News in Short

• Prenatal factors such as vitamin D deficiency during pregnancy, can influence the development of attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), say researchers.
• The findings demonstrated an association between low maternal vitamin D level in early to mid-pregnancy and an elevated risk for diagnosed ADHD in the offspring.
• In the study, the researchers used the exceptionally comprehensive Finnish Maternity Cohort (FMC) consisting of approximately 2 million serum specimens collected during the first and early second trimester of pregnancy.

• Scientists claim to have found a radio signal from deep space that repeats every 16 days.
• Known as the Fast Radio Burst (FRB), it sends the radio wave bursts for four days, stops for 12 days, and then repeats the cycle.
• The study also claims that this pattern is a first such detected periodicity of any kind in an FRB source. 
• The FRB has been traced to a galaxy called SDSS J015800.28+654253.0, which is 500 million light-years away from Earth. In spite of the distance, it is the closest FRB detected so far.

• Deep Kalra, group chief executive of Nasdaq-listed MakeMyTrip, has stepped down, with co-founder Rajesh Magow, who was heading its India business, taking over Kalra’s role.
• Kalra, a St Stephen’s College and IIM-Ahmedabad alumni, will now serve as executive chairman.
• The company, founded by Kalra in 2000, was among the earliest cohort of Indian consumer internet companies to go public when it made its $70 million debut on the Nasdaq in 2010.

• Iranian government officials admitted that an attempt to place a small Earth-imaging satellite into orbit was unsuccessful, the fourth consecutive launch failure for the country’s space program.
• A Simorgh rocket was launched from the Imam Khomeini Spaceport, located in Semnan province in the north-central part of the country.
• But the Simorgh booster did not place its payload, an Earth observation satellite named Zafar 1,  into orbit as planned.

• In a bid to boost tourism, Tripura government inaugurated the state’s first-ever Hornbill Festival at Baramura Eco Park.
• Baramura was renamed as ‘Hathai Kotor’, literally translating to a big hill in Kokborok. The hill is known for its Oriental Pied Hornbills, commonly found in Nagaland.
• While Nagaland’s Kisama village is known for conserving hornbill birds, the local community of Tripura’s Baramura Hills also has a traditional culture of conserving these birds.