Google Cloud Storage is a RESTful online file storage web
service for storing and accessing data on Google Cloud Platform infrastructure.
The service combines the performance and scalability of Google's cloud with
advanced security and sharing capabilities. It is an Infrastructure as a
Service (IaaS), comparable to Amazon S3 online storage service. Contrary to
Google Drive and according to different service specifications, Google Cloud
Storage appears to be more suitable for enterprises.
Google Storage (GS) stores objects (originally limited to
100 GiB, currently up to 5 TiB) that are organized into buckets (as S3 does)
identified within each bucket by a unique, user-assigned key. All requests are
authorized using an access control list associated with each bucket and object.
Bucket names and keys are chosen so that objects are addressable using HTTP
URLs:
https://storage.googleapis.com/bucket/object
http://bucket.storage.googleapis.com/object
https://storage.cloud.google.com/bucket/object
Google Storage offers four storage classes, identical in
throughput, latency and durability. The four classes, Multi-Regional Storage,
Regional Storage, Nearline Storage, and Coldline Storage, differ in their pricing,
minimum storage durations, and availability.[2]
Interoperability - Google Storage is interoperable with
other cloud storage tools and libraries that work with services such as Amazon
S3 and Eucalyptus Systems.[dubious – discuss]
Consistency - Upload operations to Google Storage are
atomic, providing strong read-after-write consistency for all upload
operations.
Access Control - Google Storage uses access control lists
(ACLs) to manage object and bucket access. An ACL consists of one or more
entries, each granting a specific permission to a scope. Permissions define
what someone can do with an object or bucket (for example, READ or WRITE).
Scopes define who the permission applies to. For example, a specific user or a
group of users (such as Google account email addresses, Google Apps domain,
public access, etc.)
Resumable Uploads - Google Storage provides a resumable data
transfer feature that allows users to resume upload operations after a
communication failure has interrupted the flow of data.
One of the worst side effects of a sunny summer day
is the damage it can do to you. We've spoken about how it affects your skin and
health but did you know, it can upset your hair as well. When the temperature
rises too high, the climate can leave your hair greasy, weighed down and dull.
Fortunately for you, instead of stepping into the shower for the nth time,
here's how to take control of your hair. Follow these 4 haircare tips to drive
away greasiness, grime and dullness.
1. Dry It
When an oily scalp is leave untreated, it can spread
down the strand and leave the hair greasy and dull. A quick way to stop it in
its tracks is with dry shampoo. A few spritzes of dry shampoo applied on your
scalp will soak up oils so that it doesn't ruin your hairstyle. Try Batiste's
Dry Shampoos which are specially crafted for brunettes so you won't need to
worry about any white residue showing up.
2. Rinse It
The next time you step into the shower, take a few
minutes out at the end for a hair rinse. Make it by combining quarter cup of
fresh lemon juice with three fourth cup of cold water. Once you are done
washing, tilt your head back and pour the lemon rinse over your hair, from root
till tip. Be careful not to get any in your eyes. Leave for three - four
minutes and wash off with cold water. Unlike other rinses made only for the
lengths, this one also cleanses the scalp of residue while leaving the tresses
shiny.
3. Mask It
A hair mask with the right ingredients can also keep
the greasy, lackluster look at bay. To make it, combine one whipped egg yolk
with three drops of witch hazel oil and three drops of tea tree oil. Apply the
mask over your roots and lengths and let it sit for 30 minutes. The sulfur in
egg helps control greasiness while both the oils are anti-bacterial agents.
Together, they'll also lend a sheen to your hair.
4. Treat It
Even small changes to your hair care routine can
make all the difference to the appearance of your hair. For one, find a balance
when washing your hair. Excessive washing can seem like a good idea but it only
strips hair of natural sebum, encouraging it to produce even more of it. Skip
leave-in products like conditioners and serums as that can contribute to your
hair feeling heavy and greasy.
One of April's greatest highlights is the fact that
mango season has finally arrived. The precious summer months are the only time
of the year when the king of fruits can be savoured in desserts, pickles and
even in a glass. To enjoy mango in new form, give these three delicious drinks
a try at home and say cheers to everyone's favourite fruit.
1. Mango Lemonade
If the only types of lemonade you've tried were pink
and citrusy, you're in for a treat. This refreshing drink brings together two
delightful fruits in a mix of Caribbean flavours.
Ingredients:
Two cups chopped mango chunks
Half cup lemon juice
Three fourth cup sugar
Two cups cold water
Method:
In a saucepan, mix the sugar and cold water on a
slow flame. Stir until the sugar has dissolved, remove from stove and leave
aside to cool completely. Next, make a puree of the chopped mangoes in a
blender and pour it into a pitcher. Then add the lemon juice to the pitcher and
stir well. Next add the sugar syrup, few spoons at the time to adjust your
level of sweetness. Finally, top off with ice cubes and serve.
2. Mango Colada
The delectable coconut favourite gets a tropical
twist when you add the king of fruits to the mix.
Ingredients:
Half cup mango juice
Half cup chopped mango
Quarter cup coconut milk
One tablespoon lime juice
Half cup ice cubes
Method:
Add the mango chunks in a blender and mix until it
is a smooth puree. Then add coconut milk, lime juice and mango juice and blend
until combined. Finally add the ice crushes and blend once again until it is an
icy mix. Serve in a tall glass with more ice cubes if needed.
3. Mango Fizz
This mango drink stands out from the rest with its
unique taste and refreshing fizz.
Ingredients:
Half cup ginger ale
Handful of mint leaves
Quarter cup mango puree
Two tablespoons lime juice
Two tablespoons sugar syrup (as prepared in first
recipe)
Half cup ice cubes
Method:
In a pitcher, mix mango puree with sugar syrup and
adjust syrup based on how sweet you want it. Add ginger ale to the pitcher, top
it with mint and give it a thorough stirring so that it mixes well. Serve in a
glass with a sprig of mint.
Delhi-based 28-year-old Karan has become the first Indian to
get his eyeballs tattooed.
Karan, a full-time professional tattoo artist and piercer,
claims that it does not involve risks and is just a way to look and feel
different, first reported by DNA.
Eyeball tattoos are a relatively new extreme body
modification where needles inject ink into the whites of a person's eyes to
permanently dye it a different colour.
According to the report, Karan has lost count of the number
of tattoos he has on his own body.
"At the moment, I have uncountable tattoos and 22
piercings on me," Karan told , adding his full body suit of tattoos is
a work in progress. "Eventually, I will just have one tattoo: head to
finger and toe tips."
On being asked on why he wanted to get this done, he told
DNA: “I always wanted to get something like this done and thus made sure that I
get it done from the person who invented eyeball tattooing a decade back —
Howard Smith. Because as a tattoo artist, my eyes are very important to me.”
According to Karan, he was 13 when he got his first tattoo.
At 16, he started tattooing as a hobby and soon, opened up his own tattoo
studio in Delhi.
He told that six months after beginning his full body
suit, the tattoo artist began to wonder what he would look like if he had his
eyeballs tattooed. He said he spent months debating whether to opt for the
permanent procedure and discussed it with his family and friends.
The procedure, which cost lakhs, was done by an Australian
tattoo artist, who Karan claims invented eyeball tattooing, at a tattoo studio
in New York, US.
But the medical fraternity isn’t impressed with this act.
“In all my career, I have never heard of anything like this. I did not even
know that something like this exists and that people are crazy enough to get it
done. I cannot really comment on the risks involved,” Dr Atul Kumar, head of
ophthalmology department, AIIMS, told DNA.
Meanwhile, Melbourne-based tattoo artist Luna Cobra, who
pioneered eyeball tattooing, has supported calls from a leading medical body to
ban the eye-watering procedure in Australia and New Zealand after rampant
malpractice.
The Melbourne-based practitioner, who has tattooed the eyes
of hundreds of clients worldwide, told The New Daily he backed the calls by the
Royal Australian and New Zealand College of Ophthalmologists.
The high-risk procedure involves permanently changing the
colour of the white part of the eye or sclera using coloured dye that can lead
to infection, intense pain and permanent vision loss.
Go to
Andaman & Nicobar and visit this dazzling beach with white sand, blue water
and the sun casting a striking glow against the water. This one is a
photographer's dream. Sit in the shade of a tree and enjoy the calm and sheer
clean vibes of the place.
Paradise
Beach
Pondicherry's
promenade beach may not be all that, also because you can't swim in there but
half an hour away from Pondi awaits Paradise Beach for your leisure. Somehow,
the place isn't as crowded as one will expect, and you have to take a boat to
reach the beach front (a very eye-pleasing boat ride that is). This will surely
bring you back some day.
Palolem
Beach
But of
course South Goa had to be in on our list; known to have some of the cleanest
and peaceful beaches in India, Palolem draws a lot of international crowd owing
to its beauty and cleanliness. While north Goa sees a lot of partying, it is
Palolem you head to for some down time.
It is
difficult to part ways with someone who became an integral part of your life,
but life doesn't need to come to a halt
Breakups
are hard. If it's after a long term relationship, even more so. Even if and
when you know it's probably a step in the right direction for you, there are
very few of us who derive any happiness from breaking up with someone we might
have once imagined a life with. It is difficult to part ways with someone who
became an integral part of your life; someone you shared important and
meaningful experiences with, discussed your goals and shared your secrets with.
We understand. But life doesn't come to a halt after this person has exited
your life for whatever reason. It's important to remember that too. There are
ways in which you can help yourself get your life back together and reset your
life.
1. Talk
about your ex and the relationship, but productively
Constantly
whining about how much you miss him, going through pictures of the two of you
together and crying, it's not going to help. Instead, if you really need to
talk about him, talk about why this might be the right decision for you. Sit
with yourself and introspect about all the different ways in which this could
be beneficial for you. If that's too hard to do, ask your friends to give you
their perspective on that relationship and why they thought it wasn't right
(preferably without bashing your ex). Sometimes, just listening to an objective
third party opinion can ring a bell.
2. Take
up a hobby
You know
all that time you spent with your ex, wasting Sunday afternoons and midweek
evenings, doing nothing at all? Well, now you have all that time to actually
try something new. Join a book club. Take up a sport. Go take those music
lessons you've been promising yourself you'll start for the last six months.
Being in a relationship can take up a lot of your time and effort. With that
space open in your life now, you get to try new and exciting things. Make the
most of this opportunity.
3. Get
social
All
those times you ditched your friends and family to hang out with your ex, it's
time to make up for that. Give the people who love you some undivided
attention. Not only will it make them feel good (and get you some bonus
points), but it will also help lift up your spirits like nothing else. Go out
dancing with your girlfriends or for dinner with your siblings. Do what makes
you happy, just as long as you don't stay cooped up in your bedroom.
We
helpfully sent out a guide to figure out the red flags - the warning signs to
see if a partner is cheating on you. As unpleasant and absolutely horrifying as
the whole thing is, it is also essential to know exactly where you stand in a
relationship. But what if the worst happens? After that gut-wrenching feeling
of finding out that you are being cheated on, the oncoming nausea and the
spiralling down into misery, what next? You want to kill the guy out of pure
instinct but that's not going to get you anywhere (except jail).
Talk to
them when you are ready
The
first thing to do is not to ignore what is happening, it won't disappear if you
refuse to look at it. You need to process your feelings, see how you feel about
it, and after deciding how to confront the situation, talk to your partner. You
as a betrayed party in a solid relationship have the right to ask all the
questions you need answers to, but it is essential to go about this in a
constructive way. Unless of course you have decided you don't want to go ahead with
it. Then feel free to wreck his house with a baseball bat. Kidding. Maybe.
Don't
blame yourself
A lot of
people tend to feel like it is their fault that they were cheated on. False.
The onus of cheating is not on you, never was. You are who you are, and your
partner cheating is not a commentary on you but them. In a relationship, if
your partner felt like their need wasn't being met, they should have spoken to
you about it. What they did was go behind your back and that isn't healthy,
unnecessary as it to say.
Decide
where you want to head from here
You have
to make sure you don't rush the healing process. Once you are done talking to
your partner about what happened and getting all the information you need about
the whys, and the wheres, and all, you need to decide where to head from here
and how. Do you think you can trust them again? Do you think you will ever see
them the same way? Do you think it was a mistake? Or is it an unforgivable
instance? All these are questions you need to ask yourself. That is how you
move ahead in life.
Been
meaning to pamper your skin with natural scrubs and masks, but clueless about
what all to include? We have one amazing ingredient for you that you can add to
your beauty ritual and give your skin a refreshing new look - besan or gram
flour. This kitchen staple, which is commonly used in making lip-smacking
pakoras and kadhi, in fact works as a great skin cleanser. It is known for its
antimicrobial properties and the ability to remove excess oil and dirt from
deep within the skin.
No
wonder it has been a part of age-old beauty remedies for bringing back the
skin's natural glow. Indian brides are often advised to bathe using an ubtan of
besan, haldi, fuller's earth and rose water before the wedding. It suits all
skin types and can be mixed with various other beauty ingredients to make scrubs,
face packs and cleansers.
Here are
some easy besan remedies -
1. Besan
+ turmeric + milk
Add half
a cup besan, a pinch of turmeric powder and quarter cup fresh milk to create a
smooth paste. Apply evenly on your face and neck area and leave it on for 20-25
minutes. Rinse with lukewarm water to notice the glow.
2. Besan
+ tomato + lemon
This works
as a great skin cleanser. Blend a tomato and mix it with one tablespoon lemon
juice and one tablespoon besan. Apply generously on your face and neck and let
it rest for 15 minutes. Wash with cold water and feel instantly refreshed.
3. Besan
+ yoghurt + honey
To hydrate
and nourish your skin, make use of besan, yoghurt and honey. Add quarter cup
yoghurt, two tablespoon besan and one tablespoon honey and mix well. Apply the
mixture on your face and let it rest for 20 minutes. Wash with cold water and
pat dry.
Use this
everyday kitchen ingredient to take care of your skin and bring back its
natural glow.
Have you ever known a child who is on their way to
being a millionaire before they’re old enough to legally drive a car? We joke
about the kids at the neighborhood lemonade stand being “entrepreneurs in the
making,” but that may not be as much of a joke as we thought. Kids these days.
. .
There are actually a surprising number of
millionaires who haven’t even graduated high school yet. We’re not just talking
about Richie Rich here. We’re talking self-made millionaires who aren’t even
old enough to open a bank account on their own. We’re talking about kids who
understand business and how to make money. The mindset starts at a young age.
Without further ado, here are 12 millionaire kids we
can learn from:
1. Christian Owens of Mac Bundle Box
Christian made his first million before he was 16
years old. He taught himself web design at a young age and started his first
design company at 14. He then went on to negotiate with various manufacturers
and distributors to offer a bundle package of applications for Mac OS X (Steve
Jobs was his motivator and inspiration). The Mac Bundle Box has since made him
millions.
Follow your passion, sure, but the main
lesson here is about saving people money. Find a way to offer something people
already buy for a lower price.
2. Emil Motycka of Motycka Enterprises
Emil start a lawn mowing business at 9 years old.
Lawn mowing may seem like a pretty typical business for a kid, but this kid
took it to the next level. He took out a loan for $8,000 when he was 13 years
old to purchase a commercial lawn mower. He formed Motycka Enterprises by the
time he was 18 and went on to make well over $100,000 that summer. He’s now
making millions.
Following a strong passion can work, but
on the other hand, doing something and doing it well is just as good if not
better. As Mike Rowe from Dirty Jobs says “Don’t Follow Your Passion, But
Always Bring it With You.” Whatever you do, do it better than everyone else.
3. Evan of EvanTube
Evan started a YouTube channel called EvanTube when
he was just 8 years old. Now he is making approximately $1.3 million a year
from his channel with over a million subscribers. What are his videos about?
Exactly what you might think – reviews of toys and other things that kids his
age are interested in. Yes, you can get rich talking about Minecraft, Angry
Birds and Legos!
If you do what you love and do it well,
you can turn it into a million dollar venture. That doesn’t mean it’s easy, but
with persistence, you can make it happen.
4. Cameron Johnson of Cheers and Tears
Cameron was earning around $400,000/month in high
school. It all started when he created invitation cards for a neighborhood
party his parents were having.When the
guests saw the cards, they started asking him to make cards for them and paying
him for it. He founded Cheers and Tears at 14 years old, then preceded to go
into software development and online advertising, which made him a millionaire
by the time he was in high school.
If you do something well, you might as
well do it big. Dive into new industries and try new things. They just might
make you a millionaire.
5. Adam Hildreth of Dubit and Crisp
Adam was a millionaire by his 16th birthday after
creating a teenage social networking site called Dubit (popular in the UK).
After he had so much success with his social networking site, Adam went on to
create Crisp, a company that helps protect kids against online predators. In
2004, he made the UK’s top 20 richest teens list.
Sometimes it’s best to look for a
popular trend and do it yourself. It’s also a good idea to find a need and
create a solution. Adam did both.
6. Moziah Bridges of Mo’s Bows
Moziah started a bow tie company at 9 years old and
quickly grew his business to earning $150,000/year. Today, Moziah has several
employees. He has been featured in several popular magazines and even went on
Shark Tank. He’s working on a full clothing line at the moment, which I’m sure
will end up being an impressive success as well.
If you decide to start a business, keep
growing and expanding. There is always room to make your business bigger, just
be sure to have a great team to help you along the way.
7. Geoff, Dave, & Catherine Cook of My Yearbook
Before everyone was on Facebook, these three
siblings started My Yearbook, a social media site based on the school(s) you
went to. It was similar to Facebook at the time, but with more focus on grade
school rather than college. The idea to start the website began when they moved
to a new town and wanted to make some friends. The site took off and six years
later. The Cooks ended up selling the site to the Quepasa Corps. for $100
million. Not bad at all.
Find a need and fill it. Be proactive.
These kids could have let themselves get down about not having friends in a new
place, but instead they decided to do something about it.
8. Sanjay & Shavran Kumaran of GoDimensions
Sanjay and Shavran, at 12 and 14 years old,
respectively, run their own gaming corporation. They have several apps, with
over 35,000 downloads between them. They have developed the popular Catch Me
Cop app, among others. Their apps are monetized purely through advertising,
which makes them free for kids to download. Now they speak at events and
conferences on ideas, making them happen and drawing up business plans.
This one actually merges following your
passion with doing what you do really well. It’s the best of both worlds.
9. Farrhad Acidwalla of Rockstah Media
Farrhad founded Rockstah Media, a marketing agency
with 20 employees around the world and he did it at 16 years old. You may have
heard of his company or you may know Farrhad from one of his TED Talks. He is
known today as one of the most promising entrepreneurs of our time. When asked
about the success of his company, Farrhad said “My team is the backbone of my
company,” which can definitely teach us a thing or two.
You can’t do it all on your own.
Building a strong professional team is important if you really want to take you
business to the next level.
10. Robert Nay of the Bubble Ball App
Robert raked in over $2 million in two weeks,
following the release of his famous Bubble Ball game. He was only 14 years old
at the time. Today, his game has been downloaded over 16 million times and
Robert continues to develop new apps with his company, Nay Games. Bubble Ball
has been seen on Good Morning America and continues to be one of the most
popular games in the Apple Store.
Some people really can achieve overnight
success. That shouldn’t be your goal, but if you create something good enough,
it could happen for you.
11. Nick D’Aloisio of Summly
Nick sold his company, Summly, to Yahoo for $30
million in 2013, making him one of the youngest self-made millionaires in the
world. Summly went on to become Yahoo News Digest. Nick now works for Yahoo and
has been named “Innovator of the Year” by the Wall Street Journal. He was
included in TIME Magazine’s “Time 100” as one of the world’s most influential
teenagers. Nick is also the youngest person to receive a round of venture
capital in technology from Hong Kong billionaire, Li Ka-Shing.
Age doesn’t have to hold you back. Nick
was even able to receive funding from a billionaire, despite his age.
12. Leanna Archer of Leanna’s Hair
Leanna was bottling and selling her own hair pomade
at just 9 years old. She got her secret recipes from her great-grandmother and
has since expanded to an entire line of hair products based on the same
recipes. Leanna’s company brings in over $100,000 annually and her net worth is
over $3 million. She has also founded the Leanna Archer Education Foundation.
Her foundation helps provide basic needs, including education, to 200 Haitian
kids each day.
When you find success and make lots of
money, be sure to give back. Money is a great tool for many things and it is a
necessity to help others who have little to nothing.
These kids show us that age is not a limitation.
You’re never too young or too old. If you really want to make a difference in
the world, start now, no matter your age or any other limiting factor. The
commonality among all of these kids is their mindset.They didn’t start with a
mindset of “can’t”, they started with a mindset of “how can I?” You can do the
same. Even if you’re still in high school.
Google Doodle honours British primatologist Jane Good all
Every year on April 22, people across the globe unite to
celebrate Earth Day. As the name suggests, the day is dedicated to protect the
planet and promote ways to preserve the environment. Carrying forward its
practice of honouring important personalities and days, Google on Sunday paid
tribute to British primatologist and anthropologist Jane Good all with a doodle
on its homepage. Founder of the Jane Good all Institute and the Roots &
Shoots programme, Good all has worked tirelessly on animal welfare issues as
well as environmental conservation. The Google doodle also features a short
video clip of Good all narrating her experience as an anthropologist.
Good all in the video shares how much she loves animals. “My
whole childhood really was animals, animals, animals.” She then goes on to
describe a moment when she was in the Gombe National Park and it was
raining.After the rain stopped, she
recollects she could smell the wet hair on the chimpanzees and hear the insects
singing loudly. At that moment Good all says, “I just felt absolutely at one
and it was a sense of awe and wonder.” She then goes on to highlight the
importance of rainforest and how they teach you that everything is
interconnected, and every species, “even though it may seem insignificant has a
role to play in this tapestry of life”.
At the end of the video, Good all shares her message with
everybody on. She encourages others to make a “determined effort to live lives
in better harmony with nature.” She also gives a parting wordof advice — “Every single individual matters,
every single individual makes some impact on the planet every single day, and
we have a choice as to what kind of difference we are going to make.”
This year, according to Earth Day Network, the day intends
to spread awareness about the pollution caused by plastic and the need to
eventually end its use. The Earth Day, which was first celebrated in the United
States in 1970, went global by the 1990s and now almost 192 countries celebrate
it.
People around the globe will on Sunday come together to
celebrate the Earth Day, a day meant to emphasise on the need to protect the
planet and preserve its environment. First celebrated in the United States in
1970, the idea of commemorating such a day was propounded by Gaylord Nelson, a
US senator from Wisconsin. Nelson, who had been a witness to the devastation
caused by an enormous oil spill in Santa Barbara, California in 1969, felt the
urgency of the matter.
According to Earth Day Network, this year’s Earth Day is
dedicated to spreading awareness about the pollution caused by plastic and the
need to eventually end its use. The Earth Day went global by the 1990s and is
now celebrated by at least 192 countries.
7 things we’ve learned about Earth since the last Earth Day
Earth dayturns 48 this Sunday, April 22, and Google is celebrating it
with a Google Doodle of conservationist Dr. Jane Goodall, who nudges us in a
video a “do our part for this beautiful planet.”
When Senator Gaylord Nelson (D-Wisc.) founded Earth Day in
1970, his hope was to make the environment a political issue in an era where US
rivers caught on fire and thick smog choked cities.
In many ways, it worked. Since then, major environmental
laws have helped clean up much of the vivid toxic detritus in the soil, air,
and water in the US. But our challenges today are no less daunting. The
accumulation of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere, the loss of wilderness and
species, and the acidification and pollution of the oceans have all become more
acute — and more destabilizing.
In keeping with the tradition started by former Vox writers
Brad Plumer and Joseph Stromberg, here are seven of the most troubling,
intriguing, and encouraging things we learned about the Earth since the last
Earth Day.
1) The plastic problem is even worse than we thought
One of the bleakest stories of the year so far was the
report of a six-ton sperm whale washing up on the shores of southern Spain with
64 pounds of plastic in its stomach, a grotesque sign of the alarming rate at
which we’re dumping plastics into the ocean.
The plastic crisis is a truly global one, and the numbers
are staggering: A 2015 study found that between 4.8 and 12.7 million metric
tons of plastic makes it into the ocean from land each year. By 2050, there
will be more plastic than fish in the ocean by weight.
Since plastic is synthetic, there are few natural processes
that break it down, allowing bags, straws, and packaging to linger for decades
if not centuries. And we’re not very good at containing it to landfills. About
32 percent of plastics make out into nature, where it often end up in the
bellies of fish, birds, and whales. And, as it turns out, potentially in our
stomachs too.
In one investigation, the nonprofit Orb Media found plastic
fibers in 83 percent of drinking water samples all over the world, with some of
the highest levels in drinking fountains at the US Capitol. In a separate
investigation published this year, it found microplastic particles in 93
percent of the bottled water samples it tested (250 bottles from 11 leading
brands including Dasani and Aquafina).
These kinds of findings have prompted environmental
activists pushing to reduce or end the use of disposable plastics. Curbing
plastic pollution is a key theme in this year’s Earth Day and there’s a
high-profile campaign underway to ban plastic straws in particular.
UK Prime Minister Theresa May called this week to ban
plastic straws, swabs, and stirrers. Some researchers last year openly called
for an international agreement to control plastic pollution. And there was one
bit of hopeful news for potentially more effective disposal in the future:
scientists have discovered an enzyme that can digest plastic.
2) We lost the last male Northern white Rhino
Another benchmark we’re obliged to revisit each Earth Day is
how many species we’ve lost forever.
In December, the US Fish and Wildlife Service declared the
beaverpond marstonia, a tiny freshwater snail found in Georgia, to be extinct.
The Center for Biological Diversity called it the first species declared
extinct under the Trump administration, a consequence of water overuse for
agriculture and pollution.
Also in the last year, the Christmas Island Pipistrelle, a
bat found off the coast of Australia, was declared extinct. Three reptiles also
went extinct on the island, including the chained gecko, the blue-tailed skink,
and the whiptail skink, according to the International Union for the
Conservation of Nature. Much of this is due to disease and predatory invasive
species.
And some species are teetering on the brink of extinction.
The last male Northern White Rhino, Sudan, died in March at the age of 45.
As the Northern White rhinos have been rapidly decimated by
poaching, conservationists have tried desperate tactics to resuscitate them,
including creating a Tinder profile for Sudan. The more viable strategy now is
in vitro fertilization of a female Southern White Rhino with the eggs from the
two remaining Northern White Rhino females and stored northern white rhino
semen.
3) A few species have bounced back. And we discovered some
brand new ones.
The Black-eyed Leaf Frog hopped back from the edge of the
abyss. It’s now been classified as a species of “least concern” after having
been “critically endangered,” the last step before extinction.
“This lovely leaf frog is hope in a small, green-and-black
package,” said Jennifer Luedtke, an amphibian specialist at Global Wildlife
Conservation, in a statement.
Researchers reported this year that other tropical frog
species, like the variable harlequin frog, are also bouncing back after a
fungal epidemic drastically slashed their numbers.
The Chesapeake Bay’s striped bass has also rebounded to a
healthy population.
Scientists also described some new species for the first
time. The California Academy of Sciences added 85 new species of plants and
animals last year to its catalog, including “16 flowering plants, one
elephant-shrew, 10 sharks, 22 fish, three scorpions, seven ants, 13
nudibranchs, seven spiders, three wasps, one fossil sand dollar, one deepwater
coral, and one lizard.”
Researchers also discovered a sulfur-eating giant shipworm that
lives at the bottom of muddy lagoons:
Other new species include a new parasitic wasp with spiked
forelimbs and a variety of tardigrade found in a parking lot in Japan. It’s not
too surprising since the notoriously hardy eight-legged microorganism is often
a pioneer of new ecosystems, including those created by humans.
And scientists announced they’s found the first new species
of great ape in 90 years, Pongo tapanuliensis, also known as the Tapanuli
orangutan. But with just 800 individuals on the island of Sumatra left, it’s
also endangered.
4) Greenland’s ice is melting faster than we realized
We know the Earth is warming, but we saw several jarring
examples over the past year of how quickly and dramatically this is playing
out.
Earth’s polar regions are warming twice as fast as the
average rate of the planet. NOAA scientists reported late last year that the
Arctic losing ice at its fastest rate in at least 1,500 years.
We also saw a heat wave in the Arctic. In the middle of
winter. For the third year in a row. January saw the lowest extent of Arctic
sea ice for the month on record. The sea ice maximum for the Arctic, which
typically occurs in March, was at its second-lowest on record this year, bested
only by 2017.
This warming is playing out in sharp and sudden ways across
the Arctic. Researchers reported last year that a section of Greenland’s ice
sheet suddenly started melting 80 percent faster. Another study found
Greenland’s entire ice sheet is melting at its fastest rate in at least 400
years, and that the melt rate sped up drastically in 1990.
If the entire Greenland ice sheet were to melt, it would
raise global sea levels by more than 20 feet.
Glaciers in Denali National Park are also melting 60 times
faster than they were 150 years ago.
These examples show that the impacts of a changing climate
aren’t always slow and gradual; global warming can push some phenomena to
tipping points that lead to rapid, self-propagating changes.
5) Seagrass is regrowing in the Chesapeake Bay. And humans
can take credit.
The Chesapeake Bay is the largest estuary in the United
States, and for decades it was also one of its most polluted. Massive
quantities of fertilizer, waste from farm and poultry operations, and
stormwater in Maryland, Virginia, Delaware, and Pennsylvania were leaching into
the water.
As nutrients like nitrogen and phosphorus sullied the bay,
much of the underwater life, including grasses and the fish and shellfish that
lived inside it, died off. The impact was so severe that the federal government
and states had to come up with a way to limit the pollution — and so they
started paying farmers to farm in different ways to keep fertilizer from
washing into the bay and cracked down on sewage treatment plants and other
facilities that were dumping waste.
Happily, scientists writing in the Proceedings of the
National Academy of Sciences in March report that these regulations to limit
that runoff are working. The most striking evidence is the regrowth of the
seagrass beds — now covering more than 42,000 acres, the highest cover in the
Chesapeake in almost half a century.
The recovery of the “underwater forest” of seagrass also
suggests that other forms of life in the Bay — like blue crabs and fish species
that use it for food and shelter — will recover too. And given that seagrasses
worldwide have declined by nearly a third over the last century, the successful
efforts to limit nutrient pollution in the Chesapeake could help influence new
policies to restore coastal ecosystems elsewhere.
“Nutrient reductions and biodiversity conservation are
effective strategies to aid the successful recovery of degraded systems at
regional scales, a finding which is highly relevant to the utility of
environmental management programs worldwide,” the PNAS authors write.
6) We’re woefully unprepared for disasters. And we aren’t
learning enough from them.
2017 was a brutal year for natural disasters in the US, and
the ongoing blackout in Puerto Rico continues to remind us just how vulnerable
we are to extreme weather especially as climate change makes these kinds of
events more intense.
Hurricane Maria ripped through the Caribbean with 150 mph
winds and upward of 36 inches of rain last September, knocking down 80 percent
of electricity infrastructure and creating the largest blackout in US history
for Puerto Rico’s 3.3 million residents.
Other parts of the United States were also hit hard last
year, as the worst wildfire season on record torched California and as
Hurricane Harvey drenched Texas with the largest amount of rainfall ever
recorded for a single storm.
In fact, natural disasters across 2017 caused at least $306
billion in damages across the US, making it the costliest year on record.
And researchers expect that torrential rain, massive storms,
and expansive infernos will get worse as average temperatures continue to rise.
“Human-induced climate change likely increased Harvey’s
total rainfall around Houston by at least 19 percent, with a best estimate of
37 percent,” Michael Wehner, a staff scientist at Lawrence Berkeley National
Laboratory said at the American Geophysical Union conference in December.
Despite all this, we’re already going back to our old
habits. Homes are being rebuilt in floodplains around Houston and construction
is still booming along Florida’s coasts despite rising seas. Meanwhile,
California homeowners are rebuilding their torched properties in the same
spots. Let’s do better.
7) We’re getting closer to finding another Earth out there
As far as we know, Earth is the only planet with life in the
universe. But scientists are getting better at finding tantalizingly similar
planets. And as astrophysics and astrobiology come together to make these
discoveries, we keep learning more about our own home.
There’s been a boom in exoplanet discoveries since the
launch of the Kepler Space Telescope in 2009. Of the more than 3,500 planets
we’ve found outside of our solar system, Kepler has helped identify more than
2,500 of them.
These planets range in size from larger-than-Jupiter to
smaller-than-Earth.
But by pooling from observations from telescopes around the
world and in space, scientists have discovered more spheres like ours.
Researchers reported last year that they found seven Earth-sized planets
orbiting a dwarf star called Trappist-1, the largest batch of planets in the
habitable zone of a star ever discovered.
“It represents a unique opportunity to thoroughly
characterize temperate Earth-like planets that are orbiting a much cooler and
smaller star than the Sun,” the scientists wrote.
NASA says we now know more about the Trappist-1 system than
any other planetary system save our own. And earlier this year, the agency
reported that the planets closest to the star could have liquid water, a
necessary ingredient for life as we know it.
Researchers at the MEarth Project last April also found an
Earth-like planet, LHS1140b, orbiting a star about one-fifth the size of our
sun. “It also receives similar amounts of energy from its star that Earth does
from the Sun, which means it may have liquid water on its surface!” the team
reported.
And on April 19, NASA launched the Transiting Exoplanet
Survey Satellite aboard the SpaceX Falcon 9. The $228 million mission is aimed
specifically at “discovering new earths.”
One
13-inch MacBook Pro units without Touch Bar are affected
The
affected units were made between October 2016 and October 2017
Customers
who have already paid for the new battery will get a refund
Apple on
Friday said component failure in a limited number of MacBook Pros has caused
built-in battery to expand, adding, it will offer worldwide free replacement
for such batteries.
Apple
said the flaw, reported in some 13-inch Macbook Pros without Touch Bars, is not
a safety issue.
The
affected units were manufactured between October 2016 and October 2017, Apple
said on its support page, without giving the actual number of MacBooks
affected. Users can enter their MacBook's serial number on the support page to
check whether their unit needs to be replaced. If their laptop is indeed
affected, they need to take the unit to an Apple Repair Centre, an Apple Retail
Store, and an Apple Authorised Service Provider for repairs. Customers who have
already paid for the battery replacement will be eligible for a refund, the
company has said.
The
iPhone maker previously came under scrutiny after it confirmed in December that
software to deal with aging batteries in iPhone 6, iPhone 6s and iPhone SE
models could slow down performance. The company later apologised and lowered
the price of battery replacements for affected models to $29 from $79.
Haven’t
we all seen hundreds of unboxing of mobile phones and want to check the first
look of the device. Sadly, this is not a case with automobiles as the cars we
buy don’t come packed inside the boxes, until of course – it’s a Lamborghini
supercar.
You can now satiate your eyes with the unwrapping of Lamborghini
Huracan Performante, the first one to make way to the streets of Hyderabad. The
video of the unwrapping of the Lamborghini Huracan Performante came when it was
being delivered at the owner's house.
Launched
in India last year, the Lamborghini Huracan Performante is priced at Rs 3.76
crore (ex-showroom, Delhi) and the car that is seen in the video is the second
Performante in India, the first one was delivered to its owner in Mumbai.
The
Lamborghini Huracan Performante is powered by a naturally aspirated V10 engine
that pushes out 640 horsepower and 600 Nm of torque and comes mated to a
7-speed dual clutch gearbox. In simple words, it can go from 0-100 km/h in 2.9
seconds and 0-200 km/h in a staggering 8.9 seconds and will pull all the way to
325 km/h. That’s not it, though, as it can even come to a halt from 100 km/h in
just 31 metres.
The
supercar gets forged composite carbon fibre on parts such as the engine cover,
front spoiler, rear bumper, rear spoiler, diffuser, centre console, paddles,
HVAC vents and door handles which helps the car to reduce 40kg weight. Inside
the cabin, the car gets a new digital cockpit display that can be customized
for every one of the three driving modes – Strada, Sport or Corsa.
It’s
expensive, it’s rare, it’s meant to go stupendously fast and given the Indian
road conditions, there aren’t many places that you can drive it at.
Health
is wealth, is an old saying but still holds quite a lot of value.
Liver is
considered one of the vital organs of the body which is responsible for
producing biochemicals necessary for digestion.It helps in making proteins and is essential for blood clotting and
other important functions.
The
organ helps the body to fight off infections, controls cholesterol and also
removes toxins.As a matter of fact, our
body stores fat in different parts of the system which is later used as
insulation and energy.
The
accessory digestive gland is partially made up of fat, but in case, the fat
concentrations goes high, then a person may suffer from fatty liver, which is
not good for health.
There
are two types of fatty liver disease, one- alcoholic induced and another
non-alcoholic fatty liver disease.Here
are the food items which you must include in your daily diet, if you have a
fatty liver.
Coffee
Various
studies have shown that coffee lovers with fatty liver have comparatively
lesser damage than those who don’t drink caffeine. Adding coffee to your daily
routine may prove to be quite beneficial for the liver.
Green
Tea
Researchers
have found out that having green tea can help reduce the body fat, which in
turn improves liver function. Green tea has several benefits, so why not sip up
a cup of the same everyday?
Garlic
Garlic
is an essential ingredient of kitchen life and may help cure fatty liver. A
study published in Advanced Biomedical Research suggested that the flavouring
food can help reduce fat in people with fatty liver disease.
Broccoli
There
are people who simply don’t like the taste of broccoli. However, the vegetable
is known to prevent the build-up of fat concentration in mice, according to a
report in journal of Nutrition. Including more greens in your diet should be
your new mantra.
Soy
protein or Tofu
A study
conducted by University of Illinois on rats found out that soy protein or Tofu
might help in reduction of fat build up in the liver. Tofu, also known as bean
curd, is low in fat and high in protein, hence good for our health.
