Sensex, Nifty consolidate; Sun Pharma, Ranbaxy, Jet rally

10:30am Manufacturing PMI

Despite falling from December’s two-year record of 54.5 to 52.9, the headline HSBC India Purchasing Managers’ Index (PMI) remained consistent with a solid improvement in business conditions in January.

PMI is a seasonally adjusted indicator designed to give an accurate overview of manufacturing operating conditions.

Moreover, the latest expansion was the fifteenth in as many months. Sector data highlighted consumer goods as the best performing of the three market groups for the third month in a row, says HSBC in its report.

"Manufacturing activity continued to signal improvement in January, though the rate of growth slipped to a three-month low. The slip can partly be attributed to consolidation after two months of impressive upticks," said Pranjul Bhandari, Chief India Economist at HSBC.

"New orders, both from domestic and international sources, also continued to grow, though at a slower pace than in December. New orders were strongest in the consumer goods sector. On the inflation front, growth in input and output prices moderated further due to cheaper commodity prices," he added.

"Sluggish growth and falling inflation further reinforces our view that the RBI should deliver upfront rate cuts. We expect the repo rate to be lowered by 75bp in the first half of 2015," said Pranjul.

10:00am Market Check

The market remained under pressure amid consolidation following weakness in Asian equities post China data. The Sensex fell 73.99 points to 29108.96 and the Nifty declined 16.30 points at 8792.60.

The broader markets outperformed benchmarks with the BSE Midcap and Smallcap indices gaining 0.6 percent each. About 1230 shares have advanced, 708 shares declined, and 195 shares are unchanged.

Sun Pharma gained more than 2 percent and Ranbaxy jumped over 3.5 percent to hit record highs. The US Federal Trade Commission approved the pharma major’s plan to buy Ranbaxy on the condition that it divests one antibiotic product to avoid anti-competitive impact in the US market. Torrent Pharma will acquire Ranbaxy's minocycline business in the US.

Jet Airways and SpiceJet rallied more than 4 percent as aviation turbine fuel (ATF) is slashed by a steep 11.3 percent which now costs lesser than diesel. The price of ATF, or jet fuel, in Delhi was cut by Rs 5,909.9 per kilolitre, or 11.27 per cent, to Rs 46,513.02 per kl, oil companies announced. 

Two more test positive for swine flu in city

VISAKHAPATNAM: The dreaded swine flu seems to be spreading its tentacles in the city with two more people testing positive for the virus. With this, the total number of H1N1 cases has gone up to three.

The two patients -- a 65-year-old man from Abidnagar in the city and a 35-year-old woman from Vizianagaram -- are undergoing treatment at two different private hospitals in the city. The private hospitals confirmed the two cases as H1N1 positive after they got the swab test results from a private laboratory in Mumbai on Friday.

A four-year-old boy has already been undergoing treatment for H1NI at the government-run King George Hospital (KGH) for the past few days and his condition is improving. The samples of two other people, a 12-year-old boy undergoing treatment at KGH and a middle-aged woman from Srikakulam being treated at the Government Hospital for Chest and Communicable Diseases, which arrived from the Institute of Preventive Medicine (IPM) Hyderabad, have tested negative.

On Friday, two more people, a 56-year-old woman from Kotha Road in the Old City area and 38-year-old man from Gajuwaka, suspected of contracting swine flu were admitted to the Government Chest Hospital.

Dr L D S H Devi, nodal officer for swine flu in Vizag district, said while the two people admitted to private hospitals have tested positive, the samples of two suspected cases tested at IPM turned out to be negative. "We have sent the samples of patients admitted today to the chest hospital to IPM at Hyderabad," she said.

Speaking to TOI, KGH superintendent M Madhusudhana Babu said all precautionary measures are being taken to control the spread of the virus. As part of control measures, a coordination meeting was also conducted at the KGH with the stake holders, including Andhra Medical College (AMC)

Study gives answer to why men think 'sex' when women just want to be 'friends'

A new study has recently revealed that men and women misinterpret the signals regarding sexual interests a lot while having the conversation, it has been reported. Researchers at the Department of Psychology at the Norwegian University of Science and Technology (NTNU), stated that women reported that men often misinterpret their signals of friendliness as sexual interest. Conversely, the men in the study reported that women often misinterpret their signals of sexual interest as friendliness.

In most areas of psychology, there is little to no difference between genders: mental capacity, intellectual achievements, food preferences, men and women are all more or less the same. But when it comes to reproduction and challenges related to finding a sexual partner, there are suddenly differences to be found.

Evolutionary psychology is the study of how the human mind has evolved, developed and adapted over time. One thing that evolutionary psychologists are specifically interested in was gendered sexual psychology between cultures and social groups.

Seen through the lens of evolutionary psychology, they can better understand why men often wrongly assume that women who smile and laugh during conversation might want to sleep with them. A man's ability to reproduce was all about seizing every opportunity. He has to spend both money and time on courtship, which still may not lead to sex. But it costs even more to not try, because then he won't be able to reproduce.

A woman can have sex with multiple men over a short period of time without producing any more children. So for men, it was a low-risk, potentially high-reward situation for men to have sex with women whenever the opportunity presents itself.

On the other hand, the cost was potentially great for a woman if she thinks that a man was more sexually interested than she was. A woman risks pregnancy, birth, nursing and raising the child, as well as lost opportunities to reproduce with others.

Across thousands of generations, women's psychology has evolved to set the bar higher, which means they need much clearer signals than men before they consider sex.

The results showed that both men and women find that their social signals are misinterpreted by the opposite sex. Women in the study answered that they had acted friendly towards a man and had this misinterpreted as sexual interest about 3.5 times over the past year on average. The men in the study also reported having been misinterpreted by the opposite sex in this way, but far less often.

The results also showed that men rarely misinterpret women who actually do signal sexual interest. The study showed that this was independent of whether or not the person was in a steady relationship or not

NASA SMAP atop ULA Delta II rocket all set for launch today

New Delhi: The National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) is all set to launch the Soil Moisture Active Passive satellite (SMAP) mission today at 6:20 am PST (9:20 am EST; 1420 GMT).

Launch was originally planned for Thursday but got delayed by 24 hours, due to high winds, NASA said.

On its website, United Launch Alliance said: “During inspections following the January 29 launch attempt, minor debonds to the booster insulation were identified. These insulation debonds are associated with cryogenic conditions experienced during tanking operations and a standard repair will be implemented”.

The space agency's Soil Moisture Active Passive satellite (SMAP) mission is making another attempt to blast off atop a United Launch Alliance Delta II rocket from Vandenberg Air Force Base in California.

Why is a dolphin not a cat? Researchers explain rich diversity in mammals

A new research led by European Molecular Biology Laboratory and published in journal Cell has revealed the reason behind the rich diversity found in mammals and also explained why dolphin isn’t a cat.

The research explains the reason behind the divergence of mammals by examining genome sequences in around 29 mammals and comparing gene regulation in liver cells from 20 key species.

The researchers explained the ways to turn changes in the genome into differences between species which included change of protein sequence, or by changing the way promoters or enhancers control that protein’s expression.

The team of researches explained that even both the changes can occur at the same time when amino acid sequences evolve very quickly.

Paul Flicek, head of Vertebrate Genomics at European Bioinformatics Institute said that their research focuses on evolution repurposes things that exist in all species, to make each species unique, and by looking at gene promoters and enhancers in many different mammals, their study demonstrated that species-specific enhancers come from ancient DNA.

“What we’ve shown is that evolution repurposes things that exist in all species, to make each species unique,” explains Flicek. “By looking at gene promoters and enhancers in many different mammals, we demonstrated that species-specific enhancers come from ancient DNA – that evolution captures DNA that’s been around for a long time, and uses it for gene regulation in specific tissues.”

Duncan Odom of CRUK CI and Wellcome Trust Sanger Institute explained that with their study findings they can now answer questions about the functional genetics of many under-explored, and this research has also given new insights into mammalian evolution.