The X-ray spectrometer, HEL1OS, onboard ISRO’s Aditya-L1 spacecraft on its maiden solar mission, has captured the first high-energy X-ray glimpse of solar flares, said the space agency on November 7. The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s Geostationary Operational Environmental Satellites (GOES) have provided continuous imagery and data on space weather conditions and solar activity since the 1970s. According to ISRO, the HEL1OS instrument is currently undergoing fine-tuning of thresholds and calibration operations. It is set to monitor the Sun’s high-energy X-ray a
The Civil Aviation Authority of Singapore (CAAS) and its regional counterparts have begun collaboration on a framework for safety rules and standards to regulate air taxi and drone operations. The authorities of the region met on November 9 to develop a set of regulatory reference materials by 2025 that each country can adapt and adopt to govern the emerging sectors. The inaugural meeting, organised by CAAS, was attended by representatives from 17 civil aviation authorities in the Asia-Pacific region, including delegates from China and Japan, 24 private-sector institutes, and companies suc
India is developing its own long-range air defence system, similar to Israel’s Iron Dome, under Project Kusha. This system, with a range of up to 350 kilometres, aims to protect the country against various threats and provide strategic and tactical coverage. Initially believed to be nearly impenetrable, Israel’s Iron Dome is a state-of-the-art rocket defence system that faced a stern test on October 7 when Palestinian militant group Hamas launched about 5,000 rockets in just 20 minutes. Despite the attacks, this defence system provided a considerable level of protection for the country
Boston Dynamics has harnessed the power of ChatGPT to train its robot dog to communicate like a seasoned tour guide, combining scripted dialogue and visual question-answering models for a captivating interactive experience. In an effort to give its robot, Spot the ability to “speak,” Boston Dynamics leveraged OpenAI’s ChatGPT API and incorporated open-source large language models (LLMs) to meticulously fine-tune its responses. It also equipped the robot with a speaker, integrated text-to-speech capabilities, and enabled it to mimic human speech. For each room within their faciliti
Motorola has showcased a new smartphone form factor that’s built around a flexible adaptive display that can bend backwards and wrap around a wrist like a large digital wristband or a smartwatch. The concept phone was unveiled at the Lenovo Tech World 2023, held on October 24-25, 2023, in Austin, Texas, US. It is said to be an improved version of Lenovo’s wrist phone concept, which was showcased almost seven years ago. The Motorola phone can also be used in tent mode, where it can rest elegantly on a table. The year 2023 marked the ninth consecutive year of the annual event, Lenovo
Pfizer on October 26 said that its two-in-one vaccine for Covid-19 and flu will enter the final-stage trial soon after its early to mid-stage study showed positive results. The development has helped the biopharmaceutical company and its German partner BioNTech come a step closer to potentially getting regulatory approval for the combination shot. The companies carried out initial trials among healthy adults, aged 18 to 64, who showed robust immune responses against influenza A, influenza B and Sars-CoV-2 strains after receiving the combined shot. Trial participants were compared with thos
Amidst the ongoing efforts by telecommunications service providers to extend their 5G networks across the nation, Prime Minister Narendra Modi declared that India is also actively striving to establish itself as a global leader in 6G technology. The Prime Minister officially launched a significant initiative, unveiling 100 “5G use case labs” throughout India at the 7th Edition of the India Mobile Congress 2023 at Bharat Mandapam in New Delhi on October 27. The ‘100 5G labs initiative’ is designed to harness the potential of 5G technology by promoting the development of 5G applic
Researchers at Google have demonstrated how regular earbuds with Active Noise Cancellation (ANC) can transform into heart rate monitors without the need for additional hardware or sensors. Google researchers showcased this technology at Mobicom 2023, held in Madrid from October 2-6, 2023. They also shared their research paper on the technology, titled “APG: Audioplethysmography for Cardiac Monitoring in Hearables.” The study was conducted over eight months with 153 participants to test APG in various scenarios. This technology employs a pulse-like signal to monitor heart rate. Th
Britain will set up the world’s first artificial intelligence (AI) safety institute, Prime Minister Rishi Sunak said on October 26, ahead of a global summit on November 1-2 convened to examine the risks of the technology. The institute “will advance the world’s knowledge of AI safety and it will carefully examine, evaluate and test new types of AI so that we understand what each new model is capable of, exploring all the risks from social harms like bias and misinformation through to the most extreme risks of all,” the leader said in a speech in London. Sunak wants Britain to be
The Government of India will launch the world’s first software to detect dark patterns on e-Commerce platforms, to provide protection to consumers from all types of unfair trade practices. The Union Ministry of Consumer Affairs, in collaboration with Indian Institute of Technology-Banaras Hindu University, on October 26, launched a four-stage hackathon, Dark Patterns Buster, to build an open-source software that will be available as a freely downloadable browser extension and a mobile app, to alert users to the presence of dark patterns on websites. The ministry has identified over 10