Black panther

The name of Mimi Mondal, a speculative fiction writer and ‘punk Dalit girl’ — as she calls herself — has sprung up after she was nominated for the 2018 Hugo Awards, the first Indian writer to be nominated for the award, for her work as co-editor on an anthology that reminisces on the late Octavia Butler, the pioneering African-American science fiction and fantasy (SFF) writer. Luminescent Threads: Connections to Octavia Butler is a moving curation of essays and letters, and one finds that Mimi is quite a similar firebrand determined to take the SFF pen to the throat of power, identity, and social ills.When you were roped into the Luminescent Threads project, did you see it as an assignment or as an opportunity, or a calling?When I was approached to work on Luminescent Threads along with Alexandra Pierce, I was in the middle of a hectic semester at university. It was a mix of “Wow, this is amazing!” and also, “Wait, can I really do this? Am I … [Read more...] about ‘All science fiction is political,’ says Hugo award nominee Mimi Mondal

The mysterious black hole is located in the heart of the spiral galaxy NGC 3147 and weighs around 250 million times more than the Sun. The phenomenon of the NGC 3147 black hole has been described in the astronomy journal Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society. Scientists are building more evidence about supermassive black holes. Picture: HO / European Southern Observatory / AFPSource:AFP The black hole is encircled by a thin disk, made up of debris and gas that races around the edge of the hole. It is this disk that is confusing astronomers because it technically shouldn’t be there. This is because the black hole is actually ‘starving’ because not enough material is being captured by its huge gravitational field and ‘hungry’ black holes don’t form disks of material — or so scientists thought. Lead author of the study Stefano Bianchi said: “It’s the same type of disk we see in objects that are 1,000 or even 100,000 times … [Read more...] about Black hole discovery: Spiral galaxy NGC 3147

        With a series of all-black bustier gowns that would not have looked out of place on Grace Kelly, a vintage mood reigned on the catwalk at Christian Dior on Monday - although even the historic setting for the show came with modern twists. A model presents a creation by designer Maria Grazia Chiuri as part of her Haute Couture Fall/Winter 2019/20 collection show for fashion house Dior in Paris, France, July 1, 2019. REUTERS/Regis Duvignau ( REUTERS ) Held in the French label’s headquarters in Paris, where founder Christian Dior presented his designs until his death in 1957, the brand’s latest Haute Couture collection was rich in nods to that era, with capes and A-line silhouettes galore. A model presents a creation by designer Maria Grazia Chiuri as part of her Haute Couture Fall/Winter 2019/20 collection show for fashion house Dior in Paris, France, July 1, 2019. REUTERS/Regis Duvignau ( REUTERS ) But rather than a 50s-era salon, celebrity … [Read more...] about Dior goes vintage with all-black bustier gowns at Haute Couture fashion week

KOCHI: India’s Rs 30,000-crore non-tyre rubber industry is headed for a crisis with acute shortage and spiralling prices of carbon black, a key ingredient in the manufacture of rubber products. “The domestic prices of carbon black have risen nearly 60% in the last six months, with 30% increase coming in the last three months,’’ said Vikram Makar, senior vice president of All India Rubber Industries Association. The prices range from Rs 105-130 per kg now. The association estimates the total production in the country at 9.5 lakh tonnes while the demand is around 12.85 lakh tonnes. Lack of further capacity addition and closure of a major manufacturer in Delhi have worsened the situation. Nearly 70% of the carbon black production is mopped up by the tyre industry. But the absorption by the tyre sector has gone up due to a spurt in domestic tyre production after the imposition of anti-dumping duty on tyre imports from China. “Consequently only 10% of … [Read more...] about Carbon black shortage puts rubber industry in crisis

Video PlayerClose SYDNEY, Dec. 9 (Xinhua) -- Thick black ash from bushfires has turned Sydney's iconic blue water beaches into a charcoal sludge, sparking fears from experts that the harbor city's drinking water supply could also be at risk of contamination. The fear is that it is likely to wash the ash into freshwater catchments when it rains, said ecologist Emma Johnston from the University of New South Wales while speaking with Australia's Special Broadcasting Service (SBS) on Monday. "It's not the saltwater places where people need to be worried. It's when you're drinking fresh water that's contaminated that you have real human health issues," she said. With over 2 million hectares of bushland already being destroyed and dozens more blazes continuing to wreak havoc right across Australia's east coast, Johnston explained that if the ash makes its way into Sydney's drinking water catchments it could cause large blooms of toxic algal which might also lead to mass fish deaths. "With … [Read more...] about Black ash from bushfires washes up Sydney beaches