Tag Archives: Indian Records

INTERNATIONAL: SPORT / ATHLETICS : Praveen Chithravel Walks the Talk, Breaks National Record in Cuba

ATHLETICS

The Tamil Nadu triple jumper qualifies for World Championships, moves to No. 2 in this year’s World list’

With the country’s top triple jumpers in great form last year, three months ago triple jumper Praveen Chithravel predicted that the National record could fall early this season.

In 2016 when Renjith Maheswary broke the National record, raising it to 17.30m in Bengaluru a month before the Rio Olympics, many rubbed their eyes in disbelief.

But Chithravel spoke of much bigger things in a chat with this writer from his training base, the JSW Inspire Institute of Sport, in Ballari in February.

“The goal is to do more than 17.40m this year. I need to jump something like 17.40 or 17.50m, that sort of process is going on and it’s going good,” Chithravel, the Asian indoor silver medallist, had told The Hindu then.

The 21-year-old walked the talk in Cuba on Saturday, breaking the National record comfortably at the Prueba de Confrontacion athletics meet in Havana with a gold-winning 17.37m. The Tamil Nadu youngster had three jumps over 17m (17.14 first jump, 17.07 fourth, 17.37 fifth) during that stunning series that saw him climb a rung, to second, in triple jump’s World list this year. That also saw Chithravel qualify (qualification standard 17.20m) for the World Championships in Budapest in August.

With Selva Prabhu Thirumaran — the Tamil Nadu youngster had won the under-20 Worlds silver medal in Colombia last year — finishing fourth with a personal best 16.59m, improving his previous best by 44cm, it was a nice day for Indian athletics. However, Asian Games champion Arpinder Singh had a disappointing 15.03m and finished sixth in the same event.

It was not clear whether Chithravel went through a dope test, an Athletics Federation of India criterion to ratify national records, after his Saturday stunner.

“We normally approve a record only after a dope test. Whether they had a dope control (in the Havana meet), I will have to collect all those details,” National chief coach Radhakrishnan Nair told The Hindu on Sunday afternoon.

“We also had national records in the men’s and women’s 5000m (Avinash Sable and Parul Chaudhary at the Sound Running Track Fest in California, a World Athletics Continental Tour-Silver event). There, dope test was done.”

source/content: thehindu.com (headline edited)

GLOBAL: ENVIRONMENT: Wildlife Biologist Dr. Purnima Devi Barman Honoured with the UN’s Highest Environmental Award, ‘The Champions of the Earth Award 2022’

Dr Purnima Devi Barman leads the “Hargila Army”, an all-female grassroots conservation movement dedicated to protecting the Greater Adjutant Stork from extinction.

UNITED NATIONS: Indian wildlife biologist Dr Purnima Devi Barman is among the honourees of this year’s Champions of the Earth award, the UN’s highest environmental honour, accorded for their transformative action to prevent, halt and reverse ecosystem degradation.

Barman has been honoured with the UN Environment Programme’s (UNEP) 2022 Champions of the Earth award in the Entrepreneurial Vision category.

A wildlife biologist, Barman leads the “Hargila Army”, an all-female grassroots conservation movement dedicated to protecting the Greater Adjutant Stork from extinction.

The women create and sell textiles with motifs of the bird, helping to raise awareness about the species while building their own financial independence.

Barman is also Senior Project Manager of the Avifauna Research and Conservation Division, Aaranyak.

The UNEP website said that at the age of five, Barman was sent to live with her grandmother on the banks of the Brahmaputra River in Assam.

“Separated from her parents and siblings, the girl became inconsolable. To distract her, Barman’s grandmother, a farmer, started taking her to nearby paddy fields and wetlands to teach her about the birds there. I saw storks and many other species. She taught me bird songs. She asked me to sing for the egrets and the storks. I fell in love with the birds,” said Barman, who has devoted much of her career to saving the endangered greater adjutant stork, the second-rarest stork species in the world.

“Barman’s pioneering conservation work has empowered thousands of women, creating entrepreneurs and improving livelihoods while bringing the greater adjutant stork back from the brink of extinction,” said Inger Andersen, Executive Director of UNEP.

“Dr Barman’s work has shown that conflict between humans and wildlife can be resolved to the benefit of all. By highlighting the damaging impact that the loss of wetlands has had on the species who feed and breed on them, she reminds us of the importance of protecting and restoring ecosystems.”

According to information on the UNEP website, to protect the stork, Barman knew she had to change perceptions of the bird, known locally as “hargila” in Assamese (meaning “bone swallower”) and mobilised a group of village women to help her.

Today the “Hargila Army” consists of over 10,000 women.

They protect nesting sites, rehabilitate injured storks which have fallen from their nests and arrange “baby showers” to celebrate the arrival of newborn chicks.

The greater adjutant stork regularly features in folk songs, poems, festivals and plays.

Since Barman started her conservation programme, the number of nests in the villages of Dadara, Pachariya, and Singimari in Kamrup District have risen from 28 to more than 250, making this the largest breeding colony of greater adjutant storks in the world, UNEP said.

“In 2017, Barman began building tall bamboo nesting platforms for the endangered birds to hatch their eggs. Her efforts were rewarded a couple of years later when the first greater adjutant stork chicks were hatched on these experimental platforms,” it added.

Barman said on the UNEP website that one of her biggest rewards has been the sense of pride that has been instilled in the Hargila Army and she hopes their success will inspire the next generation of conservationists to pursue their dreams.

“Being a woman working in conservation in a male-dominated society is challenging but the Hargila Army has shown how women can make a difference,” she said.

UNEP said that since its inception in 2005, the annual Champions of the Earth award has been awarded to trailblazers at the forefront of efforts to protect our natural world.

It is the UN’s highest environmental honour.

To date, the award has recognised 111 laureates: 26 world leaders, 69 individuals and 16 organisations.

This year a record 2,200 nominations from around the world were received.

The other honourees include Arcenciel (Lebanon); Constantino (Tino) Aucca Chutas (Peru); Sir Partha Dasgupta of the United Kingdom and Cecile Bibiane Ndjebet (Cameroon).

source/content: newindianexpress.com (headline edited)

INTERNATIONAL: PLANETARY SCIENCE: Dr. Arshia M Jacob, Winner of the prestigious ‘German Astronomical Society Award’

Dr Arshiya M Jacob is currently living the life of her dreams. Interested in science since childhood, she is now a research scholar at the iconic Max Planck Society in Germany. Moreover, she won the German Astronomical Society Award for the best research thesis.

Hailing from Maradu in Ernakulam district, Arshiya completed her B.Sc (Hons) in Physics from St. Stephen’s College, Delhi. In the second year, she was associated with the PSLV project at ISRO as part of her internship. This attracted her to astronomy.

After completing her degree in 2015, Arshia did her post-graduation at Bonn University in Germany. The thesis she submitted as part of the course impressed the director of the Max Planck Institute of Radio Astronomy. After that she got an opportunity to do research at the Max Planck Institute. Her research can be described, in simple terms, as the study of how clouds transform into stars.

Arshia studies matter and radiation in the galaxy. She also discovered some information about the chemical origin of the Milky Way. As part of the studies, Arshia Sofia also flew in the research plane.

Arsia’s research won the Otto Hahn Award, established by the Max Planck Society. The prestigious Otto Hahn Award is given to thirteen scientists who have made impressive research in the fields of physics and chemistry.

She gained the fame of this award when she won the award by the German Astronomical Society.

Dr. Arshia, who is currently pursuing a post-doctoral fellowship at John Hopkins University, Baltimore, United States, may return to Germany after completing his course. At Max Planck she could continue her research work with her own team of scientists.

Founded in 1948, the Max Planck Society has produced 23 Nobel Laureates till date. Swedish geneticist Svante Pabo, who won the Nobel Prize in Medicine this year, is part of the institute.

Research in science requires patience and dedication. Researchers should not be discouraged when results are negative or inconclusive. However, they have to work persistently to get the desired results that can significantly impact humanity.

Sofia
The Stratospheric Observatory for Infrared Astronomy is a joint project of NASA and the German Aerospace Center. The Boeing 747 SP aircraft has a reflecting telescope that can be observed under infrared lighting. The plane flies in the stratosphere – the layer of atmosphere that surrounds the Earth at an altitude of 11-13 km. Ground-based telescopes cannot make observations in the infrared field because the Earth’s atmosphere and water particles block infrared rays.

The Sophia project, which started in 2010, ended in September this year.

source/content: techbric.com (headline edited)