The Ergodic Paseo

CompeteWell.org

Researchers found three samples of a rock called kimberlite on Mount Meredith in the northern Prince Charles Mountains. This blue-tinted igneous rock often contains diamonds.

Chunks of kimberlite are often brought to the surface of the earth by volcanic eruptions. They come in two different types: Group I and Group II.

"The fact they are reporting Group One kimberlites is an important one as diamonds are more likely to be found in this style of kimberlite eruption," said Dr Teal Riley, a geologist working with the British Antarctic Survey.

Harvard Medical School has devised a way to understand patterns of aneuploidy in tumors and predict which genes in the affected chromosomes are likely to be cancer suppressors or promoters. They propose that aneuploidy is a driver of cancer rather than a result of it.

Astronomers at The Ohio State University have calculated the odds that, sometime during the next 50 years, a supernova occurring in our home galaxy will be visible from Earth.

The good news: they've calculated the odds to be nearly 100 percent that such a supernova would be visible to telescopes in the form of infrared radiation.

The bad news: the odds are much lower—dipping to 20 percent or less—that the shining stellar spectacle would be visible to the naked eye in the nighttime sky.

The discovery of the Higgs particle is, first and foremost, a ringing affirmation of fundamental harmony between Mind and Matter.  Mind, in the form of human thought, was able to predict the existence of a qualitatively new form of Matter before ever having encountered it, based on esthetic preference for beautiful equations.  

Physicists have made remarkable advances in understanding of the universe during the last two years. On July 4, 2012, the world celebrated the discovery of the Higgs boson at the Large Hadron Collider in Geneva, Switzerland. The discovery, made possible by more than 1,500 U.S. scientists providing talent, technology and leadership, ended a decades-long search. Physicists working in other facilities made progress in unmasking some of the bizarre behavior of particles called neutrinos.

What's next to be answered, and that could well push the seekers to the Nobel corridors.

The Higgs particle is unlike any other particle we have ever encountered. Why is it different? Are there more?

Neutrinos are very light, elusive particles that change their identity as they travel. How do they fit into our understanding of nature?

Known particles constitute 1/6 of all the matter in the universe. The rest we call dark matter. But what is it? Can we detect these particles in our labs? Are there other undiscovered particles in nature?

There are four known forces in nature. Are these manifestations of a single unified force? Are there unexpected new forces?

Are there new hidden dimensions of space and time?

Both matter and anti-matter were produced in the Big Bang, but today our world is composed only of matter. Why?

Raghuram Rajan (IIT, MIT and UChicago), chief economic advisor to the Finance Ministry, a former chief economist at the IMF who was among the first to predict the 2008 global financial crisis, will become the 23rd Governor of the Reserve Bank of India. He will take over from D Subbarao, who retires on September 4 amid a sharp economic slowdown and a plunging rupee.

"Prime Minister has approved the appointment of Raghuram Rajan as the Governor of Reserve Bank of India for a term of three years," said a Finance Ministry statement. His term is extendable by a period of two years.

The particles that make up light, photons, may live for at least 1 quintillion (1 billion multiplied by 1 billion) years.

If photons can die, they could give off particles that travel faster than light.

Many particles in nature decay over time. For instance, radioactive atoms are unstable, eventually breaking down into smaller particles and giving off energy as they do so.

Scientists generally assume photons do not break down, since they are thought to lack any mass with which to decay. However, while all measurements of photons currently suggest they have no mass, they might instead potentially have masses too small for current instruments to measure.

"How much do we actually know about photons?" asked particle physicist Julian Heeck at the Max Planck Institute for Nuclear Physics at Heidelberg, Germany. "They led to several revolutions in science, but their properties are still a puzzle."

The current upper limit for the mass of the photon is less than two-billionths of a billionth of a billionth of a billionth of a billionth of a billionth of a kilogram. This would make it about less than a billionth of a billionth of a billionth of the mass of a proton.

Jehangir Ratanji Dadabhoy Tata (29 July 1904 – 29 November 1993) was India's first licensed pilot. In 1983, he was awarded the French Legion of Honour and, in 1992, India's highest civilian award, the Bharat Ratna.

He joined Tata & Sons as an unpaid apprentice in 1925. In 1938, at the age of 34, JRD was elected Chairman of Tata & Sons making him the head of the largest industrial group in India. 

Under his chairmanship, the assets of the Tata Group grew from US$100 million to over US$5 billion. He started with 14 enterprises under his leadership and half a century later on July 26, 1988, when he left, Tata & Sons was a conglomerate of 95 enterprises which they either started or in which they had controlling interest.J.R.D. had two sons

He was the trustee of the Sir Dorabji Tata Trust from its inception in 1932 for over half a century. Under his guidance, this Trust established Asia's first cancer hospital, the Tata Memorial Center for Cancer, Research and Treatment, in Bombay in 1941. It also founded the Tata Institute of Social Sciences (TISS, 1936), the Tata Institute of Fundamental Research (TIFR, 1945), and the National Center for Performing Arts.

In 1945, he founded Tata Motors. In 1948, JRD Tata launched Air India International as India's first international airline. In 1968, he founded Tata Consultancy Services. In 1979, Tata Steel instituted a new practice: a worker being deemed to be "at work" from the moment he leaves home for work till he returns home from work. This made the company financially liable to the worker for any mishap on the way to and from work. In 1987, he founded Titan Industries. Jamshedpur was also selected as a UN Global Compact City because of the quality of life, conditions of sanitation, roads and welfare that were offered by Tata.

Quotes: "I want a Happy India."

The Psychology of Delay. Some of the causes of delay in coming to economic decisions in our country seem to lie in the psychological realm. There is such a thing as the psychology of power which motivates people: power of control and patronage, power to delay an application, power to hold up a file, power to keep people waiting in an ante-room, all of which are consciously or subconsciously treated as symbols of prestige and hallmarks of importance. (To The Central Advisory Council of Industries, New Delhi, January 3, 1969.)

At the Crossroads.The effective execution of a Plan is what counts and not mere planning on paper; it is not what we put on our plate or even what we eat that provides nourishment and growth, but what we digest. (The Central Advisory Council of Industries, New Delhi, August 13, 1965)

Quantum computers of the future will have the potential to give artificial intelligence a major boost. These computers, which encode information in 'fuzzy' quantum states that can be zero and one simultaneously, have the ability to someday solve problems, such as breaking encryption keys, that are beyond the reach of ‘classical’ computers.

Algorithms developed so far for quantum computers have typically focused on problems such as breaking encryption keys or searching a list — tasks that normally require speed but not a lot of intelligence.