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GS Paper: GS3-17.Awareness in the fields of IT, Space, Computers, Robotics, Nano-technology, Bio-technology and issues relating to Intellectual Property Rights.

  • Discovery Program investigations by NASA

    NASA announced it has selected four Discovery Program investigations to develop concept studies for possible new missions.

    What are the new missions?

    • Two proposals are for trips to Venus, and one each is for Jupiter’s moon Io and Neptune’s moon Triton.
    • After the concept studies are completed in nine months, some missions ultimately may not be chosen to move forward.

    DAVINCI+

    • DAVINCI+ stands for Deep Atmosphere Venus Investigation of Noble gases, Chemistry, and Imaging Plus.
    • This will analyse Venus’s atmosphere to understand how it was formed and evolved, and if it ever had an ocean.
    • This will advance understanding of the formation of terrestrial planets.

    IVO

    • Io Volcano Observer is a proposal to explore Jupiter’s moon Io, which is extremely volcanically active.
    • This will try to find out how tidal forces shape planetary bodies.
    • The findings could further knowledge about the formation and evolution of rocky, terrestrial bodies and icy ocean worlds in the Solar System.

    TRIDENT

    This aims to explore Neptune’s icy moon, Triton, so that scientists can understand the development of habitable worlds in the Solar System.

    VERITAS

    Venus Emissivity, Radio Science, InSAR, Topography, and Spectroscopy will aim to map Venus’s surface to find out why Venus developed so differently from Earth.

  • The ‘Pale Blue Dot’

     

    The Jet Propulsion Laboratory of the NASA published a new version of the image of Pale Blue Dot.

    Pale Blue Dot

    • The ‘Pale Blue Dot’ is one of the most iconic images in the history of astronomy.
    • It shows Earth as a single bright blue pixel in empty space within a strand of sun rays, some of which are scattering from and enlightening the planet.
    • The original image was taken by the Voyager 1 mission spacecraft on February 14, 1990 when it was just beyond Saturn.
    • At the behest of astronomer Carl Sagan, the cameras were turned towards Earth one final time to capture the image.
    • After this, the cameras and other instruments on the craft were turned off to ensure its longevity.

    About Voyager 1

    • Voyager 1 is a space probe launched by NASA on September 5, 1977.
    • Having operated for more than 42 years, the spacecraft still communicates with the Deep Space Network to receive routine commands and to transmit data to Earth.
    • At a distance of 148.67 AU (22.2 billion km) from Earth as of January 19, 2020 it is the most distant man-made object from Earth.
    • The probe’s objectives included flybys of Jupiter, Saturn, and Saturn’s largest moon, Titan.

    The Family Portrait of the Solar System

    • The Pale blue dot image was a part of series of 60 images designed to produce what the mission called the ‘Family Portrait of the Solar System’.
    • This sequence of camera-pointing commands returned images of six of the solar system’s planets, as well as the Sun.

  • SuperCam on Mars Rover 2020

     

    In its mission to Mars this summer, NASA is sending a new laser-toting robot called SuperCam as one of seven instruments aboard the Mars 2020 rover.

    SuperCam

    • Called SuperCam, the robot is used for studying mineralogy and chemistry from up to about 7 metres away.
    • It might help scientists find signs of fossilized microbial life on Mars.
    • SuperCam packs what would typically require several sizable pieces of equipment into something no bigger than a cereal box.
    • It fires a pulsed laser beam out of the rover’s mast to vaporise small portions of rock from a distance, providing information that will be essential to the mission’s success.

    NASA lists five things to know

    • From more than 7 m away, SuperCam can fire a laser to study rock targets smaller than a pencil point. That lets the rover study spots it can’t reach with its arm.
    • SuperCam looks at rock textures and chemicals to find those that formed or changed in water on Mars long ago.
    • SuperCam looks at different rock and “soil” types to find ones that could preserve signs of past microbial life on Mars — if any ever existed.
    • For the benefit of future explorers, SuperCam identifies which elements in the Martian dust may be harmful to humans.
    • Scientists can learn about how atmospheric molecules, water ice, and dust absorb or reflect solar radiation. This helps predict Martian weather better.

  • Solar Orbiter (SolO) Probe

     

    Yesterday, the Solar Orbiter, a collaborative mission between the European Space Agency and NASA to study the Sun, took off from Cape Canaveral in Florida.

    What is the Solar Orbiter?

    • Carrying four in situ instruments and six remote-sensing imagers, the Solar Orbiter (called SolO) will face the sun at approximately 42 million kilometres from its surface.
    • Before SolO, all solar imaging instruments have been within the ecliptic plane, in which all planets orbit and which is aligned with the sun’s equator.
    • The new spacecraft will use the gravity of Venus and Earth to swing itself out of the ecliptic plane, passing inside the orbit of Mercury, and will be able to get a bird’s eye view of the sun’s poles for the first time.

    Objectives of the mission

    • The Orbiter will take pictures using telescopes through a heat shield that is partly made of baked animal bones, to help it withstand temperatures of up to 600 degree Celsius.
    • By understanding the behaviour of the sun, the Orbiter aims to provide information on how the former would affect technology such as satellites, navigation systems, power grids, and telecommunication services.
    • The Orbiter will help scientists understand the sun’s dynamic behaviour, and solve mysteries such as the sunspot cycle, or why the star spews out high velocity charged particles through the solar system.
    • With more data on the global magnetic field of the star, scientists would be able to forecast space weather events.

    Earlier missions

    • In 1990, NASA and ESA had sent the Ulysses mission, which also passed over the sun’s poles but at much farther distances, and did not carry a camera.

  • Genome India Project

     

    The Union Govt. has given clearance to an ambitious gene-mapping project, estimated to be worth Rs 238 crore.

    Genome India Project

    • The Genome India Project has been described by those involved as the “first scratching of the surface of the vast genetic diversity of India”.
    • It involves over 20 scientists from institutions including the Indian Institute of Science (IISc) in Bengaluru and a few IITs.
    • One of the most comprehensive genome mapping projects in the world is the Human Genome Project (HGP), which began in 1990 and reached completion in 2003.
    • The international project, which was coordinated by the National Institutes of Health and the US Department of Energy, was undertaken with the aim of sequencing the human genome and identifying the genes that contain it.
    • The project was able to identify the locations of many human genes and provide information about their structure and organisation.

    What is Genome Mapping?

    • According to the Human Genome Project, there are estimated to be over 20,500 human genes.
    • Genome refers to an organism’s complete set of DNA, which includes all its genes and mapping these genes simply means finding out the location of these genes in a chromosome.
    • In humans, each cell consists of 23 pairs of chromosomes for a total of 46 chromosomes, which means that for 23 pairs of chromosomes in each cell, there are roughly 20,500 genes located on them.
    • Some of the genes are lined up in a row on each chromosome, while others are lined up quite close to one another and this arrangement might affect the way they are inherited.
    • For example, if the genes are placed sufficiently close together, there is a probability that they get inherited as a pair.
    • Genome mapping, therefore, essentially means figuring out the location of a specific gene on a particular region of the chromosome and also determining the location of and relative distances between other genes on that chromosome.

    Applications

    • Significantly, genome mapping enables scientists to gather evidence if a disease transmitted from the parent to the child is linked to one or more genes.
    • Furthermore, mapping also helps in determining the particular chromosome which contains that gene and the location of that gene in the chromosome.
    • Genome maps have been used to find out genes that are responsible for relatively rare, single-gene inherited disorders such as cystic fibrosis and Duchene muscular dystrophy.
    • Genetic maps may also point out scientists to the genes that play a role in more common disorders and diseases such as asthma, cancer and heart disease among others.
    • Researchers from several international institutions mapped the handful of genes whose mutation causes several different kinds of cancers.

  • New rice variety: Muktoshri (IET 21845)

    Researchers have developed and commercialized a rice variety that is resistant to arsenic.

    Muktoshri

    • The new rice variety, Muktoshri — also called IET 21845 —, was developed jointly by the Rice Research Station at Chinsurah coming under West Bengal’s Agriculture Department and the National Botanical Research Institute, Lucknow.
    • A gazette notification for the commercial use of Muktoshri was made by West Bengal last year.
    • During our multilocational trials, it was found that this variety uptakes very less amount of arsenic from soil and water in comparison to other varieties of rice.
    • The rice is long and thin, and aromatic. Across the State, thousands of farmers have started cultivation, even in areas where arsenic in groundwater is not an issue, because of the aroma and the yield.

    Significance

    • West Bengal is among the States with the highest concentration of arsenic in groundwater, with as many as 83 blocks across seven districts having higher arsenic levels than permissible limits.
    • Several studies have shown that arsenic from groundwater and the soil can enter the food chain through paddy.
    • According to the WHO, long-term exposure to arsenic, mainly through drinking water and food, can lead to poisoning. Skin lesions and skin cancer are the most characteristic effects.

  • Cancer Gene Mapping

     

    A series of new papers in the journal Nature has revealed the most comprehensive gene map ever of the genes causing cancer. It shows departures from normal behaviour i.e. mutations trigger a cascade of genetic misbehaviours that eventually lead to cancer.

    What is Mutation?

    • A mutation is a change that occurs in our DNA sequence, either due to mistakes when the DNA is copied or as the result of environmental factors such as UV light and pollution etc.
    • Structural variations mean deletion, amplification or reorganization of genomic segments that range in size from just a few bases to whole chromosomes.
    • Bases are the structural units of genes.
    • Over a lifetime our DNA can undergo changes or ‘mutations’ in the sequence of bases A, C, G and T.

    Why study cancer?

    • Cancer is known to be a disease of uncontrolled growth.
    • The growth process, like all other physiological processes, has genetic controls so that the growth is self-limiting. When one or more genes malfunction, the growth process can go out of hand.
    • Not just cancer, there are many other diseases with a genetic link in varying degrees.
    • Just a handful of “driver” mutations could explain the occurrence of a large number of cancers, the researchers said, raising hopes of a cancer cure being nearer than ever.

    How big is the cancer burden?

    • Cancer is the second most-frequent cause of death worldwide, killing more than 8 million people every year; incidence of cancer is expected to increase by more than 50% over the coming decades.
    • 1 in 10 Indians will develop cancer during their lifetime, and one in 15 Indians will die of cancer, according to the World Cancer Report by WHO.
    • The Northeastern states, UP, Rajasthan, West Bengal, Haryana, Gujarat, Kerala, Karnataka and Madhya Pradesh account for 44% of the cancer burden in India, says a recent analysis, published in The Lancet.

    Is the genetic link to cancer well established?

    • Yes, it is. One such association, for example, is of breast cancer with the BRCA 1 and BRCA 2 genes; the actress Angelina Jolie, who discovered that she carried the former gene, chose to undergo a preventive double mastectomy.
    • This is personalised therapeutics where, instead of traditional toxic medications like chemotherapy, drugs that specifically target the delinquent genetic mutation are already being used.
    • Such therapy, however, remains very expensive.

    What is the new study that has oncologists around the world excited?

    • It is a major international collaboration called the Pan-Cancer Analysis of Whole Genomes (PCAWG), in which researchers has published a series of papers after analysing some whole-cancer genomes and their matching normal tissues across 38 tumor types.
    • They concluded that on average, cancer genomes contained 4-5 driver mutations when combining coding and non-coding genomic elements.
    • This is the largest genome study ever of primary cancer.
    • Various kinds of cancers required to be studied separately because cancers of different parts of the body often behave very differently from one another; so much so that it is often said that cancer is not one disease but many.

    Breakthrough achievement of the study

    • The mutations identified by the team have been catalogued. Identification and cataloguing of the genes is a very crucial step and has taken science’s understanding of cancer and its genesis ahead by several leaps.
    • The catalogue, which is already available online, allows doctors and researchers from all over the world to look things up, consult and find information about the cancer of a given patient.
    • The study has discovered causes of previously unexplained cancers, pinpointed cancer-causing events and zeroed in on mechanisms of development, opening new vistas of personalized cancer treatment to strike at the root of the problem.
    • When it comes to drug development, however, the gene mapping is but a first step.

    The next step

    • The process of drug development will have to now kick in with pharmaceutical companies first identifying the compound(s) that target these gene mutations and then it being subjected to the rigours of clinical trials to prove its safety and efficacy.
    • That could take anything from a few decades to a few years to cover all the mutations identified.

  • [pib] SARAS Initiative

    Coal India’s flagship subsidiary NCL (Northern Coalfields Limited) has set up a centre named SARAS.

    SARAS Initiative

    • SARAS stands for Science and Applied Research Alliance and Support.
    • It aims to promote innovation, R&D and skill development along with improving company’s operational efficiency and utilize resources at optimum level.
    • SARAS will help and enable the company in Integration of Innovation and Research for enhancing coal production, productivity, and safety in mines.
    • Besides, the SARAS would also help establish centres of excellence to ensure technical support to R&D along with thrust on quality skill development and employment to local youths in and around company’s operational area.

    About NCL

    • NCL accounts for 15 per cent of India’s coal production and 10 per cent of thermal power generation of the country is met by the coal produced by this Miniratna Company of Govt. of India.
    • The company produces more than 100 million tonnes of coal every year.
    • It has planned to produce 107 million tonnes of coal in the current fiscal.

  • Remdesivir: Under-trail vaccine against Coronavirus

    The Wuhan Institute of Virology at Wuhan, China has filed for a patent on Remdesivir, an antiviral experimental drug from the US which may help treat the novel coronavirus (nCoV-2019).

    Remdesivir

    • It is an experimental drug and has not yet been licensed or approved anywhere globally. It has not been demonstrated to be safe or effective for any use.
    • It is currently being developed for the treatment of Ebola virus infection.
    • Remdesivir and chloroquine effectively inhibit the recently emerged novel coronavirus (2019-nCoV) in vitro.
    • Chloroquine is a “widely used” anti-malarial and autoimmune disease medicine that has recently come to light as a potential antiviral drug.

    Can Remdesivir treat coronavirus?

    • Significantly, Remdesivir has demonstrated in vivo (experimentation using a whole living organism) and in vitro (activity performed in a controlled environment) activity in animal models against viral pathogens that cause MERS and SARS.
    • Even so, the use of the experimental drug has been allowed only as an emergency treatment, which can be administered in the absence of any other approved treatment options.
    • These two diseases are also caused by coronaviruses structurally similar to the nCoV-2019.
    • Additionally, limited clinical data is available from the emergency administration of Remdesivir in patients with Ebola.
    • Even so, it is yet to be seen if Remdesivir and chloroquine can be effective against the novel coronavirus in humans.

    How can the novel coronavirus infection be treated?

    • As of now, there is no known treatment for the novel coronavirus, and an appropriate antiviral drug is required for this.
    • Ideally, a vaccine against the infection can also prove to be effective, but such a development does not seem to be in the offing for at least three-four months.

  • Euthermia: the anomaly of human body temperature

     

    Euthermia refers to normal body temperature. The thermometer reading of 98.6°F has been a gold standard for a century and a half, ever since a German doctor laid it down as the “normal” body temperature.  A new research has found that body temperatures have, in fact, been declining over the last two centuries.

    Why we follow 98.6°F?

    • In 1851, Carl Reinhold August Wunderlich pioneered the use of the clinical thermometer.
    • It was a rod a foot long, which he would stick under the armpits of patients at the hospital attached with Leipzig University, and then wait for 15 minutes (some accounts say 20 minutes) for the temperature to register.
    • He took over a million measurements of 25,000 patients, and published his findings in a book in 1868, in which he concluded that the average human body temperature is 98.6°F.
    • Most modern scientists feel Wunderlich’s experiments were flawed, and his equipment inaccurate.
    • Another study concluded that the average human body temperature is closer to 98.2°F, and suggested that the 98.6°F benchmark be discarded.

    The body is cooler

    • The Stanford University the researchers confirmed some known trends — body temperature is higher in younger people, in women, in larger bodies and at later times of the day.
    • Additionally, they found that the bodies of men born in the early to mid-1990s is on average 1.06°F cooler than those of men born in the early 1800s.
    • And the body temperature of women born in the early to mid-1990s is on average 0.58°F lower than that of women born in the 1890s.
    • The calculations from the research correspond to a decrease in body temperature of 0.05°F every decade.

    Why there’s decrease in body temperature?

    • The researchers have proposed that the decrease in body temperature is the result of changes in the environment over the past 200 years, which have in turn driven physiological changes.
    • The decrease in average body temperature in the US, they said, could be explained by a reduction in metabolic rate, or the amount of energy being used.
    • The environment that we’re living in has changed, including the temperature in our homes, our contact with microorganisms and the food that we have access to.
    • Actually the human body is changing physiologically.

    So what’s the normal temperature?

    • The strong influences of age, time of day, and genders determine the healthy body temperature.