Here are 2 Back2Basics collections from today’s news items

B2B #1: From news- Heavy metals in fertilizers raise risk of diabetes, heart diseases in farmers

Heavy metals

1. Heavy metals are generally defined as metals with relatively high densities, atomic weights, or atomic numbers. The criteria used, and whether metalloids are included, vary depending on the author and context
2. In metallurgy, for example, a heavy metal may be defined on the basis of density, whereas in physics the distinguishing criterion might be atomic number, while a chemist would likely be more concerned with chemical behaviour
3. More specific definitions have been published, but none of these have been widely accepted. The definitions surveyed in this article encompass up to 96 out of the 118 known chemical elements; only mercury, lead and bismuth meet all of them
4. Despite this lack of agreement, the term (plural or singular) is widely used in science
5. A density of more than 5 g/cm3 is sometimes quoted as a commonly used criterion and is used in the body of this article

B2B #2: From news- New system to measure air quality

System of Air Quality and Weather Forecasting and Research (SAFAR)

1. Ministry of Earth Sciences (MoES), Govt. of India, has introduced a major national initiative “SAFAR” for greater metropolitan cities of India to provide location-specific information on air quality in near real time and its forecast 1-3 days in advance for the first time in India
2. It was started under the plan scheme “Metropolitan Advisories for Cities for Sports, Tourism (Metropolitan Air Quality and Weather Services)
3. It has been combined with the early warning system on weather parameters
4. The SAFAR system is developed by Indian Institute of Tropical Meteorology, Pune, along with ESSO partner institutions namely India Meteorological Department (IMD) and National Centre for Medium Range Weather Forecasting (NCMRWF)
5. The implementation of SAFAR is done with an active collaboration with local municipal corporations and various local educational institutions and governmental agencies in that Metro city

As a part of revision for Prelims 2018, Here’s a Factoid to brush up your concepts

Name : Kavach (KVx) series laser walls

Defence Forces : Army

Module Type : Tech Misc.

Brief Intro : 1.The hi-tech Kavach (KVx) series laser walls immediately alert the nearest outpost about intrusion attempts and triggers action from a Quick Response Tool(QRT), which is IoT device, developed by CRON Systems, a Delhi-based defence IoT company. 2.CRON Systems has developed Kavach laser walls after working with our jawans on ground and thoroughly understanding their needs and challenges.It takes five KVx-series walls, connected with infra-red, to secure a kilometre-long stretch. Each wall is connected with a quick response tool (QRT), an IoT device, to help jawans respond to alerts.