SCIENCE

According to the US Space Weather Prediction Center (SWPC), an X2.2 flare occurred at 11.57 p.m EDT on April 19. The flare erupted from a region just beyond the southwest limb of the Sun - likely former Region 2992. The strong flare was associated with multiple bursts on specific radio frequencies but did not result in coronal mass ejection (CME)."Forecasters are waiting for available coronagraph imagery from the NASA/SOHO LASCO instrument to confirm if a CME took place, and if so, analyse accordingly," SWPC said.

In an international collaborative study, researchers from Australia, Denmark and Finland investigated how individuals of the same population differ in their ability to survive on various diets. The researchers utilised a genetic reference panel consisting of roughly 200 closely related fruit fly strains (Drosophila melanogaster). The flies were fed six different diets containing high concentrations respectively of protein, sugar, starch, coconut oil or lard, or a combination of sugar and lard.

A team from Tel Aviv University showed that a mixture of the three food supplements, each approved by the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA), appears to be avery capable of inhibiting replication of RNA viruses in a remarkable way', Times of Israel reported.

The estimated diameter of the largest icy comet nucleus is approximately 80 miles (128 km), making it larger than the state of Rhode Island, NASA said on Tuesday, Xinhua news agency reported.

The 4-member multinational crew will launch on a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket and will travel to and from the space station in a SpaceX-built Dragon spacecraft. The Ax-1 crew members are Commander Michael Lopez-Alegria of Spain and the US, Pilot Larry Connor of the US, and Mission Specialists Eytan Stibbe of Israel and Mark Pathy of Canada.

At least 17 solar eruptions from a single sunspot on the sun have blasted into space in recent days, and may reach Earth as moderate geomagnetic storms by Thursday. The sun eruptions originated from an overactive sunspot, called AR2975, which has been firing off flares since Monday (March 28). The stellar event may also cause some moderate sky storms on Earth, Space.com reported.

The planetary odometer turned on March 21, with the latest batch of 65 exoplanets - planets outside our immediate solar family - added to the NASA Exoplanet Archive. The archive records exoplanet discoveries that appear in peer-reviewed, scientific papers, and that have been confirmed using multiple detection methods or by analytical techniques.

A team of astronomers who scammed about 87 per cent of the southern sky have found no trace of Planet Nine in our solar system yet. Pluto, discovered in January 1930, was earlier known as the Planet Nine. However in 2006, astronomers reclassified Pluto as a dwarf planet. Although ACT was designed to study the cosmic microwave background radiation, its relatively high angular resolution and sensitivity makes it suitable for this type of search.

March or spring equinox, occurring on Sunday, marks the beginning of the astronomical spring season for people living in the Northern Hemisphere, including in India. Spring equinox - also called the vernal equinox - marks the beginning of longer and warmer days. On the other hand, people living in the Southern Hemisphere Southern will see autumn, also known as fall.

Webb's team now expects that the telescope's optical performance will be able to meet or exceed the science goals the observatory was built to achieve. The team completed the stage of alignment known as "fine phasing" on March 11. With the fine phasing stage complete, the team fully aligned Webb's primary imager, the Near-Infrared Camera, to the observatory's mirrors.