Since 2012, six bridges have collapsed in Mumbai, killing 28 people and injuring hundreds. Often, news of flyovers and pedestrian bridges tumbling down have made it to the headlines across the country. Although durable materials like steel and concrete are used in today’s structures, poor quality of construction and lack of maintenance are often blamed for such catastrophes. Contrast this with the rock-solid centuries-old root bridges found in Meghalaya—many as old as 250 years and still growing strong—built without modern tools or design. Could the structure of these bridges unravel architectural clues for urban construction? In a recent study, researchers from Germany and the USA have tried to understand the morphology and structure of these root bridges, built out of the aerial roots of strangler figs, and that have endured floods, earthquakes, landslides and fires.

In a recent study, scientists have discovered two new species in the Western Ghats of Kerala, India. To date, this group of termites has been documented only in the Western Ghats of India. The termite species were named after Sri K.A. Dineshan and Sri. Manikandan Nair of the Zoological Survey of India, Kozhikode, who collected the samples from the field and contributed greatly to the entire faunal survey.

In a recent study, Mr Kamath, now a researcher at Gubbi Labs, Bengaluru, along with Dr Seshadri KS, a researcher at The Madras Crocodile Bank Trust and Centre for Herpetology, Tamil Nadu, has reported the feeding behaviour of Brown mongoose. Though accidental, the study adds knowledge about some previously unknown behavioural aspects of these elusive mongooses. It is published in the Journal of Threatened Taxa.

In a recent study, researchers from Sai Nath University, Ranchi, and Bharathiar University, Coimbatore, set out to quantify the impacts of natural radioactivity on the surrounding environment in the Nilgiris of Tamil Nadu. Their findings have been published in the Journal of Radiation Research and Applied Sciences.