chakravarthy

An inscription slab dating back to 1518 AD, from the time of the Vijayanagara emperor Sri Krishnadeva Raya was found lying upside down on a street in Tadigadapa, a village on the outskirts of Vijayawada. Based on the information provided by the villagers, archaeologist-cum-epigraphist and Cultural Centre of Vijayawada and Amaravati (CCVA) Chief Executive Officer Dr. E. Sivanagi Reddy rushed to the spot and dug out the slab with the help of the locals. After careful examination, Dr. Reddy said the inscription was issued by Rayasam Kondamarusayya, a military general of the Kondapallii Kingdom to Sri Krishnadeva Raya, who had seized the fort from the Gajapathis of Odisha in 1516 AD. The inscription records the digging of a well by Kondamarusayya to provide a source of drinking water to the village in order to acquire merit for his mother Sangoyamma. The slab was once affixed to a wall in the Venugopala Swamy temple. Inview of its historical and archaeological importance, Dr. Reddy appea...

(1). HOW HIGH-CALORIE DESSERTS CAN LEAD TO HEALTHIER MEALS ? Do red velvet cheesecake, French fries or fish fries entice you but you refrain from eating those owing to the high-calories they contain? Take heart. Choosing these high-calorie options first could help you opt for a helathier meal later, says new research. The study showed choosing indulgent dessert first may lead you to eat lower-calorie meals later. "Diners who chose the indulgent dessert as their first dish, followed by a healthier main and side dish to make up for their high-calorie dessert. Diners who picked the healthier dessert may have thought they already had done a good deed for their bodies so they deserved higher-calorie food further down the cafeteria line", said Martin Reimann, Assistant Professor at the University of Arizona in the US. For the study, researchers included 134 diners aged between 18 and 60 with an average age of 32. They placed either a healthy or a less healthy main and side dish...

The human family tree has acquired a new branch with the unearthing of a previously unknown species of human that lived on an island in today's Philippines some 50,000 years ago. The species, dubbed Homo Luzonensis after the island of Luzon where its remains were found, is not a direct ancestor of modern day humans, but rather a distant ancient relative. But the discovery, published in 'Nature' adds to a growing body of evidence that human evolution is not as linear as was once thought. It also raises questions, including how the species arrived on the island and who its ancestors were. The 'remarkable discovery...will no doubt ignite plenty of scientific debate', said Matthew Tocheri, Professor of Anthropology at Canada's Lakehead University. Researchers from France, the Philippines and Australia found the remains in Callo Cave, where a bone dating back 67,000 years was discovered in 2007. It was not initially clear which type of early human that bone came fr...

Scientist Katherine Bouman has become one of the world's most popular people after helping create the first ever picture of a black hole. The researcher was one of a team made up of a huge number of experts who helped create the image, which shows the blazing red and yellow of the event horizon that surrounds the first black hole ever to be seen. And one image in particular of Bouman doing part of that work - using an algorithm she wrote to generate the image that made headlines around the world - has served as a reminder of the vast amount of expertise that has gone into creating such an achievement. The picture she posted to Facebook showed her sitting in front of a computer as the famous photograph was assembled. "Watching in disbelief as the first image I ever made of a black hole was in the process of being reconstructed", she wrote alongside the picture. Despite her role in taking the picture, Bouman is not actually an astronomer. Instead, her expertise is in comp...

Fertility doctors say a 'three-person baby' has been born in Greece, using genetic material from two women and a man. The technique was reportedly used to overcome 32-year-old Greek woman's infertility - she had tried IVF treatment four times without success. The medical team in Barcelona used a technique called 'maternal spindle transfer', in which maternal DNA is put into the egg of a donor woman, which is then fertilised using the father's sperm. The procedure was developed to help existing IVF treatments in which mothers have mitochondrial diseases. The baby was born on 09th April, 2019 (Tuesday) and weighed 2.9 kgs. The mother is also well. But the technique remains controversial and some doctors have questioned the ethics of the procedure. A Spanish company called Embryotools collaborated with fertility specialists at a clinic in Athens called the Institute of Life. Variations of the technique have been used before in Mexico, Ukraine, sparking controvers...

Doctors in Hyderabad have expressed concern over a recent study that shows out of three healthy Indians are antibiotic resistant. They say it is a serious public health problem as some bacteria that are capable of causing serious disease are becoming resistant to commonly available antibiotics, which means that treating infections in people is becoming a much harder process. The study published by ' The Indian Council of Medical Research'  (ICMR) analysed 207 healthy individuals, of which 139 were found resistant to one or more classes of antibiotics. Doctors explain why the results are such a huge cause for concern.  Worrying Results : Speaking of his personal experience with patients, Dr. J. Anish Anand, Consultant, Internal Medicine at Apollo Hospitals, Jubilee Hills says it has become very common to see blood and urine culture reports with antibiotic resistance to at least one antibiotic. "The bacteria which used to previously respond to a simple antibiotic is now ...

Americans are among the most stressed people  in the world, according to a new survey. And that is just the start of it. Last year (2018), Americans reported feeling stress, anger and worry at the the highest levels in a decade, according to the survey, part of an annual Gallup poll of more than 1,50,000 people around the world, released on 25th April, 2019 (Thursday). "What really stood out for the US is the increase in the negative experiences", said Julie Ray, Gallup's managing editor for world news. For the annual poll, started in 2005, Gallup asks individuals about whether they have experienced a handful of positive feelings the day before being interviewed. The data on Americans is based on responses from more than 100 adults. In the US, about 55% of adults said they had experienced stress during 'a lot of the day' prior, compared with just 35% globally. Statistically, that put the country on par with Greece, which had led the rankings on stress since 2012...

[ Courtesy: Anita Anand, a BBC journalist based in London and author of 'The Patient Assassin, a story of Massacre, Raj and Revenge'. The article was published in 'The Times of India' dated 14th April, 2019 (Sunday) ]. Born in Britain, of proud Punjabi heritage, I have learned to live with a degree of cognitive dissonance. At school, my classmates knew Bananarama and I knew Bhosle. Holiday picnics involved sand-peppered choley and bhature; white friends had sandwiches. In a Proustian way, and English seaside will always smell of vinegary chips and channa masala to me. I loved history at school and was good at it. I could still bore you to death with the details of a Roman hypocaust system. Yet at my desk, in what was once the epicentre of the British Empire, what I learned of the Raj was misty, slight and sepia-tinted. Robert Clive and Henry Hardinge wafted past on drifts of nostalgia. The contribution of Indian soldiers during World War I and II was mentioned in pa...

The Prime Minister kept all options open except for that of banning the book, which he considered to be 'of very doubtful legality'. In September 1956, the reprinting of a book first published in the United States in 1942, titled Living Biographies of Religious Leaders, written by Henry and Dana Lee Thomas, led to agitation and communal violence in Uttar Pradesh, Madhya Pradesh (then Vindhya Pradesh) and West Bengal. The book, comprising short biographies of Moses, Luke, Joseph, Buddha, Prophet Muhammad and Gandhi, was not noticed in India in the years after the publication of its American edition. It was noticed only when printed in India as part of a collaboration agreement in 1955 between the original publisher and the Bombay-based Bharatiya Vidya Bhawan (BVB) specialising in low-price editions. The book carried a foreword by K.M. Munshi, then the Governor of Uttar Pradesh. The agitation over the book, followed by riots that erupted when rumour spread that the Gita had be...

Several observers believe that the Mahatma's assassination put back the Hindu political movement by around 40 years. It upset the people so much that they took political refuge in Nehruvian concepts . There can be not two opinions that Mahatma Gandhi should not have been assassinated. Earlier he had declared that he would not allow India to be partitioned. Even then, if it happened, he said it would be over his dead body. On 03rd June, 1947, when Viceroy Mountbatten announced the inevitability of Partition at the Viceregal Lodge, it was meekly accepted by all the leaders present. Gandhi also was equally unprotesting in his acceptance. In due course, how the assets of undivided India were to be divided were also announced. The finances also had to be shared and Pakistan was to get from New Delhi Rs. 55 crore. On 14th and 15th August, 1947, the vivisection of the country took place. Most assets as well as personnel went the way they were allocated. People unfortunately underwent un...