These trees came as immigrants, made friends with the locals and now are upstanding inhabitants of Coimbatore providing priceless service to the city and its people. Architect, Jayashree Raman says trees offer a wealth of natural solutions to various design challenges. “They provide insights into structural strength, energy efficiency, and biomimicry, leading to more sustainable…
Every year, farmers battle an invisible, relentless, formidable enemy: plant viruses. Unlike bacteria or fungi, which can be controlled with pesticides or fungicides, there is no straightforward way to cure crops of viral infections. According to the U.N. Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO), plant pests and diseases destroy nearly 40% of the world’s annual crop,…
Malabar Flash butterfly | Photo Credit: Vinod Sriramulu Butterfly pioneer Wynter Blyth MA mentions a butterfly in his book Butterflies of the Indian Region that came out in 1957. He talks of it as a rare one, observed in the Mettupalayam Ghats and Sri Lanka, in thick jungles often at an elevation between 1000 and 3000 ft….
People walk on a dusty road in the town of Byrnihat, Meghalaya, March 29, 2025. | Photo Credit: Reuters Two-year-old Sumaiya Ansari, a resident of India’s Byrnihat town, ranked the world’s most polluted metropolitan area by Swiss Group IQAir, was battling breathing problems for several days before she was hospitalised in March and given oxygen…
Smoke rises from a coal-powered steel plant at Hehal village near Ranchi. File | Photo Credit: AP The Union Environment Ministry should roll back its 2015 policy mandating all of India’s 537 coal-fired plants to install a class of equipment called Flue Gas Desulphurisation (FGD) in order to reduce sulphur dioxide (SO2) emissions. Instead, it…
GUWAHATI An informal network of individuals and organisations working together to foster the knowledge and practice of ecological restoration of natural ecosystems in India is releasing a first-of-its-kind seed germination database on Wednesday (April 16, 2025). This free-access database, an initiative of the Ecological Restoration Alliance-India (ERA-I), offers more than 1,000 germination techniques for 465…
Since Donald Trump regained the U.S. presidency, he has coveted Greenland. Trump has insisted that the U.S. will control the island, currently an autonomous territory of Denmark, and if his overtures are rejected, perhaps seize Greenland by force. During a recent congressional hearing, senators and expert witnesses focused on Greenland’s strategic value and its natural…
Two old African elephants, Bully (left) and Susi, stand inside the Barcelona Zoo in Spain, March 27, 2025. | Photo Credit: AP At the Barcelona Zoo, a 40-year-old African elephant places her foot through the metal barrier where a zookeeper gently scrubs its sole — the beloved pachyderm gets her “pedicure”, along with apple slices…
Multiple states in the U.S. were recently in the grip of tornadoes, wildfires, and dust storms. The fires that scorched parts of Texas and Oklahoma burnt through almost 300 homes, reliving the horrors a similar blaze inflicted on Los Angeles in January this year. The fires that raged across Eaton and Palisades in particular claimed…
As dusk sets over The Nilgiris, the river Moyar is bathed in a golden hue. Peacocks make loud, plaintive calls as they show off their beautiful plumage while grey langurs forage for berries. A stocky wild boar makes its presence felt briefly and the air is streaked with the loud calls of racket-tailed drongos and…
