The Indian Society of Evolutionary Biologists (ISEB), an independent consortium of researchers and faculty working on evolutionary biology in India, is holding its first conference on the 24th and 25th of October, 2019, at the Jawaharlal Nehru Centre for Advanced Scientific Research (JNCASR), Bengaluru. The two-day meeting is themed around ‘Celebrating Ecology and Evolution in India’. It is bringing together eminent researchers and students across the country, who are actively involved in research on evolutionary biology.

In a new study, researchers from the National Centre for Biological Sciences (NCBS), Bengaluru, and the Pennsylvania State University and Colorado State University in the USA, have studied how flies land on ceilings. The researchers have also explored how the fly’s brain integrates visual and balance-related inputs from the surroundings to generate appropriate movement in the wings and legs to achieve a perfect landing.

In a country that predominantly depends on rain for irrigation, loss of crops due to disruptive weather continues to be a source of distress to farmers, and approaches to make crops tolerant to the vagaries of weather are necessary. In a recent study, researchers have shown that, by modifying particular genes, rice plants can be kept alive through periods of acute salinity in their water supply. 

In a recent study, researchers from Agharkar Research Institute, India, Harbin Normal University, China and the University of Colorado, USA, have described a new genus of diatoms called Kulikovskiyia. Diatoms belonging to this genus are currently found only in the Western Ghats of India and Hainan Province of China. The study, funded by the Science and Engineering Research Board, was published in the journal Phycological Research.

The use of vaccination for preventing diseases has had the most profound effect on human health and quality of life. Despite this, anti-vaccination movements are gaining popularity in recent years, especially in high income countries with historically near universal vaccine coverage, like the USA. Consequently, cases of diseases like measles have seen a 30% rise globally. Vaccine hesitancy has been declared one of the top ten threats to global health by the WHO in 2019. In times like these, what if science showed some added benefits of vaccination besides the obvious? A recent set of studies by a team of international researchers, led by those at the Center for Disease Dynamics, Economics & Policy (CDDEP), Washington DC and New Delhi, have shown that vaccines can have other unintentional positive effects.

Projected to be the third fastest-growing city in the world, Bengaluru's transformation from being the 'Garden City' to the 'Silicon Valley of India' has made it the modern face of the Indian economy. But all this development has come at a cost with the city losing 89% of its green cover in just forty years. Once known for its cool climate, it is now infamous for its horrible traffic and concrete buildings. Middle-class ghettos and affluent gated communities have replaced the famed lakes, and the gardens have been cleared for IT parks. Thanks to the exponential growth, poor urban planning and corruption, experts believe that the city is going to be unlivable in a few years. In a recent study, published in the journal Remote Sensing Application: Society and Environment, researchers at the Department of Atmospheric and Environmental Sciences, University of Albany, State University of New York, have explored the impact of increased urbanisation on Bengaluru. 

In a press announcement, the Green Talents programme, held under the patronage of the Federal Ministry of Education and Research, Germany, has announced this year’s 25 winners from all over the word. These awardees, called ‘Green Talents’, will travel to Germany in late October to attend the Science Forum for talented junior researchers from the field of sustainability science.

The flowers in the Himalaya, a favourite among mountaineers, may have borrowed a lesson or two from the adrenaline-high visitors. As they climb higher, mountaineers carry only essential things, shedding any extra baggage. Likewise, the flowers here shrink in their size and hold less nectar to suit their tiny pollinators, finds a recent study on Rhododendrons, a type of woody flowering plants. The study was conducted by researchers at the Ashoka Trust for Research in Ecology and Environment, Bengaluru and is published in the journal Alpine Botany. 

Human Immunodeficiency Virus (HIV) infections are one of the most severe public health problems in India, with approximately 21 lakh HIV infected people reported in 2017. Sex workers, men who have sex with men, transgender people, and people who inject drugs are at a higher risk of contracting the virus. Scientists across the world are exploring the possibility of a drug that can be taken daily to keep HIV infections at bay, which could help in reducing the spread of the disease and an overall prevalence, besides acting as a preventive measure for those under high risk. In a recent study, published in the journal Clinical Infectious Disease, researchers evaluate if such a drug can act as a preventive measure in a developing country like India. 

Child mortality is a leading cause of concern in many developing countries. Lack of necessary healthcare facilities has resulted in children's death due to infectious diseases such as pneumonia, diarrhoea and other complications related to preterm birth. However, most of these diseases are avoidable with inexpensive interventions like appropriate nutrition, breastfeeding and vaccination. A recent study, led by researchers from the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, USA, and involving researchers from the UK, Switzerland, Canada and India, has provided some insights into how well India has fared in reducing child mortality. The study provides estimates of child mortality at a national, regional and state level in India and is published in the journal The Lancet Global Health.