Mercedes-Benz GLA 45 AMG Launching on October 27, 2014

Mercedes-Benz India that launched the GLA-Class SUV recently, will launch the performance-oriented model of the car - the GLA 45 AMG - on October 27, 2014. The car features the same 2.0-litre, 4-cylinder, direct-injection petrol unit that also powers the CLA 45 AMG. Claimed to be the world's most powerful production 4-cylinder engine, it churns out a whooping 355bhp and 450Nm of peak torque. The company has reduced also the car's height by 15mm as compared to the regular model in order to make it easier to handle at high-speeds.

Other features that help differentiate the GLA45 AMG from the regular model are its sportier bumpers, a different-looking grille, quad exhaust, rear diffuser and red callipers. The cabin too looks quite different from the regular model with features a racy flat-bottomed steering wheel, a new gearbox, red seatbelts and contrast stitching on seats and steering.

As far as interior features are concerned, the GLA45 AMG is likely to be offered with rear AC vents, an infotainment system with a large touch-screen, automatic climate control, 19-inch alloy wheels as standard  provisions in addition to necessary safety and comfort features.

Rent a Tata Nano at Rs. 399/Day Through Carzonrent

India's leading car rental company, Carzonrent Pvt. Ltd and Tata Motors announced their partnership, under which people can hire a Tata Nano for self drive at Rs. 399 per day. As part of 'Myles City-Drive' initiative, Delhi-NCR would have access to 200 Tata Nano Twist units across 43 locations in the city. Customers, who wish to own the car for less hours, can get it at a price of Rs. 99/hour. And if a consumers wants it for a month, will have to pay Rs. 6,999.

Speaking on the occasion, Mr. Rajiv Kr Vij, Managing Director & CEO, Carzonrent (I) Ltd. said, "MYLES CITY-DRIVE with NANO TWIST will provide the city commuters a license to drive, empowering them to do and enjoy everyday life a little more. This association with Tata Motors is a step forward on Carzonrent's endeavor to build long-term partnerships with auto manufacturers to develop a dynamic ground mobility landscape in India."

Deepankar Tiwari, Head - Institutional Sales, Tata Motors, "The NANO TWIST is the perfect smart city car for zipping through Delhi-NCR. We are delighted to associate with Carzonrent and through this partnership we will reach out to a larger customer base and give them an opportunity to experience the awesome Nano in a self-drive avatar."

Carzonrent's Myles is currently available across 16 Indian cities and offers a wide range of cars from Mahindra e20, Swift, Innova, XUV500 to Mercedes-Benz and now has added the Nano Twist to its fleet. The car rental company currently has 600 Myles cars and aims to expand its self-drive fleet to 5,000 cars by 2016.

Interested customers can book cars through Carzonrent's official website or their android-based mobile application.

Motorola Droid Turbo Back Panel Image Leaked; 3900mAh Battery Tipped

Motorola's much anticipated Droid Turbo handset, the user manual of which was purportedly leaked last week, has once again shown up - this time in a leaked image on Twitter.

The image tweeted by @DroidLanding shows the Droid Turbo's red-coloured textured back panel featuring a camera and two LED flash modules on either side just as expected, a design first introduced with the Moto X (Gen 2). A Motorola logo in the centre and Verizon branding at the bottom are also visible in the leaked image.

Also, as seen in the leaked user manual (which didn't contain an image of the back panel) previously, the Droid Turbo in the leaked image also features a power button and two volume buttons on the right-side bezel.

The image tweeted by @DroidLanding has now been deleted. However, Phonearena managed to get its hands on the image.

Moreover, the Motorola Droid Turbo smartphone is also being tipped to feature a 3900mAh battery that can be fully charged in 3 hours. The image of the battery showed Motorola EQ40 printed on it, which is the same codename used when the handset was approved by the FCC as per Phonearena.

The Motorola Droid Turbo, as per its leaked user manual, features a 5.2-inch display, a 21-megapixel rear camera with dual-LED flash, and features like Moto Actions, Moto Display and Moto Connect.

Besides 4G LTE, the Droid Turbo also features Bluetooth, NFC, Wi-Fi and GPS connectivity options. Qi wireless charging compatibility is also mentioned as one of the features of the handset, along with support for Motorola's Turbo Charger.

A report from August claimed that Motorola is planning to debut 8 new devices before Christmas. However, out of 8, the company has now already introduced Moto X (Gen 2) and Moto G (Gen 2) handsets.

The report claims that the company is also planning to launch the Droid, the Droid Maxx, the Droid Turbo, the Moto X Play, the Moto S and the much-anticipated next Nexus smartphone codenamed 'Shamu' before the end of the year.

Samsung Gear S Tizen-Based Smartwatch Launched at Rs. 29,500

Apart from launching the Galaxy Note 4 in India, Samsung also launched the Gear S 3G-enabled smartwatch that was unveiled ahead of IFA 2014. The Gear S has been priced at Rs. 29,500 (MRP), and Samsung estimates a market operating price of Rs. 28,900.

The Gear S smartwatch is standalone in the sense that it allows users to make and receive calls via 2G or 3G, unlike other smartwatches, and also offers Bluetooth 4.1 and Wi-Fi connectivity. Samsung says the smartwatch will always remain connected, and can also switch between multiple networks to stay synchronised with the paired smartphone.

However, to be precise, the Gear S smartwatch is not truly standalone, as it requires one of 20 Samsung smartphones during initial setup, and to download apps.

Running on the company's own Tizen operating system, the Gear S now has a separate slot for a SIM card (Nano-SIM) on the back panel along with the heart rate sensor and four pogo pins.
The Gear S features a 2-inch curved Super AMOLED display with a 360x480 pixel resolution. A dual-core 1GHz processor with 512MB of RAM powers the Samsung Gear S. It comes with 4GB of inbuilt storage and is backed by a 300mAh Li-ion battery, rated to deliver 2 days of charge with typical usage.

The IP67-certified dust and water resistant Gear S shows notifications from text messages, social networks, calendars and other applications independently without the need to access the smartphone. Samsung is also touting S Voice functionality for dictating and voice commands, apart from the onscreen keyboard.

Samsung has included its own S Health app, apart from Nike+ Running, to help users track their health statistics. Also onboard is turn-by-turn pedestrian navigation provided via Here Maps, a 24-hour news service from the Financial Times, and more. The device will be available in Black and White colour variants.

"Samsung is leading this exciting and rapidly developing wearable category through progressive innovation," said JK Shin, CEO and head of IT & mobile communication at Samsung Electronics. "The Samsung Gear S redefines the idea of the smart wearable and the culture of mobile communication. It will let consumers live a truly connected life anywhere, anytime."
Samsung, along with Gear S, also launched the Gear Circle in India - priced at Rs. 8,500. The Samsung Gear Circle is a Bluetooth 3.0-enabled in-ear headset that clasps around the users' neck via a magnetic lock when not in use. The headphone can be paired with the smartphone to make/ receive calls, access music, and take S Voice and other voice commands from users. To alert users for an incoming call, Gear Circle also comes with a vibrating function. The device is backed by a 180mAh Li-ion battery rated to deliver 300 hours of standby time, 11 hours of talk time and 9 hours of music play time.

Xiaomi Mi 4 and Redmi Note to Launch in India by Year-End, Says Barra

Xiaomi has received great response from customers in India, and has been making sales records online with the entire inventory of both the Mi 3 and Redmi 1S smartphones going out of stock within few seconds in each flash sale on Flipkart.

Now Xiaomi's Vice President of International Operations, Hugo Barra, has revealed in an interview that the new Redmi Note can be expected to launch in India within the next two months. He said, "A date is not decided yet. Hopefully we will have devices ready to sell in the next two months."

On being asked about the launch of Mi 4, Barra responded, "We don't have a date for Mi 4 yet. I am going to stick with what I said earlier which is still the plan -launch it late December 2014 or early January 2015. I don't think the Redmi Note would conflict with Mi 4 even if we launch them together."

Considering that Xiaomi is no longer selling its former flagship in India, the Mi 3, the launch of the Mi 4 certainly fits in with the company's strategy as it needs a flagship in its India portfolio to make up.

Barra also confirmed that there will be no further Mi 3 sales in India. He said, "No, we are done with the Mi 3." However for Mi 3 fans, Barra revealed some good news - the company may like it did with 25,000 smartphones on October 6, add the Mi 3 automatically to the carts of Flipkart users who were repeatedly unsuccessful in their attempts to buy the popular phones during the numerous flash sales.

"We always keep a few thousand units as a precaution for replacements. However, once we are sure that we don't need that stock for replacement any more, we may do something to what we did on the 6th October for customers who did not get the Mi 3 even after 5 attempts," he added.

Xiaomi is all set to offer 1,00,00 Redmi 1S units on the sixth flash sale units on October 14. Notably, the sixth flash sale on Tuesday will kick off at 2pm IST on Flipkart for registered users.

How to Keep Your Brain Healthy

Could sudoku, drugs and a Mediterranean diet help keep our brains fit? What can the latest neuroscience research tell us?

Neuroscience research got a huge boost last week with news of Professor John O'Keefe's Nobel prize for work on the "brain's internal GPS system". It is an exciting new part of the giant jigsaw puzzle of our brain and how it functions. But how does cutting-edge neuroscience research translate into practical advice about how to pass exams, remember names, tot up household bills and find where the hell you left the car in a crowded car park?

O'Keefe's prize was awarded jointly with Swedish husband and wife team Edvard and May-Britt Moser for their discovery of "place and grid cells" that allow rats to chart where they are. When rats run through a new environment, these cells show increased activity. The same activity happens much faster while the rats are asleep, as they replay the new route.

We already knew that the part of the brain known as the hippocampus was involved in spatial awareness in birds and mammals, and this latest work on place cells sheds more light on how we know where we are and where we're going. In 2000, researchers at University College London led by Dr Eleanor Maguire showed that London taxi drivers develop a pumped-up hippocampus after years of doing the knowledge and navigating the backstreets of the city. MRI scans showed that cabbies start off with bigger hippocampuses than average, and that the area gets bigger the longer they do the job. As driver David Cohen said at the time to BBC News: "I never noticed part of my brain growing - it makes you wonder what happened to the rest of it!"

Yet great breakthroughs don't automatically translate into practical benefits. "Research may give us great insights, but we still can't cure Alzheimer's," points out neuroscientist Baroness Susan Greenfield. "And just because we know more about what parts of the brain do normally, it doesn't tell us why things go wrong. We still need to know why special cells die in dementia. How come you can have a major stroke with lots of neuronal damage, but not lose your memory? What is the link between Parkinson's disease and dementia?" In other words, why are some cells damaged but not others?

Lab-based research is key to piecing together the jigsaw of how our brains work and what goes wrong when they don't. Even scans or postmortem examinations of brains of people who had dementia are of limited value, points out Greenfied, because "degeneration starts 10-20 years before symptoms appear". So what does neuroscience tell us about keeping the brain fit?

Professor John O'Keefe.Photograph: Facundo Arrizabalaga/EPA

Use it or lose it It seems obvious that the more you train, use and test your brain, the better it will perform. There is some evidence that people with more education or skills have a lower incidence of dementia. But the picture is complicated; perhaps highly educated people eat better food. And more skilled people may be more likely to be in work, benefiting from exercise, social interaction and mental stimulation. You may build up a "cognitive reserve" while young, which gives you a headstart over less educated people once dementia sets in. Staying physically, mentally and socially active means that even if your brain scan looks as ropey as that of a less active person, you will function better. No one can confirm the benefits, but there is at least no downside to daily sudoku, crosswords, reading, walks and talks.

Neuro-enhancing drugs Nootropics are also called smart drugs or cognitive enhancers. One of the best known is modafinil, a "wakefulness-promoting" drug that stimulates the central nervous system and is only prescribable in the UK for excessive daytime sleepiness (narcolepsy). Whether it is much more effective than a strong cup of coffee remains debatable, but its effect lasts longer. Modafinil is widely used by academics and students because it makes people feel sharper and more alert. Professor Barbara Sahakian of the University of Cambridge has found that sleep-deprived surgeons perform better on modafinil, and thinks it may have a wider role in improving our memory and mental function. "We found that modafinil improves motivation and working memory in healthy people and makes doing tasks more pleasurable," she said. But long-term safety, especially for young brains, is still not established. But for a lot of students, the question isn't whether the drugs are safe or constitute cheating, but how they can get hold of some.

Avoiding damage Our environment is full of neurotoxins that can interfere with the genes, proteins and small molecules that build and maintain our brains. The younger the brain, the more susceptible it is to neurotoxins. A paper by the US National Scientific Council on the Developing Child says there are three types of neurotoxins that can affect the developing brain: environmental chemicals such as lead, mercury and organophosphates (pesticides); recreational drugs such as alcohol, nicotine and cocaine; and prescription medications such as Roaccutane, used for severe acne. Mature brains can be quite resilient, thanks in part to a barrier of cells that restricts entry of chemicals from the bloodstream into the brain tissue. But drugs, alcohol and cigarettes will poison even the most developed of brains if you take enough of them.

Keep the blood flowing The brain needs a good blood flow to deliver vital nutrients and oxygen and take away waste products. Smoking, high blood pressure, uncontrolled diabetes, obesity and high cholesterol all sludge up the arteries and impede blood flow. If you care about your brain function, sorting out these risk factors remains the most useful thing you can do.

Effects of diet Omega-3 fatty acids, antioxidants such as vitamins C and E, and vitamins B and D all have neuroprotective effects, but trials have failed to show that high-dose supplements of these individual nutrients will protect you from dementia. However, eating a tasty Mediterranean diet that combines most of these nutrients can't hurt.

Future research Professor Sahakian has identified five areas of neuroscience research that will help our understanding over the next five years.

• Smart and wearable technology to monitor people's brain health - similar to wristband monitors that track heart rate.


• Brain scanning to monitor changes in mental illness and track changes during treatments such as CBT.

• Trials of neuroprotective drugs such as solanezumab to prevent further deterioration in patients with Alzheimer's disease.

• Connectomics, the study and production of connectomes - neural maps of the brain - will combine a number of techniques to map and study connectivity in the brain.

• Genetics, to understand the genetic mutations that contribute to autism and other conditions.

 A brain ready for dissection. Photograph: Graeme Robertson/Guardian

Kawasaki to Launch Its Most Affordable Bike - Z250 - on October 16

Before we get started, remember we first told you about the Kawasaki Z250's impending arrival in India way back in February? Back then reports had us believe that Kawasaki was planning to bring in its most affordable bike - the Z250 - here by June, 2014. Turns out, the company decided it needed more time to bring in this baby and agreed to keep its Indian audience hooked with the launch of the Z800 and Z1000 in the meanwhile. However, the wait is almost over, for Kawasaki is said to be now gearing up to launch the Z250 and the Er-6n in a few days; on October 16, 2014, to be precise.
The Kawasaki Z250 looks similar to the Z800, thanks to its headlight and tank design that have been borrowed from the latter. That said, the Z250 also finds inspiration in the Ninja 300, primarily due to the identical tail section and alloy wheels. Its instrument console looks similar to that of the Ninja 300, and includes an analogue tachometer and an LCD screen that displays speed, trip and fuel level information.
Now, for the engine: the Kawasaki Z250 is powered by a 249cc, liquid-cooled, parallel-twin motor that develops 33bhp and 21Nm of turning power. Power is transmitted to the rear wheel via a 6-speed gearbox, which also does duty on the Ninja 250R. As far as fuel efficiency is concerned, the bike gets a fuel-injection system and dual throttle valve technology to help the cause.