Curiosity March 2023

E41

Latin word martius, third month of Roman calendar, which means Mars, the god of wars. March used to be the beginning of the season of warfare.

Equinox month; march equinox on 21st march. First and only sunrise in North Pole, while sunset in South Pole. Beginning of spring here in northern hemisphere, while autumn in southern hemisphere.

Defining event from last month had been Feb 6 earthquake in Turkey and Syria, with over 51000 deaths, the deadliest earthquake in this region for over 500 years. | 7.8 Mw followed by 7.7 Mw. Moment magnitude scale, instead of Richter. Logarithmic

Also 2023 Chinese Balloon Incident.

Urine based pancreatic cancer detection using nanotechnology and Raman Spectroscopy could be a game changer in early detection of cancer. Image: Elsevier

This month’s Discoveries

1. Urine test detects prostate and pancreatic cancers with near-perfect accuracy | Raman scattering sensor based on three-dimensional plasmonic coral nanoarchitecture (3D-PCN), biomimetics.
2. U Adelaid Scientists have split natural seawater into oxygen and hydrogen with nearly 100 per cent efficiency, to produce green hydrogen by electrolysis, using a non-precious and cheap catalyst in a commercial electrolyser (cobalt oxide with chromium oxide on its surface)
3. Bans on prostitution lead to a significant increase in rape rates while liberalization of prostitution leads to a significant decrease in rape rates. This indicates that prostitution is a substitute for sexual violence. [Data from Europe].
4. Video game playing causes no harm to young children’s cognitive abilities — regardless of duration of game playing and video game genre, study finds
5. Extremely rich people are not extremely smart. Study in Sweden finds income is related to intelligence up to about the 90th percentile in income. Above that level, differences in income are not related to cognitive ability. | The top 1 per cent even score slightly worse on cognitive ability
6. Greedy people have more money but are less satisfied with their lives, according to new study
7. A study of nearly 200,000 ex-felons in Florida found that ones who resettled in communities with a large number of immigrants had 21% lower rates of recidivism, suggesting that immigrant communities could reduce crime and improve safety, possibly by increasing social bonds.
8. Education to fight misinformation: Education levels impact on belief in scientific misinformation and mistrust of COVID-19 preventive measures. People with a university degree were less likely to believe in COVID-19 misinformation and more likely to trust preventive measures than those without a degree.
9. Humans ‘may need more sleep in winter’, study finds | Research shows people get more deep REM sleep in winter than in summer, and may need to adjust habits to season
10. Air filter installations in school boost the educational performance of students (measured by test scores) by reducing their exposure to pollution.
11. First observational evidence linking black holes to dark energy — the combined vacuum energy of black holes, produced in the deaths of the universe’s first stars, corresponds to the measured quantity of dark energy in our universe | 85% of matter in universe is dark matter, while 65% of energy is dark energy
12. Vitamin D supplements linked to reduced risk of suicide, study of veterans finds
13. Physically Demanding Work Tied to Higher Male Fertility. Research found men who reported often lifting or moving heavy objects at work had 46 percent higher sperm concentration and 44 percent higher total sperm count compared to those with less physical jobs.

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Observances

• 1 Jupiter-Venus Conjunction, Seagrass Day
• 3 Wildlife
• 7 Worm Moon
• 8 Women’s
• 20 Happiness
• 21 Poetry, Nowruz, Forests
• 22 Water
• 24 Moon-Venus Conjunction, Tuberculosis
• 28 Moon-Mars Conjunction
• 30 Zero Waste

Opportunities

• DBT-Wellcome Trust Team Science grant, 21st April
• DST India-EU Joint Call, 29th March
• Australia-India Strategic Research Fund: collaborative research projects Round 15 15th March
• Indo-Argentine joint call, 30th April
• Slovenian, Turkish, and British Council Govt Scholarship calls

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