
sent 20 satellites into orbit with one launch, marking
the largest satellite launch in the space agency‘s
history.
Their previous record was 10 satellites
delivered with one mission, and this latest
accomplishment takes them a lot closer to the
delivery rates of NASA and the Russian Federal
Space Agency, solidifying India's place in the global
space market. Out of the 20 satellites, 17 were commercial, so used by companies to help us do things like
get better TV signals or weather forecasts. The main cargo, though, was the ISRO‘s 725.5-kilogram (1,599-
pound) Cartosat-2 - a satellite used for earth observation much like NASA‘s Landsat program.
"Each of these small objects that you are putting into space will carry out their own activity, which
is independent of the other, and each of them will live a wonderful life for a finite period," ISRO chairman
A. S. Kiran Kumar told. Pulling off such a launch is no easy task. The satellites, which were launched from
the island of Sriharikota, have to be 'injected' into orbit at the correct distance from one another to ensure
they don‘t eventually smash together.
"After each satellite is injected into orbit, the vehicle will be re-oriented if required and the next sat-
ellite will be put into orbit with a varying velocity so that the distance between the satellites grows mono-
tonically," Vikram Sarabhai Space Centre director, K. Sivan, told T. S. Subramanian from The Hindu. "We
will do this to ensure that there is no collision of satellites."
"Then, after a huge gap of 3,000 seconds, PS-4 [the fourth stage] will be re-ignited for 5 seconds,"
Sivan continued. "Then, it will be switched off for another 3,000 seconds. It will be re-ignited for another 5
seconds." "India is attracting key foreign players, most importantly the US, in the space market thanks to its
July, 2016
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cost-effectiveness and credibility," said expert Ajay Lele, a
senior fellow at New Delhi‘s Institute for Defence Studies
and Analyses, who was not a part of the launch team.
Most of those 'key foreign players' are from the US.
In fact, 13 of the 20 satellites sent to orbit in this latest
round were from US-based companies and organisations
with a Google-owned company, Terra Bella, being one of
them.
The other 7 satellites - minus the Cartosat-2 - were
from Germany, Canada, and Indonesia, though the ISRO
does not say how many are from each. In total, the mission
- called PSLV-C34 - sent roughly 1,288 kilograms (2,863
pounds) worth of satellites into Earth‘s orbit, and, if history
is anything to go off of, they probably did it for way less
money than other agencies, but an exact number hasn‘t
been reported just yet.
This is really big news for the ISRO for two
reasons: it represents both the largest satellite launch in the
agency‘s history - putting them closer to NASA‘s 2013
record of 29 and Russia‘s 2014 record of 33 - and it shows
that foreign companies are ready to pay the ISRO to launch
satellites for them.
Launching rockets on the cheap isn‘t the only
concern for the ISRO. Just last month, the agency tested an
early version of a shuttle that they hope will offer a
reusable way for astronauts to get to and from space, just
like NASA‘s Space Shuttle programme used to.
The ISRO is becoming a major player on the space
front, joining the ranks of NASA, SpaceX, and Blue
Origin. And that's great, because if there's one thing that's
guaranteed to get us off this big blue rock faster, it's a little
healthy competition. It'll be exciting to see what happens
next.
Courtesy: sciencealert.com
How Yoga Changes the Brain
Yoga seems to bestow mental benefits, such as a
calmer, more relaxed mind. Now research by
Chantal Villemure and Catherine Bushnell of the
National Center for Complementary and
Alternative Medicine in Bethesda, Md., may
explain how. Using MRI scans, Villemure detected
more gray matter—brain cells—in certain brain
areas in people who regularly practiced yoga, as
compared with control subjects. ―We found that
with more hours of practice per week, certain areas
were more enlarged,‖ Villemure says, a finding
that hints that yoga was a contributing factor to the
brain gains.
Yogis had larger brain volume in the
somatosensory cortex, which contains a mental
map of our body, the superior parietal cortex,
involved in directing attention, and the visual
cortex, which Villemure postulates might have
been bolstered by visualization techniques. The
hippocampus, a region critical to dampening stress,
was also enlarged in practitioners, as were the
precuneus and the posterior cingulate cortex, areas
key to our concept of self. All these brain areas
could be engaged by elements of yoga practice,
Villemure says.
The yogis dedicated on average about 70 % of their
practice to physical postures, about 20 percent to
meditation and 10 percent to breath work, typical
of most Western yoga routines. Villemure
presented the work in November 2013 at the
annual meeting of the Society for Neuroscience in
San Diego.
Stephani Sutherland
www.scientificamerican.com
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Congratulations
Ms. Akshaya Sreenivasan
Sasthra Prathibha 2015 Title winner Ms. Akshaya Sreenivasan cleared IIT JEE Advanced
Examinations conducted in two phases during the months of April and May 2016.
Akshaya, the third rank holder of Bhavans at the CBSE class 12 examination becomes the first
student to have achieved of passing the IIT JEE Advanced exam.
SIF Kuwait extends hearty congratulations on her achievement
and wish her all the very best in future endeavors
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India's First Women Fighter Pilots Get Wings
Flying Officers Avani Chaturvedi, Bhawana Kanth
and Mohana Singh on Saturday were commissioned as
India's first three women fighter pilots. On completion
of successful training at the Air Force Academy in
Dundigal on the outskirts of Hyderabad, the trio were
formally commissioned into the Indian Air Force
(IAF) by Defence Minister Manohar Parrikar and were
the centre of attraction at the Combined Graduation
Parade. The women, who broke the barriers to etch
their names in the history of the IAF, will get to fly fighter jets next year after completion of stage-III training
at Bidar in Karnataka.
The women, who flew the Pilatus and Kiran jet trainers, will now get to train on the Hawk advanced
trainer jets for a year before being allowed to fly supersonic warplanes. They were all elated and excited after
the defence minister conferred on them the 'President's Commission' to formally induct them into the IAF.
Talking to reporters, they said it was a great honour to be in the first batch of women fighter pilots. "We are
happy to get this opportunity to serve the country," said Ms Chaturvedi.
They said they enjoyed the six-month training at the academy and never felt that they were being
treated differently for being women. Asked what role they expect to play in the force, they said they will now
focus on the next level of training. Ms Chaturvedi, hailing from Satna district in Madhya Pradesh, comes from
a family of army officers. She was inspired by her brother who is also in the army. She always wanted to fly
and joined the flying club of her college.
Bhawana Kanth hails from Darbhanga district in Bihar. As a child, she always dreamt of flying planes.
She opted for the fighter stream after successfully completing her stage I training. Daughter of an officer in
the Indian Oil Corporation, she set the goal of becoming a fighter pilot and serve the nation.
Mohana Singh comes from Jhunjhunu district of Rajasthan. Her grandfather was a flight gunner in
Aviation Research Centre and father is a warrant officer in the IAF. Ms Mohana is excited to continue the
family legacy of serving the nation. While women pilots have been flying helicopters and transport aircraft
since 1991 in the IAF, it was last year when the government decided to allow women into fighter jet cockpits.
In February this year, President Pranab Mukherjee had announced that women cadets will be allowed in
combat roles in all three services. Speaking at the parade, Mr Parrikar said more women would join the armed
forces.
The minister reviewed the colourful passing-out parade and conferred the 'President's Commission', on
behalf of the President of India, on 129 graduating trainees of various branches, including 22 women trainees.
Mr Parrikar also presented the 'Wings and Brevets' to the newly commissioned officers of the flying branch
and to officers from the Indian Navy and the Coast Guard.
Courtesy – www.ndtv.com
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QS University Rankings 2016: IISc, 4 IITs among Asia's top 50
The Indian Institute of Science (IISc), Bangalore and four IITs -- Mumbai, Delhi, Madras and Kanpur
-- figure in the list of Asia's top 50 universities, as per the QS University Rankings for 2016. The IISc, which
is placed 33rd this year, had emerged as the top Indian institute last year as well when it was ranked 34th. The
IIT-Mumbai has been ranked 35th, closely followed by the IIT-Delhi (36th), IIT-Madras (43rd) and IIT-
Kanpur (48th).
The IIT-Kharagpur was placed 51st and two other IITs -- Roorkee (78) and Guwahati (94) -- made it
to the top 100. Delhi University (DU), which had got 91st position last year, has jumped several steps and was
ranked 66th. The University of Calcutta was ranked 108th, a big jump from 149th last year, University of
Mumbai 145th, while Banaras Hindu University is placed at 155th position. Panjab University is in the 251 to
300 bracket.
Overall, like last year, National University of Singapore (NUS) has been ranked the best university in
Asia, followed by University of Hong Kong. India's performance in these rankings is the fifth best among the
17 countries that feature in the ratings. While India has 23 universities in the list of 350, it is outperformed by
Taiwan (34), South Korea (54), Japan (72) and China (82), who also dominate the list of top 10 institutions.
Other Indian institutions which figure in the rankings are Amrita University (169), University of Pune
(176), Amity University (195), Manipal Academy of Higher Education (200) and Anna University (251-300
band). The Indian Institute of Information Technology, Allahabad, Pondicherry University and Andhra Uni-
versity are in the 301st to 350th band. QS had evaluated 920 universities from the Asia region for this year's
rankings.
The good news from the Indian perspective is that most of its institutions have climbed to higher
positions from last year. The IIT-Mumbai has jumped 11 positions while IIT-Delhi has climbed six places
from 42nd rank last year. The IIT-Madras jumped 13 places, IIT-Kanpur 10, IIT-Kharagpur 16, IIT-Roorkee
14 and IIT-Guwahati four places from the last year's rankings.
The IISc, Bangalore, which emerged as the top Indian institution in the QS rankings, was also rated as the best
Indian university in the HRD Ministry's first ever National Institutional Ranking Framework (NIRF) released
earlier this year. According to a statement released by QS rankings, "IISc's success is partly due to its highly
impactful research and it achieved the perfect weightage score for papers per faculty."
This year, the QS rankings also introduced 'Staff with PhD' to analyse teaching quality, the statement said.
Courtesy – www.rediff.com
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2015 Was a Record-Breaking Year for Clean Energy, Global Report Reveals
Of last year‘s many scientific achievements to be proud of, a new global status report on clean energy reveals
that 2015 was a record-breaking year for renewable energy — in fact, renewables could supply nearly a
quarter of the world‘s power needs. The report, put together by the energy policy network REN21, shows how
a spike in clean energy investments drove the largest-ever annual increase in clean-energy-generating
capacity, adding an estimated 147 gigawatts (GW) to the global grid. This figure tells scientists that, by the
end of 2015, renewable energy was able to
power nearly a quarter of the world‘s ener-
gy demand — 23.7 percent to be exact.
Wind and solar energy accounted
for the majority of the growth in renewable
energy investments, raking in about 77% of
new installations, trailed by hydropower,
which accounted for most of the rest.
"What is truly remarkable about these
results is that they were achieved at a time
when fossil fuel prices were at historic lows, and renewables remained at a significant disadvantage in terms
of government subsidies," REN21 executive secretary Christine Lins said in a press statement. "For
every dollar spent boosting renewables, nearly 4 dollars were spent to maintain our dependence on fossil
fuels."
The report reveals that 2015 global investments in clean energy reached $285.9 billion, beating the
previous year‘s $273 billion. The torchbearer behind this growth is China, which accounted for more than one
-third of the global investments in renewable energy, tailed by the US, Japan, the UK, and India.
"As renewables secure record investments year after year, we are seeing that it is local governments,
communities, and citizens who are the real pioneers of this transition to a world powered by 100 percent
renewable energy," senior program manager for climate energy, Anna Leidreiter, from the charity World
Future Council, said in the status report.
"Their support is logical really – renewable energy delivers impact locally and therefore most cities
and communities see a huge benefit in investing in renewable sources to ensure that revenues stay in the
region."
However, in addition to the much-needed investments in the field, it‘s important that countries are
actually employing the energy source. The report investigated which countries were leading in terms of
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overall power capacity sourced from renewables, and found that China took the number one spot again,
followed by the US, Brazil, Germany, and Canada. But the list dramatically changed when the researchers
looked at the capacity of renewable energy power per capita: Denmark was first, trailed by Germany, Sweden,
Spain, and Portugal. Bravo to all 9 countries leading the clean energy race.
Still, despite the fact that the report was generally positive, the researchers warn that we‘ve still got
our work cut out for us. A few notches on the to-do list include addressing policy and political instability, reg-
ulatory barriers, and budgetary constraints.
"The renewables train is barrelling down the tracks, but it's running on 20th century infrastructure – a
system based on outdated thinking where conventional baseload is generated by fossil fuels and nuclear pow-
er," the Chair of REN21, Arthouros Zervos, stated in the release.
"To accelerate the transition to a healthier, more-secure, and climate-safe future, we need to build the
equivalent of a high-speed rail network – a smarter, more flexible system that maximises the use of variable
sources of renewable energy."
Courtesy – www.thescienceexplorer.com
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Scientists from India, Britain to use underwater robots to predict monsoon
Scientists from Britain and India will release underwater robots into the Bay of Bengal in a bid to more
accurately predict the Indian monsoon critical to millions of farmers. Researchers will also fly a plane packed
with scientific equipment over the bay to measure the atmosphere as part of the multi-million pound study of
the monsoon which hit southern India last week.
Better forecasting would improve the
livelihoods of India‘s more than 200 million
farmers and agricultural labourers, who are reeling
from devastating drought. Scientists from the
University of East Anglia (UEA) will release
seven underwater robots from an Indian ship next
week to study how ocean processes influence
monsoon rainfall. At the same time, colleagues
from the University of Reading and climate
experts in India will use instruments on board the
plane flying from the southern city of Bangalore to
measure heat and moisture in the air. The robots,
which have computers onboard and look like miniature yellow submarines, will spend a month moving through
a southern section of the bay, to measure temperature, salinity and currents.
―The Indian monsoon is notoriously hard to predict. It is a very complicated weather system and the
processes are not understood or recorded in science,‖ lead researcher Adrian Matthews said. ―Nobody has ever
made observations on this scale during the monsoon season itself so this is a truly groundbreaking project,‖ he
said.
More than half of India‘s farms lack irrigation for their crops, meaning they depend almost entirely on
the annual rains that fall in intense bursts from June until September. More precise predictions of the monsoon,
that sweeps up from the Indian Ocean which extends into the bay, can also help hundreds of millions better
prepare for droughts and floods. Beamed backed to scientists via satellite signals, the information will be used
to create computer models of the ocean to determine how it affects weather and rainfall over India.
―We should be able to collect an amazing amount of information about how this weather system
develops,‖ researcher Ben Webber told AFP. The eight million-pound collaboration is the latest effort to
understand the monsoon in India where weather scientists have a patchy record of predicting its start time and
intensity.
India suffered its worst drought in decades in 2009 despite the meteorological department‘s predictions
of a normal monsoon. In April, researchers in Germany said they had found a way to more accurately predict
the start of the monsoon based on an analysis of regional weather data. India‘s meteorology office is also
reportedly spending millions of dollars on a new super computer to predict how the monsoon is likely to
develop each year.
Courtesy – tribune.com
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Science Minister Announced India’s Plans to Double Investment for Clean Energy
Union Minister for Science and Technology Harsh Vardhan announced India's plan to double the
investment for its clean energy research over the next five years. This decision would hike India's current
investment from $72 million to $145 million, a government statement said. The minister, who was in San
Francisco, Calif., leading an Indian delegation to the Mission Innovation, also made a formal announcement
on new joint collaborations with the 21 Mission
Innovation Countries, of which the European Union was the
latest partner.
"Mission Innovation is the noblest mission which will
help humanity. This has also touched the heart and soul of our
prime minister (Narendra Modi)," Vardhan said.
Vardhan announced India‘s collaboration with Britain
by setting up a Joint Virtual Clean Energy Center to address the
challenges in solar energy and launching a new Research Track
on Smart Energy Grids and Energy Storage under the India-U.S.
Partnership to Advance Clean Energy Research.
"With super-efficient air conditioners we can reduce the
energy demand from 60 Giga Watts of energy to 40 GW, a saving of over 30 percent. This translates to cost
savings in consumer energy bills of $2.8 billion and GHG reductions of 20 million tons of CO2 equivalent,"
Vardhan said.
Commenting on India's LED lighting program as one of the world's largest, the minister said, ―This
program has seen India lead the way by driving 12 percent of global LED demand at present, up from 0.1
percent a couple of years ago.‖
India has reaffirmed its commitment to pursue a green path to growth as leaders of 20 countries and
the European Union gathered here for the seventh Clean Energy and the inaugural Mission Innovation
Ministerials. At the inaugural Mission Innovation, the 21 partners each pledged to seek a doubling in their
governmental and/or state-directed clean energy research and development investment over five years,
reaching around a combined $30 billion per year by 2021.
The ministers also met with leaders of the Breakthrough Energy Coalition and other leading energy
investors, underscoring the critical link between government innovation and entrepreneurship to bring
affordable clean energy technologies to market.
"I am pleased to note that ministers have endorsed the recommendations made by MI countries and
subgroups will now work together to lead the objective of Mission Innovation," Vardhan said. "I would like
to reaffirm India's commitment to pursue green path to growth through Research Innovation and Joint
Collaboration," he said. A formal announcement on new joint collaborations with Mission Innovation
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Countries was also made by him. India has launched a number of collaborative research and development
efforts to pursue research in solar energy, energy efficiency, advanced biofuels, electrical transmission and
storage with the U.S., the UK, Australia, Norway, South Korea and many other countries.
Vardhan also announced expanding India's collaboration with the UK through setting up of a Joint
Virtual Clean Energy Center to address the challenges to intermitting solar energy and launching a new
Research Track on Smart Energy Grids and Energy Storage under Indo-US PACE-R (Partnership to Advance
Clean Energy-Research).
Vardhan sought contributions of Silicon Valley-based scientists and IT professionals for India's
growth. "We want your positive suggestions, your constructive criticism, your knowledge and experience and
your ‗Vivek‘ (wisdom) to contribute to India's growth," he said in his address to a group of Indian American
professionals at a reception hosted by the Global Indian Technology Professionals Organization in the Silicon
Valley . Sharing his vision of Digital India and the current long-term as well as short-term initiatives and
achievements, the minister mentioned initiatives such as India's Mars Orbiter mission, re-usable Space
Shuttle, support for the Thirty Meter Telescope, National Monsoon forecasting, Desalination, Earthquake
Prediction, Genome Sequencing, vaccine research for Dengue and many others.
"I would like to congratulate you on being so well organized globally. Every time I visit the USA, my
respect for all of you who live here grows because of your ability to come together for India's cause," Vardhan
said in the presence of Vivek Agarwal, a senior bureaucrat from Madhya Pradesh.
Courtesy: – indiawest.com
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Scientists turn CO2 into rock to combat climate change
Scientists have turned carbon dioxide into stone in a matter of months by pumping it deep underground,
offering a revolutionary new way of storing the greenhouse gas to tackle climate change. The pioneering
experiment in Iceland mixed CO emissions with water and pumped it hundreds of metres underground into
volcanic basalt rock — where it rapidly turned
into a solid.
―We need to deal with rising carbon
emissions. This is the ultimate permanent storage
— turn them back to stone,‖ said Juerg Matter,
lead author of the study, which was
published Thursday in the journal Science.
Carbon dioxide is a key factor in global warm-
ing, and experts have long called for innovative
―carbon capture and storage‖ solutions.
Attempt in aquifers
Previous attempts to inject CO into sandstone soils or deep saline aquifers have struggled, as they relied on
capping rocks to hold the gas down — triggering fears it could eventually leak. In contrast, the Carbfix project
at Iceland‘s Hellisheidi plant — the world‘s largest geothermal facility, which powers Reykjavik — sought to
solidify the CO2. The plant produces 40,000 tons of CO a year — just five percent of the emissions of a
similarly sized coal plant, but still significant. In 2012, they began pumping 250 tons of CO mixed with water
underground.
Scientists had feared it could take hundreds or even thousands of years for the mildly acidic liquid to
solidify. But 95 per cent of the injected mixture — which they had tagged with tracer chemicals in order to
check it didn‘t leak out — had became chalky white stone within two years.
―It was a very welcome surprise,‖ said Edda Aradottir, who heads the project for Reykjavik Energy.
Encouraged by the success, the company has scaled up the project and from this summer will be burying some
10,000 tonnes of CO each year, Ms. Aradottir said. ―This means that we can pump down large amounts of CO
and store it in a very safe way over a very short period of time,‖ said study co-author Martin Stute, a
hydrologist at Columbia University‘s Earth Observatory. ―In the future, we could think of using this for power
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plants in places where there‘s a lot of basalt — and there are many such places.‖
―It‘s what we hoped for ... and in some ways better,‖ said David Goldberg, a Columbia University geophysicist
who wasn‘t part of the team but praised it. ―What‘s going on here is a natural process being accelerated.‖
A 2014 report by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change warned that without carbon
sequestration technology, adequately limiting global warming could prove impossible.
On seafloors
Basalt makes up most of the world‘s seafloors and approximately 10 per cent of continental rocks, according to
the study‘s researchers. A porous, blackish rock, basalt is rich in calcium, iron and magnesium, minerals re-
searchers said are needed to solidify carbon for storage.
―Carbon capture is not the silver bullet, but it can contribute significantly to reducing carbon dioxide
emissions,‖ Mr. Matter said.
Courtesy: www.thehindu.com
Ajay V. Bhatt - Inventer USB
Indian-American computer architect who helped
define and develop several widely used technologies,
including USB (Universal Serial Bus), AGP (Accelerated
Graphics Port), PCI Express, Platform Power Management
Architecture and various chipset improvements. Ajay Bhatt rose
to global celebrity as the co-inventor of USB through an Intel
2009 TV advertisement, where he was portrayed by actor Sunil
Narkar.
Born in India on 1957, he completed his graduation from
Maharaja Sayajirao University of Baroda, India. Bhatt received his master‘s degree from The City University
of New York, US. He joined Intel corporation in 1990 as a senior staff architect on the chipset architecture
team in Folsom. He holds 31 U.S. patents, and several others are in various stages of filing. In 1998, 2003 and
2004, Bhatt was nominated to take part in a Distinguished Lecture Series at leading universities in the United
States and Asia. He received an Achievement in Excellence Award for his contribution in PCI Express
specification development in 2002.
Ajay Bhatt was featured in July 2010 issue of GQ India, as one of ―The 50 Most Influential Global
Indians!‖.
KNOW
YOUR H
ERO
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India should be at the top of science pyramid: Noted scientist
The Principal Scientific Advisor to the Union
Government, R Chidambaram, has exhorted the
scientists to work towards development of India and
called for greater cooperation between industry and
academia.
While delivering the convocation address at
J.N. Tata Auditorium at IISc campus on Saturday he
said, ―I have always admired the role of IISc in
advancement of science and technology in India. With
the global IISc alumni link getting stronger, I want India to be at the top of the pyramid in the near future. India
should not just be a developed economy, but also be a knowledge country. Also it is my privilege to give
convocation address at an institute where I pursued my career in BSc and later Phd.‖
Chidambaram said that India needs an excellent environment with good students, high quality faculty,
sound infrastructure, strong academia and international collaborations with best emerging technology to be
successful. This plan is followed by MIT and other prestigious institutions, including IISc, and the students
have to make use of their learning for the development of the country. ―Even if you go abroad for higher
education, come back to India to serve the country. Young generation like you all should always look on the
important problems pertaining to science and society,‖ he said.
He pointed out that in developed countries the industries wait for new knowledge to come out from
institutions and the same should happen in India. Currently we are at the top in some areas, but should maintain
the equilibrium. Interaction between academia and industries should continue to happen. I am extremely happy
that IISc now ranks 18th in the world in terms of number of research works produced, he added.
Anurag Kumar, Director of IISc said that it's hard to get into IISc and hardest to get out as more and
more students are taking up their Phd after their masters degree. Prof T.N. Guru Row, Dean Faculty of Science
told the graduating students to main simplicity like R. Chidambaram and achieve great heights. As many as
593 students were awarded PhD, ME, MTech, MS, MDes and
Management degrees, while additional 120 students were awarded
with Bachelors of Science degree. As many as 56 students, five
from undergraduate and 51 from masters and Phd, received medals
for their outstanding performance.
courtesy: www.deccanchronicle.com
Hello Kiddies, Here is your Answers!!!
1. Refraction
2. Convex
3. Ohms
4. Physicist
5. Contract
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Scientists detect gravitational waves from colliding black holes again
A hundred years after Albert Einstein‘s prediction, gravitational waves from a binary black hole merger were
detected by two US-based Laser Interferometer Gravitational-wave Observatory (LIGO) detectors in
September last year. But that was no fluke, as scientists Wednesday announced that the phenomenon was
spotted a second time on December 26 last year. The LIGO team officially announced the results at a media
conference in the US.
LIGO research is carried out by the LIGO Scientific Collaboration (LSC), a group of more than 1,000
scientists from universities around the United
States and in 14 other countries, including India.
On December 26, 2015, the LIGO detectors at
Hanford in Washington and at Livingston in
Louisiana detected a signal from the coalescence
of two black holes, with masses 14 and eight
times the mass of Sun. They merged into a
single, more massive, rapidly rotating black hole
that is about 21 times the mass of Sun.
The event took place 1.4 billion years
ago, lasted in LIGO‘s frequency band for about a
second, and released about 1 solar mass worth of
energy in that short period. For comparison, only a tiny fraction of the Sun‘s mass gets converted to light in its
entire lifetime, which is enough to keep the earth warm for billions of years, according to an official release
issued by the LIGO scientists.
Compared to the first binary black hole merger event announced in February 2016, however, the
present one is less massive — 65 solar mass versus 21 solar mass. Researchers at the Inter University Centre
for Astronomy and Astrophysics (IUCAA) here in Pune told The Indian Express that these findings show
scientists are in the right path of sensitivity. Prof Tarun Souradeep, senior scientist at IUCAA and one of the
nine key researchers, said detecting gravitational waves will also become routine if LIGO-India is in place.
Dr Somak Roychoudhury, director, IUCAA, said detection of another binary black hole merger,
coming barely two months after the first one was detected, will put an end to scepticism in scientific circles.
―Clearly, this vindicates our stand that black holes are the new tools in gravitational wave astronomy,‖
Roychoudhury said. ―Despite the significance of the detection of gravitational waves in September last year,
there have been endless conversations and discussions on social media that doubted even the existence of
black holes.
―With a third LIGO-India detector to be set up soon, detection of another binary black hole merger puts an
end to any more doubts.‖
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""From the Vedas we learn a
practical art of surgery, medicine,
music, house building under
which mechanized art is included.
They are encyclopedia of every
aspect of life, culture, religion,
science, ethics, law, cosmology
and meteorology."
William James
American Author
Discover
VOLUME 03
ISSUE 03 JUL, 2016
Compiled & Edited By
Prasanth Nair
Reshmy Krishnakumar
Science International Forum, Kuwait
facebook.com/sifkuwait
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Do You Know!!!
1. Groups of lions are known as what?
2. Is a shark a fish or a mammal ?
3. Rabbits are born blind, True or False ?
4. Mice live for up to 10 years, True or False ?
5. What type of animal is the largest primate in the world ?
You have time till next edition