Science

A robot “chef” is being trained by Cambridge University researchers to taste food and determine if it is adequately seasoned while cooking it just like a human. The robot is being trained to even develop the ability to alter the flavour of the food, based on the preferences of the user. So, does this mean

Boeing’s Starliner capsule is finally ready to reattempt a key test launch to the International Space Station on May 19, officials said Tuesday. The uncrewed flight, named OFT-2, is a vital step towards certifying the spaceship for eventually carrying passengers, giving NASA a second taxi provider alongside SpaceX. Aerospace giant Boeing, which was awarded a

Black holes are intriguing and mysterious objects. They are dreaded, too, because their gravitational pull is so strong that they do not allow anything to pass through them, not even light, except on the rare occasions when they feed. When a black hole pulls in gas and dust from an orbiting star, it sends out

NASA’s Ingenuity helicopter, the first probe to ever fly on another planet, has captured images of the landing gear that helped it and its companion, the Perseverance rover, land on Mars in February 2021. NASA has shared the images, saying the copter snapped at the wreckage during its 26th flight on the Red Planet. The

Infectious diseases such as malaria remain a leading cause of death in many regions. This is partly because people there don’t have access to medical diagnostic tools that can detect these diseases (along with a range of non-infectious diseases) at an early stage, when there is more scope for treatment. It’s a challenge scientists have

The United Arab Emirates has purchased a seat on a SpaceX rocket for an Emirati astronaut to journey to the International Space Station for a six-month stay, officials said Friday, the oil-rich federation’s first long-term mission as it advances its ambitions in space. The UAE purchased the seat on the SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket through

Since he closed the deal to buy Twitter a few days ago, billionaire entrepreneur Elon Musk appears to have been bombarded with requests to fix other products of public use. Though he must be enjoying the attention, he also appears to be frustrated by these requests. The Tesla founder has a reputation of making startling

India’s newest space PSU NSIL’s first demand-driven communication satellite for Tata Sky will be launched by Arianespace on June 22, the France-based satellite launch service providers said. The Ku-Band four-tonne GSAT-24, developed by the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) for NewSpace India Limited (NSIL), will provide high-quality television, telecommunications, and broadcasting services over India. “The

Days after a SpaceX Dragon capsule crewed by wealthy adventurers splashed down off Florida’s coast, another launched Wednesday, this time for a NASA mission to the International Space Station. The Crew-4 mission blasted off from the Kennedy Space Center at 3:52 am (0752 GMT, or 1:22pm IST), carrying Americans Kjell Lindgren, Bob Hines and Jessica

Three days before Elon Musk agreed to buy Twitter, the world’s richest man tweeted a photo of Bill Gates and used a crude sexual term to make fun of his belly. Playful, aggressive and often juvenile, Musk’s past tweets show how he has used social media to craft his public image as a brash billionaire

In its more than 30 years of service, NASA’s Hubble Space Telescope has made over 1.3 million observations of intriguing cosmic events and bodies. It once captured a pair of gravitationally interacting galaxies called Arp 147, using its prime working camera – the Wide Field Planetary Camera 2 (WFPC2). The “Hubble Classic” image has been

Elon Musk’s rocket company SpaceX was due to launch the next long-duration astronaut crew to the International Space Station (ISS) for NASA early on Wednesday, including a medical doctor turned spacewalker and a geologist specializing in Martian landslides. The SpaceX launch vehicle, consisting of a two-stage Falcon 9 rocket topped with a Crew Dragon capsule

With its proton beams, the newly enhanced Large Hadron Collider (LHC) set a new world record. The LHC, which is housed at CERN near Geneva, Switzerland, reopened on April 22 after a planned three-year sabbatical during which the facility was upgraded. These improvements are already being put to the test, and the LHC has already

Jeff Bezos has asked in a post on Twitter if Elon Musk’s $44 billion cash deal to buy Twitter gives China “a bit of leverage over the town square”. The purchase of Twitter by Elon Musk has generated a debate about whether the deal is good for the social media network. In many countries, Twitter

Three wealthy businessmen and a former NASA astronaut splashed down Monday off the Florida coast after spending more than two weeks aboard the International Space Station, in a landmark mission for the commercial sector. After a dizzying descent, a SpaceX Dragon capsule carrying the Axiom-1 gently floated down to the Atlantic Ocean near Jacksonville at

Elon Musk clinched a deal to buy Twitter for $44 billion on Monday in a transaction that will shift control of the social media platform populated by millions of users and global leaders to the world’s richest person. Discussions over the deal, which last week appeared uncertain, accelerated over the weekend after Musk wooed Twitter

Ever wondered how the Earth and the Moon would appear when seen from a Martian orbit? NASA has shared an image that showed them together in a single frame. The image was caught by NASA’s Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO) when the Earth was 142 million kilometres from Mars. In the image, only the visible parts

A seismometer placed by NASA’s InSight lander on Mars has detected the two biggest marsquakes to date. According to a new study, the seismic events were of magnitude 4.2 and magnitude 4.1. Both these quakes were five times stronger than the previous largest seismic event recorded.  Researchers now hope to learn more about the interior

Since Pluto – the dwarf planet – was discovered in 1930, it has generated considerable interest among astronomers, primarily over its highly eccentric and inclined orbit. New research claims that it is also subject to chaotic perturbance and changes over shorter timescales. At larger timescales, the orbit appears relatively stable. What it really means is

The Large Hadron Collider restarted Friday after a three-year break for upgrades that will allow it to smash protons together at even greater speeds, in the hope of making new ground-breaking discoveries. It will further study the Higgs boson, the existence of which it proved in 2012, and put the Standard Model of particle physics