Scientists re-measure the world's deepest ocean trench

The world's deepest ocean trench has been re-mapped in more detail than ever before.

The Mariana Trench, in the Pacific Ocean, is 1,553 miles long. That's about the distance from Britain to the top of Africa.

At its deepest point, it's 10,994 metres below sea level, which would be deep enough to swallow Mount Everest.

The scientists used an echosounder attached to a US Navy ship to make the measurements.

It bounces sound waves off the ocean bed. The time it takes for the sound to get back to the ship shows how deep the ocean is.

The data's been collected to help the USA work out how much land it owns underwater near places it controls like the island of Guam.

But it also gives geologists a really clear and accurate picture of the one of the most unexplored places on Earth.

So far, only two humans have ever visited the deepest point of the Mariana Trench, Challenger Deep - Don Walsh and Jacques Piccard over 50 years ago - and back then, they really were going into the unknown.

New missions to return to the trench are being planned but this time they'll be prepared with a brand new map.

Australian Andrew Symonds enters 'Bigg Boss' in India & Pooja Mishra to re-enter Bigg Boss house as Andrew Symonds's translator

Australian cricketer Andrew Symonds is the latest celebrity in India's version of Big Brother, Bigg Boss.

Symonds arrived in the western city of Mumbai, where the Bigg Boss house is, on Tuesday morning.

He is the first international cricketer to enter the house and he is "hoping to have a lot of fun" and learn more about Indian culture, he said.

US actress Pamela Anderson was a guest last year and Canadian porn star Sunny Leone is in the house currently.

Symonds, a wild card entrant, is expected to be taken into the Bigg Boss house on Wednesday.

He admits he has not seen any of the episodes yet as he did not want to enter "with a biased opinion of the other contestants".

In 2008, Symonds got into a public spat with Indian off-spinner Harbhajan Singh when he accused Singh of racially abusing him.

Model and controversial housemate Pooja Mishra, who was evicted fromBigg Boss, will be re-entering the show as a translator for new celebrity contestant Andrew Symonds.

Pooja was asked to leave the house few days ago after she indulged in violence on the show.

"She (Pooja) will be entering the show again as a translator for Andrew Symonds," sources told PTI.

"Till the time he is in the show, Pooja will be there. However, she will not be part of the nominations," the source added.

The Australian cricketer will be entering the house with Pooja today.

Total Lunar Eclipse to Occur On 10th of December

"On the evening of Dec 10, it will be the second total lunar eclipse of the year. Starting from 7.35 pm, there will be a total eclipse of the moon till 8.28 pm," said Debiprosad Duari, director, research and academics, at the planetarium. 

But for India, this total lunar eclipse would be special as Indian population won’t be able to view it again for next seven years.

Dr. DP Duari, Director of Research and Academics at the MP Birla Planetarium, noted, “For observers in India, on December 10, the Moon will start falling under the Earth's shadow at around 6.15 p. m. The next total lunar eclipse, visible in its entirety from India will only be after another seven years in 2018”.

The total eclipse will last for a period of approximately one hour that is from at 7:36 p. m. to 8:28 p. m. on the 15th of June as well, total lunar eclipse did occur. However, Indian population was not able to witness it because of cloudy weather.

A lunar eclipse occurs when the Earth's shadow falls on the Moon. This can only happen on a full moon night when the Sun is on one side of the Earth and the Moon just on the opposite side. If these three celestial bodies get aligned in straight line on a single plane, a lunar eclipse occurs, Duari said in a statement. 

It is expected that on 10th of December the view of eclipse would be clearer. Usually a lunar eclipse occurs when the sun is on one side of the earth and the moon on the opposite side. The moment when they align lunar eclipse occurs.

This time, the eclipse will be visible in Asia and Australia. The view would be interesting as Moon will noticeably darken and flare different colors as the Earth blocks the Sun's rays, refracting light through its own atmosphere and coloring the Moon much like the horizon during a sunrise or sunset - a phenomenon known as Rayleigh scattering.

Lunar eclipse is interesting views which captures the mind and heart of viewers. Every year, a large number of foreigners travel from country to country to capture the beauty of eclipse. This year, as the eclipse would be visible to half of the world, it is expected that large number of foreigners will visits Asian countries.

Facebook flaw allows access to private photos

A flaw in Facebook allows users to access private photos that are hidden from view, through no less than the social network’s own image reporting tool.

Reporting features in Facebook apparently can allow users to access personal, private and hidden photos from being exposed.

The flaw was spotted by members of a body,no less.which allows Facebook private photos from being viewed and accessed by anyone who uses the tool.

Users who report “inappropriate profile photos” on a users’ profile can continue through the in-built Facebook reporting tool. If selected as “nudity or pornography”, the user can then be given the opportunity to help Facebook “take action by selecting additional photos to include with your report”.

By checking this box, and continuing the process, Facebook then displays a number of additional photos which are not publicly available to the user.

However, more often than not you get some pictures to view. Facebook wasn’t immediately available for comment. One thing to note is that exploiting this flaw requires reporting someone just to see a few pictures.

Details of this flaw were examined in detail. While some browsers restrict this flaw, private photos that are hidden or unaccessible to people who are friends, can not only be accessed but enlarged to their full scale.

Google Adds Graphing Calculator Feature To Its Search Results

Google has this week rolled out a new functionality its added to its search results, with the addition of a new graphing calculator . Google’s new graphing calculator ids sure to be appreciated by maths fans and students worldwide.Students and lovers of all things math need merely to type in a function to the Google search bar, and the tool will render an interactive graph, Google explained today in a company blog announcing the new tool.

The graphing calculator feature now allows you to plot mathematical functions right on the search result page. Just type in a function and you’ll see an interactive graph on the top of the search results page.

"You can zoom in and out and pan across the plane to explore the function in more detail. You can also draw multiple functions by separating them with commas," Google engineer Adi Avidor wrote. "This feature covers an extensive range of single variable functions including trigonometric, exponential, logarithmic and their compositions, and is available in modern browsers."

"I hope students and math lovers around the world find this experience as magical as I found the graphing calculator so long ago," Avidor wrote.

Tata Sky introduces VOD service

DTH Provider tata sky launched Video on Demand (VoD) service which allows its subscribers to watch content on demand and to download TV shows after they have been broadcast. It includes Catch Up TV and VoD library of movies & TV concerts for subscribers for easy download.

Films, TV series, and televised concerts will all be available on demand to Tata Sky's direct to home (DTH) high definition TV subscribers after the  operator unveiled the first of its kind broadband delivered service in India.

A video on demand (VOD) library will include between 500-1000 movie titles across different genres in a variety of languages, while the new 'catch up' function will allow viewers to access and watch TV shows they missed within five days of their transmission.

"We strive to remain the pioneers of the DTH industry. The VoD experience on Tata Sky is set to change the way television is seen in India," said Vikram Mehra, Chief Marketing Officer, Tata Sky.

Vikram Mehra, Chief Marketing Officer, Tata Sky said that the new service will fulfill consumer demand and added that the company will remain committed to providing its giving its viewers the best in television technology.

Tata Sky + HD customers should connect their set top box to their broadband connection via an Ethernet cable to access the VOD service. A customer can then select his choice of video from the title based search function.

The service is for free for the first month after which customers will have to pay for downloading movies while the catch up TV will be available for free.

‘Catch Up TV’ -- a service that allows its Tata Sky+ HD subscribers to watch their favourite TV show even after the original broadcast without the need to record.  This unique service will give subscribers access to select TV shows that can be downloaded from the Tata Sky server and viewed at their convenience.

Currently, Catch Up TV will be providing the Top shows from channels like Star Plus, Colors, SAB TV, NDTV, SONY Entertainment, Channel V etc.

The VoD movie library is an assortment of old and new movies that will be available to the subscriber for easy downloads. It library will host over 500-1000 movie titles across multiple genres and languages in digital quality. Subscribers can choose from erstwhile Kishore Kumar, Rajesh Khanna and Amitabh Bachchan movies to contemporary movies with Ranbir Kapoor, Hritihik Roshan & Aamir Khan.

The VoD service will be available on the Tata Sky+ HD box and subscribers will just need to connect the Set Top Box to their broadband connection through an Ethernet cable.

As part of the launch phase, Catch Up TV and Movie downloads would be offered to Tata Sky+ subscribers absolutely free for the first month. Thereafter, Catch Up TV will remain as a free service and the movie downloads will have a nominal fee.

Mr. Vikram Mehra, Chief Marketing Officer, Tata Sky Ltd. said,

“We strive to remain the pioneers of the DTH industry.  The VoD experience on Tata Sky is set to change the way television is seen in India. After extensive consumer research we know that subscribers use the pay-per-view service; however are in the lookout for TV Shows and a larger library of movies. With our pioneering technology, we have ensured that the user-friendly interface of VoD will fulfill consumer demand. Tata Sky will stay committed to giving its viewers the best in television technology.”

Kepler 22-b: Earth-like planet confirmed

Astronomers have confirmed the existence of an Earth-like planet in the "habitable zone" around a star not unlike our own.

The planet, Kepler 22-b, lies about 600 light-years away and is about 2.4 times the size of Earth, and has a temperature of about 22C.

It is the closest confirmed planet yet to one like ours - an "Earth 2.0".

However, the team does not yet know if Kepler 22-b is made mostly of rock, gas or liquid.

The planet lies about 15% closer to its star than the Earth is to the Sun

During the conference at which the result was announced, the Kepler team said that it had spotted some 1,094 new candidate planets.

The Kepler space telescope was designed to look at a fixed swathe of the night sky, staring intently at about 150,000 stars. The telescope is sensitive enough to see when a planet passes in front of its host star, dimming the star's light by a minuscule amount.

Kepler identifies these slight changes in starlight as candidate planets, which are then confirmed by further observations by Kepler and other telescopes in orbit and on Earth.

Kepler 22-b was one of 54 candidates reported by the Kepler team in February, and is just the first to be formally confirmed using other telescopes.

More of these "Earth 2.0" candidates are likely to be confirmed in the near future, though a redefinition of the habitable zone's boundaries has brought that number down to 48.

Kepler 22-b lies at a distance from its sun about 15% less than the distance from the Earth to the Sun, and its year takes about 290 days. However, its sun puts out about 25% less light, keeping the planet at its balmy temperature that would support the existence of liquid water.

The Kepler team had to wait for three passes of the planet before upping its status from "candidate" to "confirmed".

"Fortune smiled upon us with the detection of this planet," said William Borucki, Kepler principal investigator at Nasa's Ames Research Center.

"The first transit was captured just three days after we declared the spacecraft operationally ready. We witnessed the defining third transit over the 2010 holiday season."

The results were announced at the Kepler telescope's first science conference, alongside the staggering number of new candidate planets. The total number of candidates spotted by the telescope is now 2,326 - of which 207 are approximately Earth-sized.

In total, the results suggest that planets ranging from Earth-sized to about four times Earth's size - so-called "super-Earths" - may be more common than previously thought.