Hindu Notes from General Studies-02
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Aadhaar not mandatory for NEET, other all India exams: Supreme Court
News:
The Supreme Court directed the CBSE (Central Board of Secondary Education)not to make Aadhaar number mandatory for enrollment of students appearing in NEET (National Eligibility cum Entrance Test) 2018 and other all India exams.
Beyond News:
- A five-judge Constitution Bench,directed the CBSE to upload the information on their website.
- Attorney General had instructions from UIDAI that like in Jammu and Kashmir, Meghalaya and Assam, other identity proofs like passport, voter card and ration card can be used by the CBSE for enrolling students in the examination.
- The UIDAI’s remarks came on a plea challenging the CBSE’s decision seeking Aadhaar number or Aadhaar enrolment number from students who are aspiring to take up the NEET.
TB patients to get nutritional support
News:
Tamil Nadu will roll out a programme of providing nutritional support for tuberculosis patients from April.
Beyond News:
- Payments at the rate of 500 per month will be deposited in bank accounts of patients in three instalments during the period of treatment, which is typically six months but can be longer.
- The programme will be piloted at the Government Hospital of Thoracic Medicine, Tambaram, and then extended to the rest of the State.
- The scheme, announced in the Union Budget last month with a total allocation of 600 crore, has been welcomed by doctors and experts.
- Under the Revised National Tuberculosis Control Programme (RNTCP), which provides free treatment to patients in the government sector, guidance provided to patients on nutrition is limited.
The Central TB Division, last year, released a guidance document on nutritional care and support.
Hindu Notes from General Studies-03
A new state of matter created
News
An international team of physicists have successfully created a “giant atom” and filled it with ordinary atoms, creating a new state of matter termed “Rydberg polarons”.
These atoms are held together by a weak bond and is created at very cold temperatures.
How was the new polaron created?
- It uses ideas from two different fields: Bose Einstein Condensation and Rydberg atoms.
- A BEC (Bose Einstein Condensate) is a liquid-like state of matter that occurs at very low temperatures. A BEC can be perturbed to create excitations which are akin to ripples on a lake. Here, the authors have used a BEC of strontium atoms.
- Electrons in an atom move in regular orbits around the nucleus, somewhat like planets around the sun.
- A ‘Rydberg atom’ is an atom in which an electron has been kicked out to a very large orbit. These have interesting properties and have been studied for a long time.
In this work, the authors used laser light on a BEC of strontium atoms so that it impinges on one strontium atom at a time. This excites an electron into a large orbit, forming a Rydberg atom. This orbit is large enough to encircle many other strontium atoms inside it.
As the electron moves around many strontium atoms, it generates ripples of the BEC. The Rydberg atom becomes inextricably mixed with these ripples and forms a new super-atom called a ‘Rydberg polaron’.
Use of Rydberg polarons:
- A particularly interesting implication is for cosmology.
- Some theories of dark matter postulate that it is a cosmic Bose Einstein Condensate, perhaps composed of an as-yet-unknown type of particle. If we are indeed living in an invisible all pervading Bose Einstein Condensate, this experiment can suggest ways to detect it.
India to join multilateral lender EBRD
News
India has got the go-ahead to join the European Bank of Reconstruction and Development (EBRD), after shareholders of the London-based multilateral lender agreed to the country becoming its 69th member.
Beyond News
It enable Indian companies to undertake joint investments in regions in which the EBRD operates.
Set up in 1991, based on a proposal by former French President Francois Mitterand, the bank’s initial focus was helping central and Eastern European nations reconstruct their economies in the post-Cold War era.
It remains committed to furthering the development of “market-orientated economies and the promotion of private and entrepreneurial initiative.”
Indian businesses have already cooperated on EBRD projects worth some €982 million, the hope is that the membership, which will see India take up a small stake in the bank.
India’s stake will also give it a say in the direction of the EBRD’s future work.
Following the approval of Indian membership, India is expected to join EBRD within the first half of the year.
The EBRD works with the private sector and also local governments in the provision of services and infrastructure across 38 nations with projects ranging from transport provision to agribusiness, heating, waste management, to renewable energy.
Scientists on overdrive to save world’s last white rhino
News:
As the health of the world’s last male northern white rhino declines in Kenya, a global team of scientists and conservationists is making effort to save the subspecies from extinction with the help of the two surviving females.
Beyond News:
They are trying to create rhino embryos through in vitro fertilization and its success depends not on the sick, elderly male named Sudan, but on his daughter Najin and granddaughter Fatu, whose eggs would likely have to be extracted because the rhinos can’t reproduce naturally.
Semen from dead northern white rhinos is stored in various locations around the world, and it is critical to keep the two females alive “until such time when the protocol or technique for in vitro fertilization has been perfected.