Alps tunnel to handle 300 fast trains daily

Vienna: Gotthard tunnel, the world’s longest underground rail passage, will be fully operational from December and handle 300 fast trains every day. The 57-km tunnel through the Alps aims at reducing travel time between Zurich and Milan from four to three hours and shifting goods transportation from road to rail. The tunnel is equipped with European Train Control System technology which enables trains to run at speeds up to 250 km per hour. PTI

Earth may be home to one trillion species

Washington: Nearly one trillion species could be living on Earth, yet 99.999 per cent of them remain undiscovered, according to the largest-ever analysis of microbial data. The data represents over 5.6 million microscopic and non-microscopic species from 35,000 locations across all the world’s oceans and continents, except Antarctica.  The Earth Microbiome Project, a global project to identify microscope organisms, has so far catalogued less than 10 million species. PTI