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Ian Hamilton, a lecturer in the Department of Health Sciences at York University, has bought forward certain harmful impacts of the Dry January campaign run by Alcohol Concern and resulted in reduction of alcohol consumption of over 2 million people in 2015. The expert suggests that the campaign’s ‘all or nothing’ slogan is likely to cause more harm than good. However, the campaign suggests that being a part of it can bring about several benefits, from losing weight to money and getting better sleep.

The US Fish and Wildlife Service (FWS) has made an announcement that it is going to carry out a review of 11 species in the next year, to determine if any merit protection as part of the US Endangered Species Act.

One of the well known animals that will be considered is Northern Rocky Mountain fisher, second-timer in the process, which belongs to a small carnivore in similar taxonomic family as minks, weasels, and otters.

They are nearly 3 to 4 feet long, weigh about 4 to 6 pounds, and are short of foot. Fishers have bushy tails, which gives them a somewhat cat-like body shape. They are found throughout Canada, Great Lakes, the US Pacific Northwest, Northern Rocky Mountains, and New England.

NASA has recently created a new segment for the protection of Earth from collisions with comet or asteroid. The Planetary Defense Coordination Office is being headed by Lindley Johnson, a near-Earth object program executive at NASA, who is appointed as the planetary defense officer. The purpose of this office is to safeguard earth from any impact with near-Earth objects. The office is a part of the space agency’s Planetary Science Division in Washington.

A team of researchers has developed a technology for controlling individual microbots, which currently operate in a group. The new technology is based on ‘mini force fields’ and is designed so that microbots can be used in diverse fields like production and pharmaceuticals. An assistant professor of mechanical engineering at Purdue University, David Cappelleri, stated that till now, microbots could be controlled only in unity and not individually. He added that the independent control of these tiny machines will allow them to undertake cooperative manipulation tasks, thereby carrying out different operations at the same time.

A study by the scientists of the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research has revealed that human activities are likely to affect the emergence of the next ice age. As the scientists uncover the mystery behind glacial inception, they have established a unique functional association between the summer insolation and atmospheric CO2 concentration. This association provides the primary explanation for the occurrence of previous eight ice ages.

University of Virginia astronomer Trinh Thuan formed an international team of scientists to uncover the mystery behind the re-ionization of universe in its early stages of evolution. Matter gradually took shape subsequent to the expansion and cooling down of the universe after the Big Bang. Hereafter, the universe reheated and a process known as cosmic re-ionization occurred that led to ionization of hydrogen. The team is likely to have found an evidence for cosmic re-ionization, while studying the emission of huge volumes of ionizing photons into the intergalactic medium by a compact or a green pea galaxy.