Forget the Shovel, Ancient Finds Now Made From Space

Badgers discovered the burial site of 12th-century Slavic warriors and a Stonehenge cremation burial. The Lascaux cave paintings were discovered by four schoolchildren and a dog. The 5,000-year-old corpse of Ötzi was discovered when hikers happened upon in the Alps. The Rosetta Stone was discovered by French soldiers expanding their fort.

Many discoveries in archaeology have happened this way, by accident. But archaeology now has much better tools than badgers and lucky amateurs with shovels.

RELATED: Lost Egyptian Pyramids Found?

So Parcak developed a way to process satellite images with infrared in order to identify chemical changes in the soil caused by the activity of ancient civilizations. She quickly found patterns where there were previously none. With this technique, she located the long-ago path of the Nile and the probable location of this important city, which was the capitol of Egypt for 400 years during its important middle kingdom.

Looking for ancient sites this way has proved to be a boon for the study of ancient human civilizations.

Back in 2011, Parcak discovered more than a dozen lost pyramids and over 1,000 tombs and 3,100 ancient settlements in Egypt alone using this technique.

Last year, NASA archaeologist Tom Sever, archaeologist William Saturno of the University of New Hampshire in Durham, and researcher Daniel Irwin of NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Alabama used satellite images to locate several Mayan settlements that had been cloaked in deep jungle.

In June 2016, Parcak and archaeologist Christopher Tuttle, executive director of the Council of American Overseas Research Centers, used satellite imagery and drone photography to locate an enormous hidden monument in the well-known — and much visited — historical site Petra in Southern Jordan.

Last week, the Afghanistan Ministry of Information and Culture (MoIC), announcedthat it has used satellites to identify 5,000 ancient sites in that country over the past year. It's creating a map of the sites and hopes to use the information to protect the sites from looters.

But that doesn't mean that happy accidents are no longer needed in the quest to uncover the knowledge about prehistoric humans. In fact, Parcak is hoping to solicit the help of interested amateurs to speed up this important work.

Demonetisation: Deposits in banks cross Rs 1.5 lakh crore, more ATMs go live

MUMBAI: Crowds continued to throng bank branches on Sunday, the fifth day after demonetisation, but there were fewer customers waiting to exchange and deposit notes and a large number to withdraw funds. Card transactions at the PoS machines of a leading private bank faced problems even as more ATMs went live (at least for an hour) until cash ran out.

The total cash deposited in banks since the announcement of the withdrawal of the old Rs 500 and Rs 1,000 notes has crossed Rs 1.5 lakh crore, according to estimates received from different banks. SBI received total cash deposits of Rs 75,945 crore and exchanged currency worth Rs 3,753 crore.\

Against this, there had been withdrawals of Rs 7,705 crore in currency notes of Rs 100 and Rs 2,000 until Sunday.

On Sunday, banks took measures to speed up cash transportation, giving more power to officials to improve availability of currency in branches. On Monday, banks will be closed in several states on account of Guru Nanak Jayanti. Cash deposits are expected to pick up next week with utilities ceasing to accept old high-denomination currency notes from November 14.

Branches in eight states - Gujarat, Madhya Pradesh, Chhattisgarh, Karnataka, Kerala, Tamil Nadu, Bihar, and Haryana - will be open for transactions on Monday.

Bankers said they had streamlined the queue system at their branches.

Most banks have started a token a system and separate queues for senior citizens.

"Branches have been strengthened with additional staff to efficiently handle the extraordinary crowd. The services of retired staff are also being utilised. Additional cash counters have been set up with separate counters for senior citizens. Shades/pandals have been placed outside branches and other amenities are provided to make the public more comfortable," said Canara Bank MD & CEO Rakesh Sharma.

The Reserve Bank of India, meanwhile, notified the introduction of the new Rs 500 currency note.

Axis Bank, ICICI Bank, HDFC Bank and SBI have recalibrated some of their ATMs for the new notes. These machines will be tested for a day for accuracy in dispensing the new notes following which they will be loaded with the new Rs 500 and Rs 2,000 notes.

HariChasing site: Wait 2-3 weeks for normal banking, time needed to ...

HariChasing site: Wait 2-3 weeks for normal banking, time needed to ...: NEW DELHI: With anger and chaos over lengthening queues at banks rising after currency ban +  imposed by the government, finance minister  ...

Wait 2-3 weeks for normal banking, time needed to recalibrate all 2 lakh ATMs: Jaitley

NEW DELHI: With anger and chaos over lengthening queues at banks rising aftercurrency ban+ imposed by the government, finance minister Arun Jaitley on Saturday tried to soothe tempers, but said it could take two to three weeks for ATMsto function normally.

Jaitley said at a news conference here on Saturday that each ATM will need to be recalibrated to dispense the new notes, and that is why the whole process would take time+ . He urged people to be patient, citing larger economic benefits from the move to replace old Rs 500 and Rs 1,000 denomination notes with new ones

"Such a massive currency replacement+cannot take place mechanically overnight. It takes time," the FM said. The machines need to be calibrated to the size and weight of new Rs 500 and Rs 2,000 notes. Refuting the charge of mismanagement, he said SBI alone undertook 2.28 crore transactions while queues had been long but orderly.

A finance ministry statement later said a total of over 7 crore transactions took place from November 9 up to mid-day of November 12 for deposit, exchange of old notes and withdrawal from ATMs and over the counter. Old notes of Rs 500 and 1000 denominations amounting to about Rs 2 lakh crore have been deposited with banks

RBI’s new Rs 2000 notes do not have a Nano-GPS chip

The government of India has demonetised the current Rs 500 and Rs 1000 notes, but it plans to replace these with new Rs 500 and Rs 2000 notes. However, rumours are spreading about the upcoming Rs 2000 note, with messages being circulated on WhatsApp which claim the new higher denomination currency comes with a Nano-GPS chip installed on it.

The message claims these notes are embedded with Nano-GPS chips which act as a signal reflector, giving precise location coordinates of the currency in order to allow every note to be tracked. Apparently the chip is so strong that one can track these Rs 2000 notes even if they are kept 120 metres below the ground level, according to the message

Aila! Internet Calls Sachin's Son Arjun Tendulkar 'Indian Justin Bieber

Once upon a time in Bollywood, siblings, especially twins, would keep getting lost and separated in the Kumbh Mela. Well, according to the Internet, that seems to have been the case with cricket legend Sachin Tendulkar's son Arjun and Canadian singer and pop icon Justin Bieber.

It was 17th birthday of the u-19 all-rounder on September 24th and a Facebook page called 'Circle of Cricket India' posted a candid picture of the Jr Tendulkar with his dad. Now, instead of wishing the birthday boy, every one noticed how Arjun bears an uncanny resemblance to Bieber.
The idea has since gone viral on social media with users posting photos of Arjun Tendulkar and commenting on the striking resemblance to the 'Sorry' hitmaker.
Well, while some called the two -- Arjun and Justin -- twins, others, commenting on the uncanny resemblance, decided the Sachin's son was 'Indian Justin Bieber'.

Samsung to offer digital assistant service in Galaxy S8

Samsung Electronics said Sunday it will offer an artificial intelligence assistant service in the upcoming flagship smartphone, as the South Korean firm seeks recovery from its global smartphone recalls.

The Galaxy S8 will let users order food or perform other tasks without going through a third-party application but by simply asking the phone's virtual assistant, Samsung said in a statement. The artificial intelligence service will also be made available in Samsung's other consumer electronics products, such as refrigerators.

The company declined to disclose what specific tasks the S8 phone will perform through its artificial intelligence feature.

Samsung is expected to unveil the next iteration for its flagship Galaxy device in spring as it has typically done in the past. Sales of the Galaxy S8 will be crucial for the recovery of Samsung's mobile business, which saw its latest quarterly profit nearly wiped out by two global recalls of the Galaxy Note 7 smartphone. Samsung estimates it has lost at least $5.3 billion as it discontinued the model, which overheated and caught fire.

The company said last month that it has not figured out what went wrong with the Note 7 phones.

The South Korean company joined the race to create the digital assistant service when it acquired in October Viv Labs Inc., a Silicon Valley startup launched by the same entrepreneurs who sold Siri to Apple. Past and current Samsung phones offer a voice assistant service called "S Voice" developed internally, but the feature did not gain much traction.

Samsung's acquisition of the Silicon Valley firm was seen as its taking another step to seek independence from Google, which offers its brand of virtual assistant service in Android-powered devices.

Executives at Samsung and Viv Labs said that the biggest difference between the existing digital assistant and the one they are jointly developing is that the latter will be an "open AI platform," meaning that third-party developers will be able to offer their services through Samsung's AI platform.

"Our Galaxy smartphones don't provide services that enable consumers to order pizza or coffee, but does provide third party applications. But the new AI platform will enable consumers to do things that they would usually do through a separate third party application," Samsung's statement said.