Derived from the Latin word titulus, meaning inscription or heading, the ‘tittle’ is a dot or diacritic that is used to mark a lowercase ‘i’ or ‘j’. It was initially used to distinguish ‘I’ and ‘J’ from the neighbouring letters. The ‘tittle’ appeared in the Latin alphabets in the 11th century. Originally a larger mark,…
In 1920, Meghnad Saha discovered his ionization formula (Saha Ionization Equation). In 1924, Satyendra Nath Bose found his photon derivation of Planck’s Law (Bose Statistics). In 1928, Chandrasekhara Venkata Raman discovered the Raman Effect. In 1930, Subrahmanyan Chandrasekhar predicted the Chandrasekhar Limit. Together they contributed to the golden era of Indian physics.
The goldfish (Carassius auratus) belongs to the carp family to which the common carp or Koi fish belongs. It was originally domesticated as normal grey or silver fish by the ancient Chinese. In several cases, the grey fish produced mutated fish that was yellow, orange or red. The yellowish orange (golden) fish were chosen to be…
Borra Caves in Araku Valley, Visakhapatnam, got their name from a hole in the ceiling of the cave. Borra means ‘hole’ in the local language. According to a legend, one day a cow fell into the cave through this hole, and when the villagers reached the cave, they discovered a Shivalingam formation at the spot,…
Lutyens fancied the idea of the great detective walking into the multi-store to meet his urgent needs. It is believed that Sir Edwin Landseer Lutyens had kept this aspect in mind while designing the Gole Market in New Delhi. However, the thought came too late for Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, the creator of Sherlock Holmes,…
The red dirt in Central Australia closely resembles the red surface of Mars, which also explains the abundant formation of gem-quality opal in the red dirt of the Great Artesian Basin in Central Australia. It is referred to as ‘Mars on Earth’.
