How is inflation calculated? — Each country has its own method to calculate inflation. However, it reflects how the market prices affect a person’s purchasing capacity. In India, it is based on Wholesale Price Index (WPI) where the price level of the data of 435 commodities is tracked through WPI.

The equatorial area is a region of high temperature. Due to intense heating, the atmosphere heats up, expands and becomes lighter. Hence, the air starts rising vertically, causing low pressure on the ground. The horizontal movement of wind in this belt is very feeble. It is, therefore, a calm belt, also known as doldrums.

First of all, raw buffalo milk stored in big steel containers is given thermic treatment and then it is poured into a cream separator where curdling is done by induction of natural whey. The curd is stored in tubs to reduce acidification processes till it reaches a pH value of nearly 4.95. Then, hot water is poured on it in …

The atomic mass of a specific atom or molecule is determined by using an experimental technique called mass spectrometry. This technique separates different isotopes of atoms to allow determination of the percent abundance or isotopic composition of the element in the given sample. Each isotope of the element appears as a peak in the mass spectrum. The intensity (height) of …

Satellite and cellular phones are wireless devices. They almost look alike but the way they work is totally different. A cellular phone functions on the basis of cells, and hence are called cell phones. The whole network area is divided into small areas and an antenna is installed in each area. These are also called towers. When a cellular phone …

Stars vary in temperature greatly. The hottest stars have surface temperatures of as much as 35,000 (C or more and shine a brilliant blue-white. The less hot stars are, the redder they appear to be. Stars are classed into various groups according to their surface temperature.

The waves that break on the seashore are usually caused by winds blowing across the open sea. During storms, waves reach 12m (39 ft) or more in height. The highest wave recorded in the open sea was 34m (112ft) high. Other large and often destructive waves, called tsunamis, are triggered off by earthquakes or volcanic eruption. They are low, fast …

Bodies of ice, ranging from vast ice sheets to valley glaciers move downhill because of gravity. In Antarctica the ice sheet moves by only a metre (39in) or so a year, while most valley glaciers move the same distance in a day. Special circumstances can speed up the movement of the ice. In 1936-37, Alaska’s Black Rapids Glacier moved downhill …

Telescopes are like time machines. The father off in space they look, the farther back in history they go, because of the time that light takes to reach us from distant objects. The farthest galaxies and quasars visible in the Universe are so far away that their light has taken over 10,000 million years to reach us. Therefore we see …

Stars are too far away to use kilometers or miles to measure their distances, so astronomers use light-years instead. One light-year is nearly 10 million million km, and the nearest star, Proxima Centauri, is 4.25 light-years distant. The farthest heavenly bodies are at the unimaginahble distance of 8,000 million light-years! As the earth moves around the sun, the nearer stars …