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Wednesday, 13 November 2013

A glance into world’s greatest experiment

APPeter Higgs

“I don’t visualise the Higgs boson particle. For me it is just a byproduct of a theory that is significant,” observed Peter Higgs, the 84-year old Nobel Prize winner for Physics, 2013. He was addressing journalists at the opening of the London Science Museum’s new exhibition on the Large Hadron Collider. “So you can visualise it anyway you want,” he said.

And visualising this watershed event in science is what the exhibition “Collider: step inside the world’s greatest experiment” does. Melding imagination and science, the exhibition takes the visitor through the story of the LHC experiment conducted at CERN (the European Organisation for Nuclear Research) where Professor Higgs’ theory of the Higgs boson particle was tested and proved.

Described by Ian Blatchford, Director of the Science Museum Group as “most significant of any science exhibition anywhere in the world, and a major cultural event,” Collider is science communication at its best; an evocative and avant-garde multimedia offering in which scientists from CERN and the London science museum, creative designers, a playwright and video artists contributed, the exhibition will be open till early May.

“With this exhibition we are going where we have not gone before … into meaty, real science,” said Dr. Blatchford, adding it was the close collaboration with CERN and a diverse creative team that brings the exhibition alive.

While praising the exhibition, Professor Rolf Heuer, Director-General of CERN, referred to the egalitarian and democratic spirit and work ethic of CERN that contributed to the success of the LHC experiment, on which a 10,000-strong multinational team worked.

From an innovative video installation in which CERN scientists and engineers introduce the significance of the Large Hadron Collider experiment, with many a digression in irony and wit (“It is not the God particle, but the Goddamned particle,” an exasperated scientist exclaims), the visitor is led into the bowels of the experiment to be shown the working of its innards. Virtual scientists and engineers from CERN take breaks from their work to speak about their role in the experiment. Actual LHC artefacts are displayed, as in a 2-tonne part of the 15-metre high magnets that direct particle beams, which are then revved up and guided to culminate in the explosion of particles.

The highlight of the exhibition is the dramatic and almost cosmic visualisation of the outcome of this grand experiment. Screened on a circular wall, the soundless 3D video sequence in just two captivating minutes takes the viewer through the apparatus of the experiment and its essential stages until two particles, visualised as dancing balls of pulsating light, collide in an eruption of colour and energy. And like lava from an eruption, flows knowledge represented here as streams of data. The curating team includes Alison Boyle, Science Museum Curator of Modern Physics and Harry Cliff, Science Museum Fellow of Modern Science.

CBI Director regrets remark on rape

CBI Director, Ranjit Sinha. Photo: Rajeev Bhatt

Faced with criticism over his remark on rape, CBI Director Ranjit Sinha on Wednesday expressed regret if he had hurt anyone inadvertently, saying he had deep sense of regard and respect for women and commitment to gender issues.

In a statement, Mr Sinha said he had made the comment in the context of legalising betting in sports.

“I gave my opinion that betting should be legalised and that if the laws cannot be enforced that does not mean that laws should not be made. This is as erroneous as saying that if rape is inevitable one should lie back and enjoy it.

“I regret any hurt caused as the same was inadvertent and unintended. I reiterate my deep sense of regard and respect for women and commitment to gender issues,” he said.

Mr Sinha was participating in a panel discussion being moderated by Editor-in-Chief of India Express Shekhar Gupta.

Former Indian cricket captain Rahul Dravid and BCCI’s anti-corruption chief R N Sawani were among other participants.

The CBI Director, who was on the panel of a session on ‘Ethics and integrity in sports-- need for a law and role of CBI’, had said on Tuesday night that there was no harm in legalising betting in the country.

Mr Sinha maintained that the law should be strictly enforced and absence of enforcement or lack of will for idoes not mean that law the should not be made.

Sachin won’t be missed as new generation has arrived: Miandad

The HinduFormer Pakistan captain Javed Miandad.

Pakistan’s former Test captain Javed Miandad feels veteran batsman Sachin Tendulkar will fade from public memory once he retires after the second Test against West Indies as he is leaving the stage at a time when the Indian cricket team has found some exciting talent to fill the void.

“The nature of the cricket fans in this region is such that if a player tries to prolong his international career they tend to forget him soon after he retires,” Mr. Miandad told PTI.

Tendulkar has announced he will retire after the second Test which begins on Thursday. “I must admit, unlike others, I feel that Tendulkar should have retired earlier...and he is now going at a time when India has found some very talented batsmen who are now the reigning heroes and idols of the people,” he said.

Mr. Miandad said Tendulkar was deservedly getting a lot of adulation and tributes in the run up to his final match.

“It is good to see this because Tendulkar deserves all this respect and tributes as he has contributed a lot to Indian cricket over the years and his place among the master batsmen of the modern era is guaranteed,” Miandad added.

“I would recommend him as a role model for all young cricketers in all the cricket playing nations.”

The former Pakistani batting legend saw Tendulkar make his Test debut in Karachi in 1989 and said the teenager had impressed everyone and also fulfilled the vast potential and talent he had.

Rice godown looted in Philippines amid aid shortage

Children who say they fled when armed men were seen in their village wait in Tacloban city, Leyte province in central Philippines on Wednesday five days after cyclone Haiyan levelled tens of thousands of houses. Relief efforts have been hampered by blockd roads and closed airports.AP Photo

APChildren who say they fled when armed men were seen in their village wait in Tacloban city, Leyte province in central Philippines on Wednesday five days after cyclone Haiyan levelled tens of thousands of houses. Relief efforts have been hampered by blockd roads and closed airports.AP Photo

Thousands of people stormed a rice warehouse on an island devastated by Typhoon Haiyan, authorities said on Wednesday, highlighting the urgent need to get water, food and medical supplies into an increasingly desperate region.

Eight people were crushed to death on Tuesday when a wall collapsed as they and thousands of others stormed a rice warehouse on Leyte Island, said National Food Authority spokesman Rex Estoperez. The looters in Alangalang municipality carted away up to 100,000 sacks of rice, he said.

Five days after one of the strongest tropical storms on record levelled tens of thousands of houses in the central Philippines, relief operations were only starting to pick up pace, with two more airports in the region reopening, allowing for more aid flights.

But minimal food and water was reaching people in the devastated city of Tacloban, on Leyte island, which bore the brunt of the storm, and outlying regions due to a lack of trucks and blocked roads.

“There’s a bit of a logjam …getting stuff in here,” said Sebastian Rhodes Stampa, from the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs.

“You’ve had quite a lot of security coming in over the last couple of days, less so other things. So then it gets here and then we’re going to have a real challenge with logistics in terms of getting things out of here, into town, out of town, into the other areas,” he said from the airport in Tacloban. “The reason for that essentially is that there are no trucks, the roads are all closed.”

Since the storm, people have broken into homes, malls and garages, where they have stripped the shelves of food, water and other goods. Authorities have struggled to stop the looting. There have been unconfirmed reports of armed gangs involved in some instances.

Police were working to keep order across the ravaged wasteland. An 8 p.m. to 5 a.m. curfew was in place.

“We have restored order,” said Carmelo Espina Valmoria, director of the Philippine National Police special action force. “There has been looting for the last three days, (but) the situation has stabilized.”

U.S. Brig Gen. Paul Kennedy said that later Wednesday his troops would install equipment at Tacloban airport to allow planes to land at night. Tacloban, a city of 220,000, was almost completely destroyed in Friday’s typhoon and has become the main relief hub.

“You are not just going to see Marines and a few planes and some helicopters,” Kennedy said. “You will see the entire Pacific Command respond to this crisis.”

A Norwegian ship carrying supplies left from Manila, while an Australian air force transport plane took off from Canberra carrying a medical team. British and American navy vessels are also en route to the region.

At the damaged airport in Tacloban, makeshift clinics have been set up and thousands of people were looking for a flight out. A doctor here said supplies of antibiotics and anesthetics arrived Tuesday for the first time. “Until then, patients had to endure the pain,” said Dr. Victoriano Sambale.

At least 580,000 people have been displaced by the disaster. In some places, tsunami-like storm surges swept up to one-kilometer inland, causing more destruction and loss of life. Most of the death and destruction appears concentrated on the islands of Samar and Leyte.

The damaged infrastructure and bad communications links made a conclusive death toll difficult to estimate.

The official toll from a national disaster agency rose to 2,275 on Wednesday. President Benigno Aquino III told CNN in a televised interview that the toll could be closer to 2,000 or 2,500, lower than an earlier estimate from two officials on the ground who said they feared as many as 10,000 might be dead.

“There is a huge amount that we need to do. We have not been able to get into the remote communities,” U.N. humanitarian chief Valerie Amos said in Manila, launching an appeal for $301 million to help the more than 11 million people estimated to be affected by the storm.

“Even in Tacloban, because of the debris and the difficulties with logistics and so on, we have not been able to get in the level of supply that we would want to. We are going to do as much as we can to bring in more,” she said. Her office said she planned to visit

Cameron to meet PM tomorrow

British Prime Minister David Cameron

Expansion of business ties, exploring new areas of cooperation and the Vodafone tax dues issue are likely to figure during talks between Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and his British counterpart David Cameron here on Thursday.

Mr. Cameron will be here on a day-long visit, his third in two years, on his way to Colombo to attend the Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting (CHOGM) on November 15-16.

The British Prime Minister will hold talks with Dr. Singh on number of crucial bilateral, regional and international issues.

Both the leaders are likely to deliberate on boosting cooperation in trade and investment besides enhancing ties in areas of mutual interest.

Issues relating to Vodafone’s tax dues and other matters relating to business and investment are likely to figure in the meeting.

Vodafone, a British company, is facing tax liability of over Rs. 11,217 crore for purchase of Hong Kong-based Hutchison Whampoa’s stake in Indian telecom business Hutchison Essar in 2007.

The Government has agreed to resolve the issue amicably but there has been no significant development in the case so far.

During his visit to India in February, both India and the UK had decided to start negotiations on a civil nuclear pact to facilitate entry of British companies into emerging Indian atomic power sector besides agreeing to explore ways to enhance cooperation in diverse sectors.

India and the UK have vibrant economic ties and the two-way trade rose to about USD 16.15 billion in 2012 from USD 12.56 billion in 2010-11. The bilateral trade between India and UK stood at USD 16.25 billion in 2012. During April 2000 and November 2012, India has received FDI worth USD 17 billion from the UK.

There are about 700 Indian companies which have operations in the UK out of which over 70 are listed on London Stock Exchange.

Mr. Cameron will arrive here on Wednesday night. After holding talks with Dr. Singh, he will leave for Kolkata where he will meet West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee.

In Kolkata, he will also visit Indian Institute of Management (IIM) at Joka and will interact with the students and alumni there.

He will also visit the Indian Museum to see restoration work and interact with an NGO.

Mr. Cameron’s visit to India comes over a week after U.K. announced its decision to scrap the controversial 3,000-pound visa bond scheme for some “high risk” overseas visitors to the country including those from India which was scheduled to be implemented on a pilot basis this month.

India, which had raised the matter with the UK Government, welcomed the decision.

Andhra should be kept united: YSR Congress, CPI(M)

YSR Congress leaders M.V. Mysoora Reddy (left) and G. Ramachander Rao addressing the media after meeting the Group of Ministers (GoM) at North Block, in New Delhi on Wednesday. Photo: Shiv Kumar Pushpakar.
B.V. Raghavulu (R), State Secretary of the Andhra Pradesh unit of the Communist Party of India (Marxist) with the party’s MLA J. Rangareddy addressing the media after meeting the Group of Ministers (GoM) at North Block, in New Delhi on Wednesday. Photo: Shiv Kumar Pushpakar.

YSR Congress Party and CPI(M) on Wednesday told the GoM on Telangana that Andhra Pradesh should be kept united as the “devil of division” will raise its ugly head in other states and create more problems.

Maintaining that the State should not be bifurcated, B.V. Raghavulu, Andhra Pradesh CPI(M) secretary said, “We have expressed our opinion that Andhra Pradesh should be kept intact as more problems would recur than be solved.

“Our party has suggested various measures to improve the livelihood in backward regions of the State,” he told reporters here.

If bifurcation of Andhra Pradesh is inevitable, the Centre has to face problems arising out of dividing it, he said.

YSR Congress Party urged the Union Government to stop the division process forthwith as it would spell “doom” to a multitude of Telugu people for generations to come.

In a letter submitted to GoM, the party has said that it would oppose every step towards bifurcation of the State. “Our party reiterates with clarity and conviction that the State should be united.”

Andhra Pradesh Tourism Minister Vatti Vasant Kumar said, he had on Tuesday urged the GoM to make Hyderabad Metropolitan Development Area (HMDA) a Union Territory.

Without making HMDA as a Union Territory, how will the Centre offer protection to life and property of Andhra region in HMDA, he asked.

Meanwhile, TRS has targeted TDP chief Chandrababu Naidu for boycotting the GoM meeting.

“Among eight recognised political parties in Andhra Pradesh, all of them have expressed their opinion with GoM, except for TDP. He (Chandrababu Naidu) talks about justice, but doing injustice to both the regions,” TRS leader K.T. Rama Rao charged at a press conference here.

SBI Q2 profit falls 33%

THE HINDU

State Bank of India (SBI), the country’s largest lender, on Wednesday posted a 33 per cent drop in net profit at Rs 3,072.77 crore for the quarter ended September 30 after higher provisioning for bad debts.

The bank’s consolidated profit was Rs 4,575.31 crore a year earlier.

Total income on a consolidated basis rose to Rs 53,118.63 crore from Rs 49,917.47 crore in the same period a year ago, SBI said in a BSE filing.

On a standalone basis, SBI’s profit declined 35 per cent to Rs 2,375 crore from Rs 3,658.1 crore. Total income was Rs 37,199.92 crore as against Rs 32,953.47 crore in the same period a year ago.

This is the bank’s first earnings after Arundhati Bhattacharya took over as Chairperson on October 7.

Provisions for non-performing assets during the quarter rose to Rs 2,645.40 crore as against Rs 1,837.19 crore in the same period of the previous financial year.

As of September 30, the bank’s gross non-performing assets (NPAs) deteriorated to 5.64 per cent of gross advances, compared with 5.15 per cent year a year ago. Net NPAs rose to 2.91 per cent from 2.44 per cent.

SBI shares traded at Rs 1,724.90, up 2.95 per cent on the BSE.