Google signs 60-year lease with NASA

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Google promised to restore Hangar One, a San Francisco Bay Area landmark. (Image credit: wsj.com)

Washington: In a bid to reduce costs and shed surplus property, the US space agency has signed a 60-year lease with Planetary Ventures LLC - a shell organisation operated by Google for real estate deals - to manage Moffett Federal Airfield (MFA) in California and restore its historic Hangar One.

Google will initially invest more than $200 million into the site, NASA said in a statement.

It is estimated that the lease will save the US space agency approximately $6.3 million annually in maintenance and operation costs and provide $1.16 billion in rent.

MFA, currently maintained by NASA’s Ames Research Center in Moffett Field, California, includes approximately 1,000 acres of land located on South San Francisco Bay.

The land includes Hangars One, Two and Three, an airfield flight operations building, two runways and a private golf course.

"As NASA expands its presence in space, we are making strides to reduce our footprint here on Earth,” said NASA Administrator Charles Bolden.

“We want to invest taxpayer resources in scientific discovery, technology development and space exploration - not in maintaining infrastructure we no longer need. Moffett Field plays an important role in the Bay Area and is poised to continue to do so through this lease arrangement,” Bolden continued.

After a fair and open competition, the US General Services Administration (GSA) and NASA selected Planetary Ventures, LLC as the preferred lessee in February 2014 and began lease negotiations.

“Hangar One is an important landmark in Silicon Valley. GSA was proud to support NASA in delivering the best value to taxpayers while restoring this historic facility and enhancing the surrounding community,” added GSA administrator Dan Tangherlini.

“We look forward to rolling up our sleeves to restore the remarkable landmark Hangar One, which for years has been considered one of the most endangered historic sites in the United States,” noted David Radcliffe, vice president of real estate and workplace services at Google Inc.

The negotiated lease will put Hangar One to new use and eliminate NASA's management costs of the airfield, with the federal government retaining title to the property, the statement added.

Children brought to Kerala for studies: Bihar govt

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Kochi: Bihar government Monday informed the High Court that children had been brought from their state to Kerala for studies and it was not human trafficking.

Over 500 children had been brought to Kerala from the eastern states of Jharkhand, Bihar and West Bengal, early this year for being sent to various orphanages.

In an affidavit filed by Deputy Director of Social Welfare Department, Bihar, it was stated that children were brought from Bihar after taking permission of their parents.

The government had conducted an investigation through Crime Branch and it was revealed that no child trafficking was involved, it was stated.

The court posted the cases for hearing after two weeks.

The racket was busted by the Railway Police as the children arrived at Palakkad station and the adults who accompanied them were found to have no valid documents for taking the children from the home state.

They claimed that the children were mostly meant for orphanages in north Kerala and had come with the consent of their parents. However, they could not produce any document to support their claim.

Laundry detergent pods pose poisoning risk for kids

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Washington: Detergent pods pose serious threat to children's health, a study has said.

Researchers have recommended using traditional detergents in the households with children.

'Laundry detergent pods are small, colourful, and may look like candy or juice to a child,' said Marcel J. Casavant, chief of toxicology at Nationwide Children's Hospital, Columbus.

'It can take just a few seconds for children to grab them, break them open, and swallow the toxic chemicals they contain, or get the chemicals in their eyes,' Casavant noted.

Between 2012 and 2013, the US poison control centres received reports of 17,230 under six-year-old children swallowing, inhaling, or otherwise being exposed to chemicals in laundry detergent pods, the study said.

At least 769 children were hospitalised during that period, an average of one per day and one died.

Around half (48 percent) of the children vomited after laundry detergent pod exposure.

Other common effects were coughing or choking (13 percent of cases), eye pain or irritation (11 percent), drowsiness or lethargy (seven percent) and red eye or conjunctivitis (seven percent), showed the study.

'It is not clear that any laundry detergent pods currently available are truly child resistant. A national safety standard is needed to make sure that all pod makers adopt safer packaging and labelling,' said Gary Smith, director, Centre for Injury Research and Policy.

Parents should use traditional detergent instead of detergent pods, which is much less toxic than laundry detergent pods, suggested Smith.

IANS

AirAsia India offers one-way ticket for Rs.699

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New Delhi: Budget carrier AirAsia's Indian arm Sunday launched a week-long sale offer for its entire network with one-way tickets at prices as low as Rs.699, including taxes.

The offer comes as part of the Malaysia-based parent company's 'Big Sale' with three million promotional seats on its network from Kuala Lumpur, with the starting fare of Rs.2,599 for international flights operated by AirAsia Berhad and Thai AirAsia, the airline said in a statement.

AirAsia's offer of Rs.2,599 would be available on flights from Chennai, Kochi, Kolkata, Bengaluru, Tiruchirappalli and Hyderabad to Kuala Lumpur operated by AirAsia Berhad and Chennai to Bangkok flown by Thai AirAsia, the release added.

AirAsia India is offering an all inclusive one-way fare starting from Rs.699 for flights from Bengaluru to Chennai, Kochi, Goa, Jaipur and Chandigarh and vice versa.

Tickets can be booked on Airasia's website from Sunday night till Nov 16, for travel period from June 10 next year to Jan 17, 2016, the company said.

'The 'Big Sale' offer would allow our guests to plan their travel early with extremely low fares,' said AirAsia India chief executive Mittu Chandilya.

IANS

Cricket world champions to get $4 mn

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Dubai: The total prize money of the 2015 World Cup would be $10 million, an increase of nearly 20 percent over the previous edition of the tournament four years ago, according to the International Cricket Council (ICC) Board, which also decided to use the Decision Review System (DRS) in all 49 matches of the tournament.

An unbeaten path to winning the Cup will fetch the victorious team $4,020,000 while a defeat in their way to lifting the trophy will mean a depleted purse of $3,975,000.

The winners of the next year's mega event, starting Feb 14, will receive $3,750,000, up from $3,250,000 in 2011 while the runners-up will collect $1,750,000 in comparison to $1,500,000.

The two losing semi-finalists will each get $600,000. In 2011, the two losing teams received $500,000.

The board also expressed satisfaction with the preparations for the upcoming mega event, to be hosted by Australia and New Zealand and decided to use the DRS in all 49 matches of the tournament with reserve days kept for the knock-out phase matches only.

It was also decided that Super Over won't be used in tied matches in the knock-out phase. In case of a tied quarter-final and semi-final, the side finishing in the higher position in the group stage will progress. If the final is tied or if the match is a no-result, then the teams will be declared joint winners.

The board also approved cut-off dates for qualification to the 2017 Champions Trophy 2017 and the 2019 World Cup.

It was decided the top eight sides on the One-Day International (ODI) rankings as of Sep 30, 2015, will qualify for the Champions Trophy, to be hosted by the England and Wales Cricket Board (ECB).

The cut-off date for the 10-team 2019 World Cup, also to be held in England and Wales - was set for Sep 30, 2017.

The top eight ranked sides on that date will automatically qualify for the 2019 edition of the event, while the ninth and 10th ranked teams will play in the qualifiers to be held in Bangladesh in 2018.

The meeting Monday also saw the acceptance of the Pakistan Cricket Board's (PCB) nomination of Najam Sethi, former chairman of PCB, for the ICC Presidency.

Sethi's nomination will be ratified by the general council at the 2015 annual conference, following which he will take over from Mustafa Kamal as the president for a period of 12 months.

IANS

Suicide bomber kills 48 students in Nigeria

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POTISKUM: Disguised in a school uniform, a suicide bomber set off explosives hidden in a backpack during an assembly Monday at a high school in northern Nigeria, killing at least 48 students and wounding 79 others.

It was the latest attack by suspected Boko Haram militants who kidnapped more than 200 schoolgirls earlier this year.

Soldiers rushed to the grisly scene, spattered with body parts, but were chased away by a stone-throwing crowd angry at the military's inability to halt a 5-year-old Islamic insurgency that has targeted schools and killed thousands.

The Islamic militants _ whose name means 'Western education is sinful' in the local Hausa language _ have intensified the tempo and deadliness of attacks since the government announced last month that the group had agreed to a cease-fire and that the schoolgirls would be released imminently. Boko Haram's leader has denied any cease-fire deal and the girls have not been set free.

Monday's bombing came one week after a suicide attack in Potiskum, the capital of Yobe state, killed 30 people taking part in a religious procession by moderate Muslims.

Some 2,000 students had gathered for a weekly assembly at the Government Technical Science College when the explosion ripped through the school hall, survivors said.

'We were waiting for the principal to address us, around 7:30 a.m., when we heard a deafening sound and I was blown off my feet. People started screaming and running. I saw blood all over my body,' 17-year-old student Musa Ibrahim Yahaya said from his hospital bed, where he was being treated for head wounds.

Survivors said the bomber hid the explosives in a type of backpack popular with students. Months ago Nigeria's military reported finding a bomb factory where explosives were being sewn into backpacks in the northern city of Kano.

Hospital records showed 48 bodies and many body parts were brought to the morgue. Seventy-nine students were admitted, many with serious injuries that may require amputations, health workers said. The hospital was so overcrowded that some patients were crammed two to a bed.

The victims all appeared to be between the ages of 11 and 20, a morgue attendant said.

The U.S. strongly condemned the attack.

'Our sympathies and thoughts are with the victims and their families of these latest egregious assaults on innocent civilians by those bent on fomenting violence, extremism and insecurity in northeastern Nigeria and the region,' U.S. State Department spokeswoman Jen Psaki told reporters in Washington.

U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon strongly condemned the suicide bombing and expressed outrage at 'the frequency and brutality of attacks against educational institutions in the north,' U.N. deputy spokesman Farhan Haq said.

'These repeated and relentless attacks on children and schools are attacks on the future of Nigeria, a country that already has the largest number of children out of school in the world,' UNICEF said.

Ban demanded an immediate halt to 'these abominable crimes' and called for the perpetrators to be swiftly brought to justice and adequate security measures to protect civilians, Haq said.

The Yobe state government ordered the immediate closure of all government schools in the area.

Potiskum was once the home of one of Africa's biggest cattle markets and a booming grain market that attracted traders from neighboring countries before a state of emergency was declared in May 2013 in Yobe and two other northern Nigerian states, where Boko Haram has attacked schools and villages and driven hundreds of thousands from their homes in its fight to impose an Islamic state.

Gov. Ibrahim Gaidam said he was heartbroken by the loss of life during Monday's attack, and denounced the failure of emergency rule. 'Instead of forcing insurgents and criminals to flee, the insurgents are forcing innocent people to flee and making life miserable,' he said.

Nigerian President Goodluck Jonathan owes an urgent explanation to people living under a state of emergency while attacks increase, the governor said.

Garba Alhaji, the father of one of the wounded students, said the high school did not have proper security. 'I strongly blame the Yobe state government for not fencing the school,' he said, adding that just three months ago a bomb was discovered in the school and removed by an anti-bomb squad.

The government of Jonathan, who is running for re-election in February, has promised more security for schools.

Boko Haram attracted international outrage with the April kidnapping of 276 mostly Christian schoolgirls as they were taking exams at a boarding school in northern Nigeria. Dozens of the girls managed to escape, but 219 remain missing. Boko Haram has said that the girls have all converted to Islam and been married off to extremist fighters.

Many Nigerians are angry that Boko Haram has increased attacks and bombings since Oct. 17, when the government claimed to have brokered a cease-fire. Boko Haram leader Abubakar Shekau has denied negotiating a truce.

AP

8 women die, several critical after sterilisation surgeries in C'garh

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Raipur: As many as eight women, who attended the mass sterilisation camps organised by the state government at Bilaspur and Takhatpur here on Saturday, died while several others were hospitalised in critical condition, sources said here on Tuesday.

The first victim was Janaki Bhai (30), who died at Bilaspur district hospital on Monday.

The sate government has ordered a probe into the incident. 

Is the Higgs particle for real?

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London: The particle discovered last year by the European Organisation for Nuclear Research (CERN) may not be the famous Higgs particle as has been claimed, says a study.

While the researchers agree that the CERN experiments did find a new particle that had never been seen before, they noted that there is no conclusive evidence that the particle was indeed the Higgs particle.

The Higgs particle is the missing piece in the theory called the Standard Model. This theory describes three of the four forces of nature. But it does not explain what dark matter is - the substance that makes up most of the universe.

'The CERN data is generally taken as evidence that the particle is the Higgs particle. It is true that the Higgs particle can explain the data but there can be other explanations, we would also get this data from other particles,' said Mads Toudal Frandsen, associate professor at the University of Southern Denmark.

The researchers' analysis does not debunk the possibility that CERN has discovered the Higgs particle. That is still possible - but it is equally possible that it is a different kind of particle.

'The current data is not precise enough to determine exactly what the particle is. It could be a number of other known particles,' Frandsen added.

For the study, the research team scrutinised the existing scientific data from CERN about the new-found particle.

But if it was not the Higgs particle, that was found in CERN's particle accelerator, then what was it?

'We believe that it may be a so-called techni-higgs particle. This particle is in some ways similar to the Higgs particle - hence half of the name,' Frandsen concluded.

Although the techni-higgs particle and Higgs particle can easily be confused in experiments, they are two very different particles belonging to two very different theories of how the universe was created.

The study appeared in the journal Physical Review D.

IANS

WHO reassures on health impact of mobile phones

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New Delhi: The World Health Organisation (WHO) has again sought to reassure billions of mobile phone subscribers globally that no adverse effect has been found till date on an individual's health by its use.

'A large number of studies have been performed over the last two decades to assess whether mobile phones pose a potential health risk,' the premier body on health in the United Nations system has said in its latest fact sheet.

'To date, no adverse health effects have been established as being caused by mobile phone use,' the organisation said, seeking to allay fears in several countries over the ill effects of mobile phone usage on health, including the triggering of cancer.

The fact sheet speaks of both short-term and long-term impact of mobile phone use. As per latest data, there are some 6.9 billion mobile phone subscriptions the world over.

In the short-term assessment, it says, even as tissue heating is the primary concern of exposure to the human body, the frequencies of mobile are so low that they result in negligible temperature rise in the brain or other organs.

It also said a number of studies that used volunteers to probe the effects of radio waves on a brain's electrical activity, function, sleep, heart rate and blood pressure did not find any consistent evidence of adverse health effects.

'Further, research has not been able to provide support for causal relationship between exposure to electromagnetic fields and self-reported symptoms, or electromagnetic hypersensitivity.'

As regards long-term affects, the global body said epidemiological research has mostly looked for a link between brain tumours and mobile phone. It also said such cancers take many years to detect, and that mobile phones were not in use widely before 1990s.

'However, results of animal studies consistently show no increased cancer risk for long-term exposure to radio frequency fields.'

According to WHO, several large multinational epidemiological studies have been completed or are ongoing, including case-control studies and prospective cohort studies examining a number of health endpoints in adults.

The largest retrospective case-control study to date, led by the International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC), was designed to determine whether there are links between use of mobile phones and head and neck cancers in adults.

It said while the analysis of data from 13 participating countries found no increased risk of glioma or meningioma with mobile phone use of more than 10 years, some indications came from the highest 10 percent cumulative hours of mobile phone use.

'The researchers concluded that biases and errors limit the strength of these conclusions,' it added.

Speaking about its own response to the issue as expressed by the public and governments, WHO said it had established the International Electromagnetic Fields Project in 1996 to assess the matter scientifically.

'WHO will conduct a formal risk assessment of all studied health outcomes from radio frequency fields exposure by 2016,' it said, adding it will also promote research and exchanges among its agencies, scientists, governments, industry and the public.

IANS

CMP leader M V Raghavan no more

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Kannur: Senior leader and CMP general secretary M V Raghavan (81) breathed his last at Pariyaram Medical College Hospital here around 8 am on Sunday.

Born on May 5, 1933, Ragahvan joined politics at the age of 16. He made vital contributions to the growth of CPM in Malabar area.

He was expelled form CPM in 1985. Following this, he founded Communist Marxist party (CMP) and the party went on to become a constituent of the UDF.

He represented Madayi, Thaliparamba, Koothuparamba, Payyannur, Azhikode, Kazhakuttam and Thiruvananthapuram West constituencies in the Assembly.

He is also the founder chairman of Pariyaram Medical College, the first cooperative medical college in the country.