Kiev, Sep 15 (IANS) Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky was involved in a car accident, his spokesman said on Thursday, adding that he was not seriously injured.
In a brief social media post, the President’s spokesman Serhii Nykyforov said that a passenger car collided with Zelensky’s vehicle and his escort in capital Kiev.
Nykyforov said that the driver of the car that collided with the motorcade was provided with “emergency aid and transferred him to an ambulance”
“The President was examined by a doctor, no serious injuries were found,” the spokesman said, adding that law enforcement officials will “find out all the circumstances of the accident”.
Nykyforov, however, did not provide any other details of the accident, including the day.
The development comes after Zelensky visit the recaptured city of Izyum, a key logistics hub in north-eastern Ukraine, on Wednesday, the BBC reported.
During his visit, he thanked troops who took part in a swift counter-attack against Russian occupiers, and oversaw a flag-raising ceremony.
Harare, Sep 15 (IANS) Amid an ongoing drought, the Zimbabwe National Parks and Wildlife Management Authority (ZimParks) said it has relocated 100 elephants since July and a significant number of other wild animals from the arid southern parts of the country to the north where there is better vegetation and water.
ZimParks spokesperson Tinashe Farawo told Xinhua news agency on Wednesday that the Authority issued permits for the transfer of 2,650 animals from the Save Valley Conservancy to three national parks in the north namely Tsapi, Chizarira and Matusadonha.
The animals targeted for relocation include 400 elephants, 2,000 impalas, 70 giraffes, 50 zebras, 50 buffaloes, 50 elands, 10 lions and 10 wild dogs.
The relocation exercise began in July and so far, 100 elephants and a “significant number of other wild animals” had been relocated, he said.
He said the main reason for relocation was to depopulate overcrowded areas and create a balance in the ecosystem.
Climate change induced-drought resulting in loss of habitat, food, and water was posing a risk to the animals and the only way to protect the habitat was to make sure that we create a balance by relieving pressure on overcrowded areas, Farawo said.
Zimbabwe has become prone to frequent droughts in recent years due to climate change, posing the risk of hunger not only to humans but also to wild animals.
The country has an overpopulation of elephants numbering over 100,000 against an ecological carrying capacity of 45,000.
The jumbos are located in four main ecological zones, and two of the zones are overpopulated.
An elephant herd is spotted near nyamandhlovu pan, a popular water-hole in the Hwange National Park, Matabeleland North Province, Zimbabwe
The four zones are North West Matabeleland where the country’s biggest game park Hwange is located; South East Lowveld, home to the second biggest park Gonarezhou; as well as the Sebungwe region and mid Zambezi in the northern part of the country.
This is not the first time that ZimParks has moved the animals.
Lions
In 2018, it moved 100 elephants from the South East Lowveld to mid Zambezi while plans to relocate 600 elephants in 2020 were affected by the Covid-19 pandemic.
The relocation program is an expensive exercise and ZimParks has in the past lamented inadequate funds to successfully carry out the program.
Following the demise of Queen Elizabeth II, a 56-year-old man by name Simon Dorante-Day has made it to headlines in the British press again renewing his claim to be the secret love-child of Prince Charles III and Camilla, and seeking the new King to join a paternity test.
Since he is elder to natural heir-apparent Prince Williams to the British throne after Charles III, the case may become significant and upset the established norms of the ascent to the Crown.
Citing decades of research, Dorante-Day revealed details of his DNA paternity case, when he appeared in TV channel 7NEWS to share updates about his next move to knock at the doors of a court demanding the King’s participation in paternity test.
Simon Dorante-Day
“There has been a discussion in there between a judge and myself and his barrister about the legal standing of Charles, and whether the monarch is protected by the law or is above the law,” Dorante-Day told YNews. “And the answer to that was no – they told me that we don’t see any reason why he is. And secondly, Camilla and her family are certainly not above the law. So that argument’s already been had and settled,” he noted.
Irrespective of Charles III being the new King of the United Kingdom, he insists that his case remains valid. “It makes no difference to me whether that mountain in front of me is male or female. It makes no difference to me how high that mountain is,” said Dorante-Day.
He claimed that his letter earlier this year to Queen Elizabeth II did not get any response.
Right-handed batter Robin Uthappa on Wednesday announced his retirement from all forms of Indian cricket.
The 2007 T20 World Cup-winning batter, who last played for India in 2015, took to Twitter to announce his decision.
“It’s been 20 years since I started playing professional cricket, and it has been the greatest honour to represent my country and state, Karnataka- wonderful journey of ups and downs; one that has been fulfilling, rewarding, enjoyable and has allowed me to grow as a human being. However, all good things must come to an end and with a grateful heart I have decided to retire from all forms of Indian cricket. While I will spend a significant time with my young family, I look forward to charting a new phase in life,” he wrote in his farewell note.
Indian cricketer Robin Uthappa
He also thanked all the IPL teams he has played so far. In the Indian Premier League, he played for Chennai Super Kings last season. He also appeared for Mumbai Indians, Royal Challengers Bangalore, Pune Warriors India, Rajasthan Royals and Kolkata Knight Riders in the 14 years of IPL.
In domestic cricket, he represented Karnataka, Saurashtra and Kerala, respectively.
New Delhi, Sep 14 (IANS) Former Indian tennis player and Davis Cup captain Naresh Kumar, who was a mentor to Olympic medallist Leander Paes, passed away in Kolkata on Wednesday.
He was 93. He is survived by his wife Sunita, son Arjun, and two daughters — Gita and Preah.
All India Tennis Association (AITA) condoled the demise of Indian tennis legend, calling it an irreparable loss
“We have come to know about the sad demise of Indian Tennis Legend and former Davis Cup Captain Naresh Kumar. It’s an irreparable loss to Indian Tennis. We pray for his eternal peace and our deepest condolences to his family, friends and fans around the world,” said AITA in a tweet.
Indian tennis great Naresh Kumar passes away. He was 93.
Kumar rose to prominence in 1949, making the latter stages of the Indian International championships and Northern Championships. He made his debut for India in the Davis Cup in 1952 and was a mainstay of the team.
Playing in the days before the Open Era, where only amateurs were allowed, Naresh’s best performance at Wimbledon came in 1955 when he made the fourth round in the men’s singles. In the men’s doubles, Naresh Kumar thrice made the quarter-finals – in 1953 with Narendra Nath and in 1955 and 1958 with Ramanathan Krishnan.
Kumar retired in 1969 with five titles to his name and later turned his attention to coaching and non-playing roles in tennis, such as writing and commentary. He was the non-playing captain of the Indian Davis Cup team in 1990, when Leander Paes made his debut in the tournament.
The legendary player was conferred with the Dronacharya Lifetime Achievement award by the Indian government in 2020, becoming the first tennis coach to receive the honour.
FBI Art Crime Team agents recently returned several pieces of historical artwork back to their rightful owners—the Italian government, with few more returnable items to follow next.
Special Agent Allen Grove of the FBI Art Crime Team undertook the task of returning priceless artifacts—ones that may have been lost for as long as 100 years—back to their rightful home in Rome.
“I thought I’d be investigating art crime and repatriating antiquities. But so much of the work behind the scenes is communications, contracts, and getting the right items to the right people,” Grove said.
In late 2020, an art attorney reached out to FBI Art Crime Team Special Agent Elizabeth Rivas about an anonymous client who had a mosaic of the mythological figure Medusa. The enormous work had been cut into 16 pieces and stored in individual pallets in a Los Angeles storage facility since the 1980s. Each pallet weighed between 75 and 200 pounds.
Some of the pallets were termite-infested, but the pieces of the mosaic were largely intact thanks to the climate-controlled facility they’d been kept in. The client had no documentation—known in the art world as provenance—so they could not sell the pieces as it’s illegal.
Mosaic Piece in Shipping Pallett
A piece of an ancient Roman mosaic, in storage for decades, was found, carefully packed in shipping containers and shipped via diplomatic channels.
When a local art expert said the mosaic was likely of North African or Italian heritage. So Rivas started with the FBI’s liaison in Italy.
A few months later, the FBI’s Italian counterpart, the Carabinieri, whose art squad frequently works with the FBI’s art crime investigators, confirmed the mosaic was Italian. It had been entered into cultural property records in 1909.
The mosaic is believed to be about 2,000 years old and is a key part of Rome’s history. The only modern record of the mosaic’s existence was a 1959 newspaper ad that appeared to show it for sale in the Los Angeles area.
Ad for sale in 1959
“We worked with the owner and made sure we documented the condition and had everything we needed to ship it back to Italy,” Grove said. “We then worked with the Italian consulate here in Los Angeles. This is something of great interest to Italy; they came and inspected the mosaic and helped us facilitate the logistics of actually getting it back to Italy.”
The art arrived safely in April, and experts are now working to clean and restore it so the art can be enjoyed by generations to come.
“The mosaic was handcrafted from an age where people put an amazing amount of care and effort into it. It really speaks to the ingenuity and creativity of the time,” Grove said. “It’s not meant to be in Los Angeles. The mosaic belongs to the people of Rome. It allows us to understand a bit about the history of humans 2,000 years ago.”
Earlier returned two paintings
Prior to this, the FBI New York Art Crime Team returned two stolen paintings, dating back to the 1820’s, to the Historic Huguenot Street in New Paltz, NY after the works were stolen five decades ago.
The team reached out to members of the Art Crime Team in 2021 when they discovered the painting had been listed for sale at an auction. Investigators tracked down the buyer, who did not know the paintings had been stolen, and they assisted the FBI in returning the art to HHS.
Ammi Phillips, a famed 19th century portrait painter, created these art works / FBI
In December 1971, a woman named Marie Wiersum donated the works to what was then known as Huguenot Historical Society. The paintings depict Derrick Wynkoop and his wife Ann Eltinge, a wealthy married couple who were decedents of the first Dutch settlers in the area.
Both were oil on canvas created by Ammi Phillips, a famed 19th century portrait painter. In February 1972, the paintings were stolen from HHS, along with several other items. Members of the Society were able to track down many of the pieces by March 1972, but never recovered the paintings.
Through the course of their investigation, FBI agents discovered police made an arrest in the theft. However, no public documentation of the paintings showed up until the auction house listed them for sale in 2005. Agents attended the paintings on June 2, 2022.
New Delhi, (IANS): The Padma awards, namely Padma Vibhushan, Padma Bhushan and Padma Shri, are among the highest civilian awards of the country.
Instituted in 1954, these awards are announced on the occasion of Republic Day every year.
The award is given for distinguished and exceptional achievements or service in all fields or disciplines such as Art, Literature and Education, Sports, Medicine, Social Work, Science and Engineering, Public Affairs, Civil Service, Trade and Industry etc.
All persons without distinction of race, occupation, position or sex are eligible for these awards. Government servants, including those working with PSUs, except doctors and scientists, are not eligible for the Padma awards.
Padma awards
Online nominations/recommendations for the Padma Awards 2023 to be announced on the occasion of Republic Day, 2023 have opened on 1st May, 2022. The last date for nominations for Padma Awards is 15th September, 2022. The nominations/recommendations for Padma Awards will be received online only on the Rashtriya Puruskar Portal (https://awards.gov.in).
The Prime Minister, Narendra Modi has met the King of Bhutan, Jigme Khesar Namgyel Wangchuck in New Delhi today.
Both the dignitaries have discussed the various ideas to further strengthen the close and unique India-Bhutan friendship. Shri Modi has also conveyed his appreciation for the guiding vision provided by successive Druk Gyalpos in shaping relations between India and Bhutan.”
“Had a warm meeting with His Majesty the King of Bhutan. Discussed various ideas to further strengthen the close and unique India-Bhutan friendship. Conveyed my appreciation for the guiding vision provided by successive Druk Gyalpos in shaping our relations.”
PM meets King of Bhutan, Jigme Khesar Namgyel Wangchuck
The Union Cabinet chaired by the Prime Minister Narendra Modi has approved the Signing of Guarantees for hosting Federation Internationale de Football Association (FIFA) Under 17 Women’s World Cup 2022 in India.
FIFA U-17 Women’s World Cup 2022 is scheduled to be held in India between 11th and 30th October 2022. The seventh edition of the biennial youth tournament will be the first-ever FIFA women’s competition to be hosted by India. Carrying on the positive legacy from the FIFA Under-17 Men’s World Cup 2017, the nation is preparing for a seminal moment for women’s football when the best young female footballers from across the world will be showcasing their skills to lift the coveted trophy.
Financial outlay:
Financial outlay of Rs. 10 crore assistance to All India Football Federation (AIFF) for Field of play Maintenance, Stadium power, Energy & Cabling, Stadia & Training Site Branding etc. will be met from the budgetary allocation for the Scheme of Assistance to National Sports Federations (NSFs).
Bhubaneswar: U-17 Women’s football team pose with the FIFA U17 Women’s World Cup trophy at Kalinga Stadium in Bhubaneswar on Saturday, September 10, 2022
Objectives of the Scheme:
The FIFA U-17 Women’s World Cup India 2022 has potential to strengthen women’s football in the country.
Carrying on the positive legacy from the FIFA Under 17 Men’s World Cup 2017, the nation is preparing for a seminal moment for women’s football when the best young female footballers from across the world will be showcasing their skills to lift the coveted trophy. Following objectives have been contemplated in order to leave behind a positive legacy:
increase representation of women in football leadership and decision-making bodies
inspire more girls to play football in India
advocate for gender-inclusive participation by normalising the concept of equal game from a young age
opportunity to improve football standards for women in India
improve the commercial value of the women’s game.
Football
Justification:
The FIFA Under-17 Women’s World Cup is a prestigious event and would be held for the first time in India. It would encourage more youngsters to participate in sports and help develop the sport of football in India. The event will not only promote football as sport of choice among Indian girls, but is also poised to leave a lasting legacy that will facilitate girls and women in the country to embrace football and sports in general.
Background:
The FIFA U-17 Women’s World Cup is the world championship for female players under or upto the age of 17, organized by FIFA. The event started in 2008 and is traditionally held in even-numbered years. The 6th edition of the event was held in Uruguay from 13th November to 1st December, 2018. Spain is the current champion of FIFA Under-17 Women’s World Cup. FIFA U-17 Women’s World Cup India 2022 will be the 7th edition of the tournament in which 16 teams, including India, will participate. The AIFF has proposed holding of the competition matches in 3 venues namely; (a) Bhubaneshwar; (b) Navi Mumbai and (c) Goa. India successfully hosted the FIFA Under-17 Men’s World Cup India-2017 at 6 different venues namely New Delhi, Guwahati, Mumbai, Goa, Kochi and Kolkata in the country from 6th to 28th October, 2017.
New Delhi, Sep 14 (IANS) An Air India Express flight B737 IX-442 MCT-COK (Muscat-Cochin) VT-AXZ witnessed smoke and fire in its engine number two at Muscat airport on Wednesday.
The plane was carrying 145 passengers, including four infants, the officials said, adding that all of them were safe and no injuries have been reported.
“A DGCA official said that during taxiing for takeoff, the engine number two experienced smoke and fire. Appropriate Checklist was completed after the incident. Slides were deployed and all passengers and Crew were evacuated on taxiway and all of them were safe and no injuries reported,” said the official, adding that passengers have been transported to the terminal building.
Air India express flight
As per local reports, there was scare among the passengers after the smoke was detected in the engine of the plane.
The official said that another relief flight will be organised for the passengers. The aircraft was currently parked on the taxiway and further probe was on.
Hyderabad, Sep 14 (IANS) A CBI court here on Wednesday sentenced former Member of Parliament from Andhra Pradesh, Kothapalli Geetha, her husband P. Ramakoteshwara Rao and two bank officials to five years imprisonment in a bank fraud case.
Geetha, a former member of Lok Sabha from Araku, and others were arrested and shifted to Chanchalguda Central Jail.
Sentencing them for cheating the Punjab National Bank to the tune of Rs 42.9 crore, the court also imposed a fine of Rs 1 lakh each on Geetha and her husband.
The former MP was charged with cheating the bank by submitting false documents to obtain loan for Visweswara Infrastructure Pvt Ltd (VIPL).
Arrested
Ramakoteshwara Rao is Managing Director of the company. The company also diverted the loan for purposes other than it was sanctioned for.
The CBI had filed the charge sheet against them in 2015.
The others convicted and sentenced are B.K. Jayaprakasam, then branch manager of Mid Corporate Branch of PNB, and K.K. Aravindakshan, then general manager, PNB head office.
Geetha was elected to Lok Sabha from Araku in 2014 on the ticket of YSR Congress Party (YSRCP). In 2018, she floated political party Jana Jagruti.
She later joined the BJP and merged her party with it.
New Delhi, Sep 14 (IANS) President Droupadi Murmu will represent India at the state funeral of Queen Elizabeth II in London on September 19.
Murmu will be visiting London from September 17 to 19 to offer condolences on behalf of the Government of India.
Queen Elizabeth, the former head of state of the UK and Head of the Commonwealth of Nations, passed away on September 8.
Queen Elizabeth II passed away, Charles III becomes UK’s new King
President Droupadi Murmu, Vice President Jagdeep Dhankhar and Prime Minister Narendra Modi expressed condolences at the demise of Queen Elizabeth II.
External Affairs Minister S. Jaishankar visited the British High Commission in New Delhi on September 12 to convey India’s condolences. India also observed a day of national mourning on Sunday (September 11).
Prime Minister Narendra Modi had tweeted, “Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II will be remembered as a stalwart of our times. She provided inspiring leadership to her nation and people. She personified dignity and decency in public life. Pained by her demise. My thoughts are with her family and people of UK in this sad hour.”
“In the 70 years of reign of Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II, India-UK ties have evolved, flourished and strengthened immensely. She played an important role in the welfare of millions of people around the world as Head of the Commonwealth,” the Ministry of External Affairs said in a statement.
Ahmedabad, Sep 14 (IANS) At least six labourers were killed and one seriously injured after the lift of an under-construction building collapsed here on Wednesday.
The lift crashed from the seventh floor. The under-construction highrise building, named Aspire-II was located near the Gujarat University campus.
“At the time of the accident seven labourers were inside the lift, which was used to carry various materials. The lift crashed from the seventh floor on Wednesday morning. The labourers were working in the lift chamber,” said Mahendra, an eyewitness and labourer at the site.
Building collapsed
He told the media that all the labourers hailed from the Panchmahal district.
The Ahmedabad Municipal Corporation said the incident will be probed and action against responsible builders will be taken.
Lift crashed
Hitesh Barot, Ahmedabad Municipal Corporation Standing Committee Chairman told the media that all aspects of safety measures will be investigated, and if the builder was found responsible, suitable action will be taken against him or the company. The police were also carrying out the investigation parallely.
For decades, scientists have been trying to solve a vexing problem about the weather in outer space: At unpredictable times, high-energy particles bombard the earth and objects outside the earth’s atmosphere with radiation that can endanger the lives of astronauts and destroy satellites’ electronic equipment. These flare-ups can even trigger showers of radiation strong enough to reach passengers in airplanes flying over the North Pole. Despite scientists’ best efforts, a clear pattern of how and when flare-ups will occur has remained enduringly difficult to identify.
This week, in a paper in The Astrophysical Journal Letters, authors Luca Comisso and Lorenzo Sironi of Columbia’s Department of Astronomy and the Astrophysics Laboratory, have for the first time used supercomputers to simulate when and how high-energy particles are born in turbulent environments like that on the atmosphere of the sun. This new research paves the way for more accurate predictions of when dangerous bursts of these particles will occur.
“This exciting new research will allow us to better predict the origin of solar energetic particles and improve forecasting models of space weather events, a key goal of NASA and other space agencies and governments around the globe,” Comisso said. Within the next couple of years, he added, NASA’s Parker Solar Probe, the closest spacecraft to the sun, may be able to validate the paper’s findings by directly observing the predicted distribution of high-energy particles that are generated in the sun’s outer atmosphere.
NASA/Photo: Nasa.gov
In their paper, “Ion and Electron Acceleration in Fully Kinetic Plasma Turbulence,” Comisso and Sironi demonstrate that magnetic fields in the outer atmosphere of the sun can accelerate ions and electrons up to velocities close to the speed of light. The sun and other stars’ outer atmosphere consist of particles in a plasma state, a highly turbulent state distinct from liquid, gas, and solid states. Scientists have long believed that the sun’s plasma generates high-energy particles. But particles in plasma move so erratically and unpredictably that they have until now not been able to fully demonstrate how and when this occurs.
Using supercomputers at Columbia, NASA, and the National Energy Research Scientific Computing Center, Comisso and Sironi created computer simulations that show the exact movements of electrons and ions in the sun’s plasma. These simulations mimic the atmospheric conditions on the sun, and provide the most extensive data gathered to-date on how and when high-energy particles will form.
The research provides answers to questions that scientists have been investigating for at least 70 years: In 1949, the physicist Enrico Fermi began to investigate magnetic fields in outer space as a potential source of the high-energy particles (which he called cosmic rays) that were observed entering the earth’s atmosphere. Since then, scientists have suspected that the sun’s plasma is a major source of these particles, but definitively proving it has been difficult.
Aldrin walks on the surface of the Moon during Apollo 11(NASA)
Comisso and Sironi’s research, which was conducted with support from NASA and the National Science Foundation, has implications far beyond our own solar system. The vast majority of the observable matter in the universe is in a plasma state. Understanding how some of the particles that constitute plasma can be accelerated to high-energy levels is an important new research area since energetic particles are routinely observed not just around the sun but also in other environments across the universe, including the surroundings of black holes and neutron stars.
While Comisso and Sironi’s new paper focuses on the sun, further simulations could be run in other contexts to understand how and when distant stars, black holes, and other entities in the universe will generate their own bursts of energy.
“Our results center on the sun but can also be seen as a starting point to better understanding how high-energy particles are produced in more distant stars and around black holes,” Comisso said. “We’ve only scratched the surface of what supercomputer simulations can tell us about how these particles are born across the universe.”
New Delhi, Sep 14 (IANS) The Delhi High Court on Wednesday directed former BJP Rajya Sabha MP Subramanian Swamy to hand over the possession of his government bungalow to the estate officer within six weeks.
Citing security reasons, Swamy, who was the former Union Minister, was allotted the government accomodation in the Lutyens zone by the cabinet committee on January 15, 2016 for a period of five years.
He was knocking the doors of the high court seeking re-allotment of the accommodation citing ‘continuing security threats’. His Rajya Sabha term came to an end in April 2022.
The Centre opposed his plea arguing that the accommodation was required to be given to other ministers and MPs.
parliament
Hearing Swamy’s plea, Justice Yashwant Varma observed that the original allotment was made for a period of five years and there was no material to show that the applicant required the allotment of the government bungalow as per his claims.
“The Court further directs the petitioner to ensure that the possession in question is handed over to the estate officer concerned within a period of six weeks from today,” the court said, while disposing of the plea.
As the issue of moonlighting or working elsewhere to make extra money in India is plaguing many tech giants after the Work From Home concession that entailed tech employees work remotely, several Indian tech giants are facing the challenge to keep their workforce committed and focused.
The ethical issue has been raised by tech services giant Infosys first, followed by cloud Major IBM on Wednesday. Infosys has already made it clear that the practice is not ethical and the company may fire those who are moonlighting.
However, no company has so far issued any framework to monitor its employees who are moonlighting as legally it is still daunting to gather evidence and withstand legal suits in courts. Secondly, the problem is not new in smaller and minor companies which have been struggling to pay higher wages to employees to retain them. Often, they blink to let the workforce work elsewhere in non-working hours.
Moreover, the issue is legally overwhelming for the companies as strict guidelines or framework of supervising or monitoring employees is often termed as violation of privacy rules in many courts and they may stand loose the legal battle even after firing such employees.
But the issue has already bogged down even major companies. Besides infosys, IBM Managing Director Sandip Patel said that the company’s position is exactly that of the overall industry in the country. “All of our workers when they are employed, they sign an agreement which says that they are going to be working full-time for IBM. So moonlighting is not ethically right for them to get into,” he said.
However, some startups are encouraging employees to opt for moonlighting or work outside their primary working hours. Swiggy has encouraged the practice but the traditional companies are calling it cheating and unethical and issued warning to employees from practising Moonlighting even in extra hours.
In one case, a techie who was interviewed by a Hyderabad-based company found that he hired another techie to work on his behalf, while he is engaged in working on other projects. He has been summarily fired now but the issue has brought to light the glaring anomaly in misuse of a pact with the company.
Infosys has already warned employees on Monday against moonlighting, saying that involvement in such practice can result in “disciplinary action including termination of employment”. “No two-timing, no moonlighting”, the company said in an internal memo, adding that it “strictly discourages dual employment”.
Wipro Chairman Rishad Premji recently said that the concept of a second job amounts clearly to “plain and simple” cheating. “There is a lot of chatter about people moonlighting in the tech industry. This is cheating — plain and simple,” he emphasised.
New research published in Current Biology on September 13 demonstrates the importance of carrying crying infants rather than simply holding them. Led by Kumi Kuroda at the RIKEN Center for Brain Science (CBS) in Japan, the study details how crying babies are physiologically affected by being held, carried, and laid down. The data yield a simple but cost-free and effective technique that increases the chance of getting a crying infant to calm down and sleep in bed.
Most parents know the occasional frustration and discomfort of dealing with a crying baby. For some, it’s a regular occurrence that affects the baby’s ability to sleep and stresses out the parents. What can you do in this situation? Kuroda and her team found a “Transport Response” in distressed mouse pups and human babies in which infants calm down when carried by their mothers. The response is a complex series of parallel biological processes that result in reduced crying and lower heart rates, which helps parents to transport the infants.
Based on the ‘Transport response’ in which distressed animals calm down when carried, the behavioral and physiological data in this study showed that when babies are crying a lot, walking for about 5 minutes, following by sitting for about 8 minutes should help calm them down and put them to sleep. Note, sitting and holding a crying baby never calmed them down and heart rates rose. Putting babies to sleep immediately after walking often led to higher heart rates and woke babies up./photo:RIKEN
The new study used a baby ECG machine and video cameras to systematically compare changes in heart-rate and behavior as mothers acted out activities that are commonly used to calm infants, including carrying, being pushed in a stroller, and holding while sitting. Data during these activities were recorded from babies that were crying, awake and calm, or sleeping. At each heartbeat, behavior was assessed as asleep, alert, or crying, and scored accordingly. This way the researchers could track changes in both behavior and physiology with sub-second precision.
The experiment led to a few important findings. First, as Kuroda explains, “walking for five minutes promoted sleep, but only for crying infants. Surprisingly, this effect was absent when babies were already calm beforehand.” Among the babies studied, all had stopped crying by the end of the five-minute walk and had reduced heart rates, and about half were asleep. Second, sitting and holding crying babies was not calming; heart rates tended to go up and crying persisted.
The heartbeat measure allowed the researchers to dissect the effect of each micro-activity as infants were handled. The researchers found that the babies were extremely sensitive to all movements by their mothers. For example, heartrates went up when mothers turned or when they stopped walking. The most significant event that disturbed the sleeping infants happened just when they became separated from their mothers.
infant-small child
Every mother has experienced the disappointment of having a finally sleeping baby wake up again after being put down. The researchers pinpointed the problem using the heartbeat data. “Although we did not predict it,” says Kuroda, “the key parameter for successful laydown of sleeping infants was the latency from sleep onset.” Babies often woke up if they were put down before they got about 8 minutes of sleep. Thus, based on the data, Kuroda recommends that when babies are crying too much and can’t sleep, mothers should carry them steadily for about 5 minutes with few abrupt movements, followed by about 8 minutes of sitting before laying them down for sleep.
Although this procedure does not address why some babies cry excessively and cannot sleep, it offers an immediate solution that can help parents of newborns. Additionally, the researchers recognize the usefulness of heartrate data in this age of wearable fitness devices. “We are developing a “baby-tech” wearable device with which parents can see the physiological states of their babies on their smartphoness in real-time,” says Kuroda. “Like science-based fitness training, we can do science-based parenting with these advances, and hopefully help babies to sleep and reduce parental stress caused by excessive infant crying.”
Jammu, Sep 14 (IANS): Twelve persons were killed and 27 others injured on Wednesday in a road accident in Jammu and Kashmir’s Poonch district.
Police sources said that a minibus went out of the driver’s control near Brari Ballah in the Sawjian area of Poonch district.
Death toll in the road accident in Jammu and Kashmir’s Poonch district rose to 12 on Wednesday as three injured persons succumbed to their injuries in the hospital while five were airlifted to Jammu city for specialised treatment, officials said here.
“Three persons among 27 injured succumbed to injuries in the hospital. Five have been airlifted to Jammu city for specialised treatment,” the officials said.
Road accident in Jammu and Kashmir
The accident occurred this morning when a minibus with registration number JK12 1419 went out of the driver’s control near Brari Ballah Sawjian in Poonch district and dropped into a gorge.
Rescue teams of the Army, local police and civilians rushed to the spot. Nine passengers died on the spot.
“Five of the 24 injured passengers have been airlifted to Jammu city for specialised treatment”, officials said.
President of India Droupadi Murmu said on the Rashtrapati Bhavan Twitter page, “The loss of lives in a tragic road accident in Sawjian, Poonch is deeply distressing. My thoughts and prayers are with the bereaved families. I wish speedy recovery of the injured”.
J&K Lt. Governor Manoj Sinha has announced ex gratia compensation of Rs 5 lakhs each to the next of kin of those who lost their lives in this accident.
Sinha said on his official Twitter page, “Saddened by loss of lives due to road accident in Sawjian, Poonch. Condolences to bereaved families. May the injured recover soon. Rs 5 lakh will be given to next of kin of deceased. Directed police and civil authorities to provide best possible treatment to the injured”.
In an interview at the Code Conference in Beverly Hills early this week, Google CEO Sundar Pichai retorted to a question about competition in artificial intelligence stating clearly that it’s not always the competition but lack of focus within that leads to failure.
“I have always held the view that you tend to go wrong by focusing too much on competition. Big companies, particularly, fail because they stumble internally.”
In a well-connected world, companies are often struck in their plans based on the capabilities and pursuit of their competitors than what their own assessment is. Almost every business ends up paying more attention and time about the competition than it should, which is detrimental, he elaborated.
He reiterated that big companies also fail because they make bad decisions or fail to execute decisions on time. While competition remains to be watched, it should not leverage on your own plans and future prospects. Instead, it should help you revamp inside and be prepared, he suggested.
Sundar Pichai on competition and “Dharma”
“You want to be aware of everything that is going outside. But at the end of the day, your success depends on your execution,” he reminded, which means not to be naive or ignorant of happenings around you but focus on your job first. Your job is to deliver whatever it is you do.
Here, people familiar with Hindu holybook ‘Bhagavad Gita’ can infer that Pichai was referring to Indian philosophy that a person’s “Dharma” is to do his job sincerely regardless of results or rewards. At a broader level, it encompasses ideas such as duty, rights, character, vocation, religion, customs and all behavior considered appropriate, correct or morally upright, but in this context, it entails doing one’s job properly.
Since nobody knows from where the competition might come, Pichai advised companies to focus on serving customers better and at the same time take a note of the competition. “Look, I think–the thing about being in tech is competition comes from nowhere. None of us were talking about TikTok three years ago,” he reminded the audience at the code conference.
His advise remains simple — focus on what you can control.
Air traffic in France will be severely disrupted this Friday due to a strike over wages, the French Civil Aviation Authority (DGAC) has warned. French air traffic controllers are taking action to demand higher wages due to soaring inflation.
The national strike will last from 6 a.m. on Friday to 6 a.m. on Saturday, DGAC announced on Tuesday.
In addition to calling for higher wages, air traffic controllers will also use this strike to force authorities to open up employment in aviation, especially in air traffic control, Xinhua news agency reported.
flight services
“From 2029 to 2035, a third of the body will be retiring, it is imperative to anticipate and plan recruitment,” the National Union of Air Traffic Controllers (SNCTA) said, adding that “failure to do so will have inevitable consequences in terms of public service, working conditions and mobility”.
The SNCTA and the DGAC have called on airlines to reduce their flight services by 50 per cent on Friday, both in Metropolitan France and in the French overseas territories. Passengers are being advised to postpone their trips.
Meanwhile, SNCTA said on Tuesday that a second strike could be expected between September 28 and 30.
