Astronauts aboard the space station have found themselves facing a foe far tinier than any rogue asteroid: A joint study by IIT-Madras and NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory -- under Principal Investigator Kasthuri Venkateswaran -- has revealed that strains of the bacterial species Enterobacter bugandensis, a multi-drug resistant superbug, have been hitting the gym in the microgravity crucible. Though the situation at the ISS is slightly unsettling, holding funeral dirges would be an overkill, says Kumar Abishek.

Rajesh Karkera journeys through verdant countryside to the little-explored pristine Lonar lake in eastern Maharashtra.

National Aeronautics and Space Administration's (NASA's) Double Asteroid Redirection Test (DART) -- the world's first planetary defence technology demonstration -- successfully impacted its asteroid target on Monday, the agency's first attempt to move an asteroid in space.

Stephen Hawking, in his final book Brief Answers to the Big Questions, considered an asteroid collision to be the biggest threat to the planet. At this point, we are as well prepared as dinosaurs were when a 10-km wide asteroid hit the planet 65 million years ago, notes Kumar Abishek.

'China pumps in a lot more money than what we do. China's space budget is close to $5 billion while it is hardly $1 billion for us.' 'We manage the programmes within the constraints of our budget. The main difference is we prioritise.'

A collection of off-beat stories from around the world.

An asteroid the size of a tour bus zipped past the Earth in a flyby so close that it was\\nnearer to the planet than some satellites, National Aeronautics and Space Administration scientists have said.

According to the theory profounded by Professor George Poinar of the Oregon State University and his wife Roberta, the demise of the dinosaurs and the rise and evolution of the insects, particularly the biting and disease-carriers, are linked to each other.

The source of this shower is asteroid 3200 Phaethon.

Toutatis is about 2.9 miles long and 1.5 miles wide (4.6X2.4 kilometres). It looks something like a dumbbell hurtling awkwardly through space. It has a crazy rotation that makes normal days impossible.

2003 QQ47 has a mass of around 2.6 billion tonnes and is 1.2 kilometres wide.