What do you get when a trip to Sikkim does not follow the plan, thanks to hectic schedule and unfavourable weather? It's frustration for many; an "Eureka!" moment for some! A trip, meant to meet up with fellow scientists, ended with the discovery of two new species of diatoms—Stauroneis sikkimensis and Stauroneis lepchae.

In this digital age, ruled by smartphone apps, how about one to tell you how fresh your milk is? Although there are stringent safety rules concerning the quality of milk, almost 68% of what is available in the country does not conform to them. In a recent study, researchers at the Indian Institute of Technology Guwahati have come up with a paper-based detection system to detect if a sample of milk is pasteurised and fresh. This technique, they say, is cost-effective, rapid, user- and environment-friendly.

Researchers from the Indian Institute of Science, Bengaluru, have used a non-traditional method to measure extreme rainfall events. This approach is more accurate than what is currently used by meteorologists and researchers.

The team of researchers, from the Indian Institute of Science, Bengaluru were attempting to study and classify snakes in the Western Ghats systematically. That's when they came across Proahaetulla antiqua, which is endemic to the southern Western Ghats. What's more interesting is that it is an ancient species, thought to have evolved around 26 million years ago during the mid-Oligocene. 

Every year, since 2010, the 29th of July is celebrated as the International Tiger Day to raise awareness about tiger conservation. India is home to over half of the world's tigers. New tiger populations are still being discovered, with one as recent as last year, in the Eastern Himalayas at altitudes of 3,630 metres. In 2010, India reportedly had 1,706 tigers, and this number increased to 2,226 in 2014. Isn't a 30% increase in population in just four years remarkable?

This article is the second part of the series ‘The How and the Why: Interpreting Scientific Studies’, brought to you by Research Matters. The series focuses on the method of scientific studies, including emphasising the importance of meta-analyses, the repercussions of the replication crisis and the inclusion of ethics in experimental biology. We hope this series will better enable our readers to understand and evaluate scientific research they are interested in and those that could impact their lives.

In a recent study, researchers at the Raman Research Institute, Bengaluru, have used a technique known as spin noise spectroscopy to probe the atomic, magnetic and sub-atomic properties of rubidium vapour. 

Researchers from IISc, Bengaluru and IBM Research-India have developed a machine learning-based technique to manage the demand and supply of power in a network of microgrids while maximising profit. Since such local grids can run on renewable sources of energy instead of relying on fossil fuels, they also reduce carbon emissions and are sustainable.

An international collaboration of researchers have studied the trends in tobacco use in China, Japan, South Korea, Singapore, Taiwan and India. The study, which included a million participants, is a meta-analysis of 20 cohort studies in these countries that collected data on tobacco habits from representative individuals above 35 years of age. The results reveal region–specific tobacco smoking patterns and the resulting mortality.

A team of Indian scientists, working with collaborators from Singapore, Australia and France, have shown how clusters of circulating tumour cells—cancer cells that have sloughed off the tumour and are circulating in the blood—could help monitor the response to cancer treatments and predict a patient's survival chances using a simple blood test.