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by Professor Alon Tal
When the United Nations and the World Bank brought together the best minds in ecology from around the world to assess...
Nature’s Lightning Show
Utterly enthralled by the enigmatic nature of dramatic thunderstorms, Jacci Ingham, a photographer from Darwin, sets off on a mission to record these beautiful...
The Birth of Divergence: The Discovery of the Tadpole-Laying Frog
Text and images by Djoko T. Iskandar
During an expedition in 1989, a small, common-looking frog with a body length of about 40 milli-metres was...
Invasion of the Bloodiest: Asia’s Bite-Size Biters
by Associate Professor Gregor Devine
Mosquitos – those bloodsucking demons that have roamed the face of the Earth for more than 100 million years –...
Top 5 Reasons Why Coral Communities Are Dying or Flourishing
Greenhouse gases are wreaking havoc on land and ocean temperatures all over the Earth. The rise in sea and ocean temperatures has caused widespread...
Singapore’s Bloom: 5 Rare Flowers of an Island Nation
HANGUANA NEGLECTA
• Small primary forest herb with black berries
native to Singapore and extending to Johor,
Peninsular Malaysia
• Considered Critically Endangered (IUCN
Red List)
• Currently, only a...
India’s Superlative Banyan Trees
Asia is a land of superlatives – the largest countries, the most populous nations, the highest mountains, and the lowest regions. It’s a much...
The Great Forests of Asia
Humanity’s increasing and often clashing needs for food, fuel, fibre and forests (4Fs) lie at the heart of the 21st-century challenge to balance local...
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Namasté
The Hindu devotee’s hands are pressed together. His palms touch, close to his chest, and his fingers point upwards. His brightly-coloured turban is in stark contrast to his thick white beard. “Namaste,” he says with a slight bow. Literally translated, the word means “I bow to the divine in you.” A respectful greeting, namaste, or namaskar, combined with the wordless hand gesture, conveys the same meaning of acknowledgement for a loved one, a guest or a stranger, regardless of the speaker’s language, culture or religion.