A farmer using a mobile phone while resting in the back of a tractor trolley on a blocked highway during a protest against new farm laws, at Singhu Border (Delhi-Haryana) in New Delhi, India. Image by Raj K Raj/Hindustan Times via Getty Images On January 26, Nidhi Suresh of Newslaundry travelled with farmers from the Singhu border to Red Fort but could not send any information back to her newsroom. The same day, Asmita Nandy of The Quint could not look up the speeches that protestors at the Singhu border kept referring to. On January 27, independent journalist Saahil Murli…
Author: Loknath Das
Video gamers are helping researchers discover methods to design RNA structures. The authors of a study published in PLOS Computational Biology on June 27 analyzed 1.8 million moves by players in a RNA design game. The players are given a target RNA structure and asked to change the RNA sequence to try to match the target. The developers of the game report that approaches based on those choices can be used to create algorithms for a computer to construct RNA. R.V. Koodli et al., “EternaBrain: Automated RNA design through move sets and strategies from an Internet-scale RNA videogame,” PLOS Comput Biol, doi:10.1371/journal.pcbi.1007059, 2019.…
1. Newspaper article Carey, B. (2019, March 22). Can we get better at forgetting? Harlan, C. (2013, April 2). North Korea vows to restart shuttered nuclear reactor that can make bomb-grade plutonium. The Washington Post, A1, A4. Stobbe, M. (2020, January 8). Cancer death rate in U.S. sees largest one-year drop ever. Chicago Tribune. Parenthetical citations: (Carey, 2019; Harlan, 2013; Stobbe, 2020) Narrative citations: Carey (2019), Harlan (2013), and Stobbe (2020) In the source element of the reference, provide at minimum the title of the newspaper in italic title case. If the newspaper article is from an online newspaper that has a…
When Chandrabhan Kushwaha, who runs a small chocolate-biscuit shop in the Hatta tehsil headquarters of Damoh district in Madhya Pradesh, got infected with COVID-19 during the deadly second wave, little did he know that it would devastate his entire family. Chandrabhan succumbed to the virus within a few months, leaving his two kids orphaned. His wife, Rekha, had passed away a few years ago. Their father’s demise meant that Akruthi*, who is studying in class 12 and Santhosh*, studying in class 10th, not only had to halt their education but also find a means to provide for themselves. This harsh…
There are lots of celestial events to look out for this December, from Venus being at its brightest to the arrival of the Full Cold Moon on December 18. One phenomenon that has astronomers extra excited? Peaking on the night of December 13—on this coming Monday, until Tuesday at sunrise—one of the most active meteor showers of 2021 will take place in the form of the Geminids. Farmers’ Almanac reports that, with a clear sky, “free of moonlight, you can easily spot 50 or more meteors per hour. On an optimum night for the Geminids, it may even be possible…
Nicolai tangen brings an unusual set of skills to the task of leading the world’s largest sovereign-wealth fund. In addition to a career in finance, the head of Norges Bank Investment Management (nbim), which oversees Norway’s oil fund of $1.4trn, holds degrees in art history, economics and social psychology. Mr Tangen’s public profile and his musings on leadership, decision-making and cross-disciplinary learning have been admired by many Norwegians in his first year on the job. But the task of running Norway’s gargantuan piggy-bank is likely to become only more difficult in coming years. Enjoy more audio and podcasts on iOS or Android. A fraught appointment…
Amazon has announced AWS IoT FleetWise at its re:Invent conference, a service that aims to make fleet management simpler and more cost-effective. “Today’s connected cars are already data centres on wheels, each generating GBs of data per hour,” explains Mike Tzamaloukas, GM IoT Automotive, AWS. Automakers can use IoT FleetWise service to manage this vast amount of vehicle data in the cloud in near real-time. Intelligent filters can be applied to reduce network traffic and increase efficiency by selecting only relevant data to transfer based on parameters such as weather conditions, location, or vehicle type. Once the data is in the cloud, automakers can…
Many businesses effectively use social media to promote their products and connect with customers. However, social media can also pose a risk to companies. Not only can social media use interfere with productivity, but information shared on social networks can do real damage both to co-worker relationships as well as your brand. Time Management Most of your employees have social media accounts. Unfortunately, many have developed the habit of checking their accounts multiple times during the day, even when they are at work. Time spent on personal accounts is time that is not spent on work tasks. Even when an…
Misinformation such as the statements above and many more like these have been spread around the country repeatedly, leading India to become the biggest source of COVID-19 misinformation, as per a study published in Sage’s International Federation of Library Associations and Institutions journal. What study? The study, ‘Prevalence and Source Analysis of COVID-19 Misinformation in 138 Countries’ analysed 9,657 pieces of misinformation that originated in 138 countries. They were fact-checked by 94 organisations to understand the prevalence and sources of misinformation in different countries. The study revealed that with 18.07 percent, India produced the largest amount of social media misinformation. The study also…
False Information v Fake News Experts now recommend avoiding the term ‘fake news’, or at least limit its use, as the term ‘fake news’ is closely associated with politics, and this association can unhelpfully narrow the focus of the issue. The term ‘false information’ is preferable as it can refer to a diverse range of disinformation covering topics such as health, environmental and economics across all platforms and genres, while ‘fake news’ is more narrowly understood as political news stories. What is False Information? Lots of things you read online especially in your social media feeds may appear to be…