A team of scientists has published a paper recently that looks into how amino acids formed on early Earth to birth complex life.
July 17, 2019The writer is an IAS officer, presently posted as Commissioner of School Education, West Bengal. The views are personal and don't reflect those of the Government.
July 8, 2018For more than two millennia, the physicists have provided materialist explanations for almost everything in our cosmos, including the evolution of life. However, with Quantum Physics affirming the non-material, spiritual underpinning to the physical world and relegating matter to a secondary position, the classical physicists suddenly seem to be struggling. Such books as ‘The Tao …
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May 25, 2018The IISER, in an examination, asked what was wrong with Union minister Satyapal Singh’s argument criticising Charles Darwin’s theory, with the dean of the institute saying that the question was “aimed at testing logical thinking of the students”. Sanjeev Galande, Dean of Research and Development at the IISER said the question was why the quoted …
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February 24, 2018Powerful agencies have started working against the world’s resolve to contain global warming. A belief has grown that the Earth has seen warm times in ages past but the results were not catastrophic. And a theory is about that the tropics, which account for 50 per cent of the surface of the Earth, would absorb …
Continue reading "Silent witnesses of steamy days"
August 23, 2017“Our planet is a lonely speck in the great enveloping cosmic dark. In our obscurity – in all this vastness – there is no hint that help will come from elsewhere to save us from ourselves. It is up to us.” – Carl Sagan Darwin’s explanation of ‘Natural Selection’ demonstrates how heritable traits in species …
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August 17, 2017Australian researchers have unlocked the reason why adults use infant directed speech or baby talk when addressing infants. According to a new study published on Wednesday, the Western Sydney University revealed that mothers unconsciously raise the pitch of their voice as an evolutionary trait in order to comfort their babies and make themselves appear friendlier, …
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August 2, 2017Australian researchers have unlocked the reason why adults use infant directed speech or baby talk when addressing infants. According to a new study published on Wednesday, the Western Sydney University revealed that mothers unconsciously raise the pitch of their voice as an evolutionary trait in order to comfort their babies and make themselves appear friendlier, …
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August 2, 2017At least 75 per cent of human genome is junk DNA, or useless but harmless DNA, suggests a new research. The functional portion of the human genome probably falls between 10 and 15 per cent, with an upper limit of 25 per cent, according to the study published online in the journal Genome Biology and …
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July 16, 2017Title: How the Zebra Got its Stripes And Other Darwinian Just So Stories Author: Leo Grasset (translated by Barbara Mellor) Publisher: Profile Books/Hachette India Pages: 162 Price: Rs 499 It was birthplace of the human race but that is not the only contribution of Africa to life on our planet. On its sprawling savannah can …
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December 22, 2016Some high-risk gene variants, such as those for Alzheimer’s disease or cancer, can persist in the population for a long time without disappearing and researchers have now discovered why these harmful gene variants do not get weeded out by natural section in the course of evolution. The same process responsible for helping us fend off …
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September 4, 2016