Hindu Notes from General Studies-01

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Powerful 7.5-magnitude earthquake rattles remote Papua New Guinea

News

• A powerful earthquake rattled forest villages and a large gold mine in central Papua New Guinea , and the government sent officers to the region to assess unverified reports of fatalities and check the extent of the damage.

Beyond News

• The magnitude 7.5 quake hit about 89 kilometers (55 miles) southwest of Porgera, the site of a large gold mine that employs more than 2,500 residents.
• The area also is home to a number of oil and gas operations and coffee plantations.
• Oil Search Managing Director Peter Botten said the company was closing down some production operations in the region as a precaution.
• The quake hit at a relatively shallow depth of 35 kilometers (22 miles), and shallow quakes tend to be more strongly felt than deep ones.
• The area lies along an earthquake zone known as the Papuan Fold Belt, which is the fault responsible for the mountain range that forms the spine of the nation.
• Papua New Guinea is located on the eastern half of the island of New Guinea, to the east of Indonesia. It is home to about 7 million people.

Hindu Notes from General Studies-02

 U.K. industry body to shut India office

News

A U.K. industry body which facilitates defence and aerospace partnerships has decided to shut its office in India. Member-companies have however, expressed concern at the decision.

• Beyond News

  ADS (Aerospace, Defence, Security and Space) Group decided to shut down its India office by March end. 

• While a few large U.K. companies such as BAE Systems have their own offices in India, the Small and Medium Enterprises which cannot afford to do so utilise the services of ADS to connect with the Indian industry.
• The closure move was taken by its Chief Executive Paul Everitt in December. Since then about 40 members had raised objections.

Hindu Notes from General Studies-03

 ‘Overexploitation of water alters perennial streams’

News:

• Overexploitation of water for monoculture has altered some of the perennial streams in the ghats of the Netravathi river basin to intermittent streams coming in the way of perennial nature of the Netravathi, according to a study report by a team of researchers of the Indian Institute of Science (IISc), Bengaluru.

Findings in the Report:

• The swamp ecosystem in the basin, spread over 4,409 sq km in 11 taluks in Chikkamagaluru, Hassan, Kodagu, Dakshina Kannada and Udupi districts, is under higher threat due to horticulture expansion and land conversion for other development activities.
• The report “Carrying capacity of Netravathi river basin based on the ecological sensitiveness” has said that soil depth and texture decided the water holding capacity in the catchment.
• The Netravathi catchment is dominated by clayey soils which have fewer pores due to which infiltration capability is very low but have higher water holding capacity which supports larger vegetation and keeps the rivers perennial in natural condition. Soils are moderately deep to very deep in nature.
• The presence of deeper soils with clayey content in the ghats have higher retention capacity during post monsoons and summer keeping the Netravathi perennial. But over exploitation of water for monoculture has altered some of the perennial streams to intermittent streams.
• Referring to the forest cover of 2016 in the basin, it said that the area under forests stood at 51.67 % after losing significant green patch for mini-hydroelectric, infrastructure projects and monoculture plantations. The plantations constituted 26.42 % of the basin.
• The report remarked that the existing exotics should be replaced with endemic species.
• Community-based conservation approach in ecologically sensitive regions (ESR) of II and ESR III would help in the conservation of biological diversity.

New plant species from West Bengal

News

Scientists from the Botanical Survey of India have identified a new plant species from two protected National Parks in West Bengal.

Beyond News

Named Drypetes kalamii, it is a small shrub found to be shorter version of its close relative Drypetes ellisii.This adds to the rich floral wealth of India.

Standing just 1 metre tall, the newly described plant is unisexual in nature, which means they have separate male and female plants.

Medicinal cousin

Dr K. Karthigeyan, scientist at BSI said,the new species is a close relative of a medicinal plant known in Sanskrit as Putrajivah .

NASA had recently named a new bacterium after Dr Kalam, and we also chose his name as he is a big inspiration for students and young researchers,adds Dr Karthigeyan.

The new species is found in wet, shaded areas of subtropical moist semi-evergreen forests, at a height ranging 50-100 metres. With pale yellow flowers in clusters and bright orange to red fruits, the plant is exclusive to the two national parks.

By following the IUCN (International Union for Conservation of Nature) rules, the scientists have provisionally assessed the plant to be “Critically Endangered”. The report states forest fires and grazing as two plausible threats to the new species.

Moon’s water may be widely distributed

News

A new analysis of data from India’s Chandrayaan-1 mission and NASA’s Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter (LRO) suggests that Moon’s water may be widely distributed across the surface, not confined to a particular region.

Beyond News

The findings could help researchers understand the origin of the Moon’s water and how easy it would be to use as a resource.

If the Moon has enough water, and if it is reasonably convenient to access, future explorers might be able to use it as drinking water or to convert it into hydrogen and oxygen for rocket fuel or oxygen to breathe.

The new finding of widespread water suggests that it may be present primarily as OH, a more reactive relative of H2O that is made of one oxygen atom and one hydrogen atom.

OH, also called hydroxyl, does not stay on its own for long, preferring to attack molecules or attach itself chemically to them. Hydroxyl would therefore have to be extracted from minerals in order to be used.

For the study, the researchers analysed data from the Moon Mineralogy Mapper spectrometer on board Chandrayaan-1.

The results point toward OH and/or H2O being created by the solar wind hitting the lunar surface, though the team did not rule out that OH and/or H2O could come from the Moon itself, slowly released from deep inside minerals where it has been locked since the Moon was formed.

Rustom-2 UAV successfully test-flown

News

• India’s under-development Unmanned Aerial Vehicle Rustom-2 was successfully test-flown by the Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO).

Beyond News

• This flight assumes significance because of the fact that this is the first flight in user configuration with a higher power engine.
• The flight was conducted at the DRDO’s Aeronautical Test Range at Chitradurga in Karnataka.
• Rustom-2 belongs to a family of UAVs under development, besides Rustom-1 and Rustom-H.
• It is a Medium Altitude Long Endurance drone (MALE). It can fly up to an altitude of 22,000 feet and has an endurance of over 20 hours. It is capable of carrying payloads for electronic and signal intelligence missions.
• Currently, the three services employ hundreds of Israeli drones and have projected a requirement of hundreds of more UAVs, including armed variants, in the near future. The DRDO is also developing other drones in different categories.

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