ప్రపంచం తీరూ తెన్నూ

Malaysia Airlines jet with 239 people on board, including five Indians, missing for 17 days crashed in the southern Indian Ocean with no survivors and their families have been informed, Prime Minister Najib Razak stated today, citing new satellite data. "With deep sadness and regret that I must inform you that, according to this new data, flight MH370 ended in the southern Indian Ocean," a grim-faced Najib told a specially convened press conference. The announcement came on the fifth day of an international search effort in the southern Indian Ocean, with Australian and Chinese planes reporting spotting of several floating objects, about 2,500 km west of Perth. There is no official word yet on the wreckage of the Boeing 777-200 that went missing on March 8. Najib said he will hold a press conference tomorrow, indicating that he will then come out with more information on the aircraft. Based on new analysis UK's Air Accidents Investigation Branch (AAIB) ...

Paris has leapt into the headlines over an alert for dangerous atmospheric particles, yet it does not ordinarily count among the world's most polluted cities that include Ludhiana and Kanpur in India. Here are the top 10 cities for which data is available, according to a 2011 World Health Organisation (WHO) report. The pollution is measured as the microgramme (mcg) concentration per cubic metre of air of particulate matter smaller than 10 micrometres (PM10) -- about a seventh of the width of a human hair. The figures are the average for the year. Seasonal spikes can be many times higher. The WHO's health guidelines are maximum exposure of 20 mcg/m3, measured as an annual average. 1) Ahvaz, Iran 372 mcg/m3 (2009 data) 2) Ulan Bator, Mongolia 279 mcg/m3 (2008 data) 3) Sanandaj, Iran 254 mcg/m3 (2009 data) 4) Ludhiana, India (2008 data) and Quetta, Pakistan (2003/4 data) tied at 251 mcg/m3 5...

Russian flags were flying high in the historic naval city of Sevastopol today as people looked forward to rejoining what many see as their homeland after a crunch referendum on Crimea's future. Several thousand people -- many waving the white, blue and red Russian standard or holding flowers -- gathered for a celebratory concert in the city's Nakhimov Square, named after one of Russia's most illustrious admirals. Shortly after polling closed, exit polls confirmed what spectators never doubted and showed that 93 per cent of voters favoured joining Russia and breaking away from Ukraine. "We're free of the occupation," shouted Lucia Prokorovna, 60, carrying a giant Russian flag. "Ukraine was attached to Crimea like a sack of potatoes. Today I visited the polling station -- I only slept half the night hoping for the moment we would be with Russia." Russian rock band Lubeh, known for their patriotic songs, were at the event, drawing a ...

More than 7 million Americans are living with an artificial knee or hip, which may have significant future implications in terms of the need for ongoing patient care, according to new research. Two related studies also found a growing incidence of adults younger than age 65 undergoing total knee replacement (TKR) and total hip replacement (THR) surgeries, and a potential underutilisation of these procedures in some segments of the population. Researchers reviewed THR and TKR incidence rates, mortality rates and relative mortality rates (the difference in survival between THR and TKR patients and the general population), over a 40-year time period, to estimate 2010 prevalence rates according to age, sex and time since surgery. Researchers found that approximately 0.8 per cent of Americans are living with a hip replacement, and 1.5 per cent with a knee replacement. More women are living with prosthetic hips and knees than men, they found. The study also shows that pre...

Malaysian investigators today examined a flight simulator found at the home of the pilot of the missing jetliner while probing hijacking, sabotage and terrorism angles as search operations expanded to large tracts of land and sea covering 11 countries, including India. The mystery of the missing Flight MH370 from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing since March 8 continued to baffle aviation and security authorities who have not succeeded in tracking the aircraft despite deploying hi-tech radar and other gadgets. Malaysian police said they are refocusing the probe on the crew, passengers and ground staff based on "new leads" that the aircraft was deliberately disabled and its transponder switched off before the plane veered from its path. Police chief Khalid Abu Bakar said they have dismantled the simulator found at pilot Captain Zaharie Ahmad Shah's residence and reassembled it in their office to examine it. "Investigations include possibility of hijack, sabota...

The booking of tickets for the Premium special train for Jammu today drew a good response with the dynamic fare system in place for the same seeing a more than 50 per cent jump in the rates for AC-II and AC-III tickets. "Till 5 P.M. there were 563 berths (booked) out of a total of about 1,000 berths on the Premium train for Jammu on March 14," said a senior railway ministry official. The Delhi-Jammu Premium Express, also known as the Jai Hind Express, will run from here on March 14, 16 and 21. Bookings for the special train started today. The official said that going by the response all seats would likely be sold out by tomorrow. While a Second AC ticket went up to Rs 2,332 as against the base price of Rs 1,320, a Third AC ticket fetched Rs 2,109 when its base price was Rs 1,164. With the twin views of meeting the peak demand for travel ahead of Holi and earning additional revenue, the cash- strapped railways had decided to run two superfast Premium trains...

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Eating oily fish or omega-3 supplements could improve children's quality of sleep, a new Oxford study has found. The study suggests that higher levels of omega-3 DHA, the group of long-chain fatty acids found in algae and seafood, are associated with better sleep. Researchers from the University of Oxford explored whether 16 weeks of daily 600mg supplements of algal sources would improve the sleep of 362 children. At the outset of the study, the parents filled in a child sleep questionnaire, which revealed that four in 10 of the children in the study suffered from regular sleep disturbances. Of the children rated as having poor sleep, the researchers fitted wrist sensors to 43 of them to monitor their movements in bed over five nights. The study showed that the children on a course of daily supplements of omega-3 had nearly one hour (58 minutes) more sleep and seven fewer waking episodes per night compared with the children taking the corn or soybean placebo. The study looked...

A national flag, measuring 90 feet in length, 60 feet in width and weighing 35 kilograms, that was hoisted at the Central Park, Connaught Place in New Delhi on Friday. The flag is being claimed as largest and the flagpole as highest in the country.

Questioning police's handling of missing complaints, the Bombay High Court today said that if anybody approaches a police station saying a child or woman relative is missing the police should first take down the complaint, instead of worrying about the jurisdiction. The remarks were made by a division bench of Justices N H Patil and Anuja Prabhudesai while hearing a petition filed by advocate and activist Abha Singh seeking probe by the state Crime Investigation Department (CID) into the "gross inaction" by police officers, who failed to act on the missing complaint filed by the family of techie Esther Anuhya. Esther had gone missing on January 5 after alighting at the Lokmanya Tilak Terminus in suburban Kurla. Her decomposed body was found on January 16 in suburban Kanjurmarg. The police yesterday arrested one Chandrabhan Sanap for the murder of Esther. According to the petition, when Esther's uncle had approached the MIDC police and Kurla railway ...

The New York Times today issued a correction for an error in a story that appeared in its pages 161 years ago about African-American Solomon Northup, whose memoir '12 Years a Slave' won the best picture Oscar this year. In an article that appeared on Januray 20, 1853, the Times had misspelt Northup as "Northrup". The error was pointed out by a Twitter user a day after the movie based on Northup's life won the top award at the Oscars. The 1853 article spelled Northup's name wrong in two different ways. It appeared as "Northrop" in the body of the article and "Northrup" in the headline. "An article on Januray 20, 1853, recounting the story of Solomon Northup, whose memoir '12 Years a Slave' became a movie 160 years later that won the best picture Oscar at the 86th Academy Awards on Sunday night, misspelled his surname as Northrop. And the headline misspelled it as Northrup," the NYT correction said. The ne...