Science : Silent Hypoxia

Silent Hypoxia

Hypoxia : Hypoxia is a condition in which the body or a region of the body is deprived of adequate oxygen supply at the tissue level. It can affect whole body or a part of body.

Silent Hypoxia : A person’s oxygen level in blood cells and tissue can drop without any initial warning. In cases of silent hypoxia of COVID-19 patients they did not experience shortness of breath or coughing until their oxygen levels had plummeted to such a degree that the patients risked acute respiratory distress (ARDS) and organ failure.

Normally partial pressure on Oxygen in arterial blood is around 75-100 mmHg.Measuring oxygen level in blood from Pulse oximeter normally reading comes to around 90-100%.

Detection of this type of Hypoxia is difficult therefore it is called Silent Hypoxia / Happy Hypoxia

Euthanasia

Introduction

Euthanasia is the termination of a very sick person's life in order to relieve them of their suffering.The term is derived from the Greek word euthanatos which means easy death.

Ethics Involved :

Euthanasia raises a number of agonising moral dilemmas:

• is it ever right to end the life of a terminally ill patient who is undergoing severe pain and suffering?
• under what circumstances can euthanasia be justifiable, if at all?
• is there a moral difference between killing someone and letting them die?

Why Euthanasia should be forbidden ? 

Religious opponents of euthanasia believe that life is given by God, and only God should decide when to end it.
"First, do no harm" is the oldest oath in medicine. It solemnly confers the doctor's duty to prevent rather than cause distress. When it comes to treating children, doctors are especially mindful of this obligation.

Fish Oil

1. A genetically-modified plant that produces seeds packed with fish oils is set to be grown in open fields in the U.K. within months, scientists announced on Friday. The oils could provide feed for farmed fish, the researchers hope, but they could ultimately be used as a health supplement in human foods such as margarine.
2. Fish oils — specifically omega-3 long-chain polyunsaturated fatty acids — have been shown to cut the risk of cardiovascular disease and are a popular food supplement.
3. The particular fish oils that benefit the health of both fish and humans, called EPA and DHA, are not in fact produced by fish themselves but instead accumulated by eating marine microbes. Mr. Napier’s team therefore took up to seven genes from algae that produce the fish oils and transplanted them into oil seed plants called camelina.

Phosphorus

Phosphorus is a nonmetallic chemical element with symbol P and atomic number 15.

Occurence 

Elemental phosphorus exists in two major forms—white phosphorus and red phosphorus—but due to its high reactivity, phosphorus is never found as a free element on Earth.

Usage :

1. Phosphorus is an essential component of living systems and it is found in nervous tissue, bones and cell protoplasm.
2. Phosphorus used in the manufacture of safety matches, pyrotechnics, incendiary shells, smoke bombs.
3. Phosphorus used in pesticides and also in the production of special glasses.
4. Na3PO4 is important as a cleaning agent, water softener and for preventing boiler scale and corrosion of pipes and boiler tubes
5. Phosphorus found in food items are pumpkin, soya foods, cheese, nuts like badam and fish. 

Cervical Cancer

Symptoms:

One of the most common symptoms of cervical cancer is abnormal vaginal bleeding, but in some cases there may be no obvious symptoms.Also, moderate pain during sexual intercourse and vaginal discharge are symptoms of cervical cancer.

Cause:

Human papillomavirus (HPV) infection appears to be a necessary factor in the development of almost all cases (90+%) of cervical cancer.Other than that smoking is also one of the factor.

Victims :

Cervical cancer is the most common malignancy among Indian women, particularly those who marry early. 

Diagnosis : 

The device AV Magnivisualizer which was developed by the Institute of Cytology and Preventive Oncology under the Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR) has 95 per cent accuracy for detecting pre-cancerous lesions.

Blood

Who can Donate Blood ? 

1. Anybody between 18-60 years of age.


2. Ensure a 3 month gap between donations.


3. Those who weigh over 45kg can donate 350 ml of blood and over 56kg can donate 450 ml of blood


4. Those who are HIV positive or have any STDs cannot donate blood.


5. Those suffering from high BP,heart diseases, or have a history of jaundice,tuberculosis,leprosy,hepatitis B/C are permanent deferrals and cannot donate

Trans Fats

Trans_Fats

Trans fats are a type of unsaturated fat which is uncommon in nature but can be created artificially.Trans fat is short for trans fatty acid.  They are created during hydrogenation of liquid vegetable oils, to solidify them.They are present in foods like French fries, baked food and doughnuts.

 

Effects on Health 

1. The consumption of these fats raises the level of low-density lipoprotein (LDL), known

India's Mars Mission

Introduction : 

India’s first interplanetary probe, the Mars Orbiter Mission, has left home on the first leg of a voyage of scientific discovery. Once again, the Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle developed by the Indian Space Research Organisation performed its task with impeccable ease.

Facts : 

• ISRO’s next focus is Chandrayaan 2 and GSLV
• Mars orbiter mission would continue till 2015.
• India's Mars orbiter will travel 300 days through space to reach the orbit of Mars

Journey : 

A long and difficult trek now lies ahead of the spacecraft. It will circle Earth for the rest of this month, repeatedly firing an onboard liquid-propellant engine to gain velocity. Shortly after

C V Raman

Raman Effect

Sir Chandrasekhara Venkata Raman (7 November, 1888 – 21 November, 1970), was awarded the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1930 for his work on the scattering of light, ‘Raman Effect’ - that when light traverses a transparent material, some of the deflected light changes in wave length.

Technology - Terms

1. Pelican Imaging : This multiple-optics technology, at its simplest, allows users to adjust an image’s focus after the photo is taken, or allows a singe picture to have multiple foci. Focussed by Nokia.


2. HEVC (High Efficiency Video Coding) : The HEVC standard doubles data compression, while enabling far higher resolutions.Successor to MPEG-4 standard. Its USP is that it doubles data compression, while simultaneously enabling far higher resolutions, of up to 8,192x4,320 pixels.

Water Harvesting

1. Subsurface dyke is a structure that is built in an aquifer with the intention of obstructing the natural flow of ground water, thereby raising the ground water level and increasing the amount of water stored in the aquifer.

GISAT

About GISAT:

The satellite will carry a GEO Imager with multi-spectral (visible, near infra-red and thermal), multi-resolution (50m to 1.5 km) imaging instruments. It will be placed in geostationary orbit of 36,000 km.

Functions:  

Fire Ice

Japan has successfully developed new technology for extracting methane gas from a previously untapped off-shore fossil fuel resource that has been dubbed ‘fire ice’. Japan has invested several hundred million pounds in developing technology to tap methane hydrate reserves off its coast.

• What is Fire Ice?
  It is another name of Methane hydrate, which consist of methane trapped in ice, present under the continental shelves around the world. It is said to be next big energy resource.
• Earlier, it was believed to only exist in the outer space of the solar system – but now experts are saying it could be ‘the new shale gas’.
• Methane hydrate is also called Methane clathrate, hydromethane, methane ice, fire ice, natural gas hydrate, or gas hydrate.

How does it form?
Methane hydrate is formed within marine sediments where methane is generated by chemical reactions or by microbes breaking down organic matter. The gas moves up to the sea bed where the temperature is much low. It causes the gas to cool, due to this cooling methane molecules form weak chemical bond with surrounding water molecules, producing solid mehane hydrate. This substance has long been regarded by oil and gas companies as a problem, because it can block marine drilling rigs.
Thus, Methane hydrate is a solid clathrate compound (more specifically, a clathrate hydrate) in which a large amount of methane is trapped within a crystal structure of water, forming a solid similar to ice.
How did scientists separate methane from Fire ice?
Engineers used depressurisation to turn methane hydrate to methane gas.

Flexible Use of Airspace

• In the fast changing environment of air warfare and national security, there is an urgent sense of need of airspace use by the military. Therefore, sharing of airspace on a need basis, by civil and military users was an urgent national requirement.
• This will be achieved via direct routing between 7 city pairs of: Delhi-Mumbai, Delhi-Kolkata, Delhi–Chennai, Delhi-Hyderabad, Delhi- Begaluru, Kolkata-Chennai and Chennai-Mumbai for which the information is available.
• First step would be implementation of a National High Level Airspace Policy Body (NHLAPB) for airspace use will be set up in order to take up the job of strategic planning and assess/reassess the national airspace requirements of various stakeholders.
• The NHLAPB will be chaired by Secretary, Ministry of Civil Aviation with representation from Ministry of Defence, Indian Air force, Indian Navy, Indian Space Research Organization, Airport Authority of India and Directorate General of Civil Aviation. It can co-opt new members in future depending upon requirement.

Project Arrow

• Introduced in 2008 by department of Posts
• Objective: To transform the existing India Post infrastructure across the country by upgrading key postal operations such as mail delivery, remittance and banking services.
• Under the project, the exterior and interior of the post offices have undergone a transformation. Service delivery has been upgraded through information technology-enabled procedures.

Electronic Project Proposal System

The Electronic Project Proposal System (e-PPS) is a web-based system that covers the complete life-cycle of funding of R&D projects, starting from online submission of project proposals for funds, to monitoring and management of funded projects. It supports the following processes:

• Online submission of project proposals
• Evaluation of proposals by experts
• Project recommendations
• Project Monitoring

Mobile HD Voice

• Mobile HD voice is high quality voice service which enables high quality voice calls as it cuts down the background noise often heard on a regular call.
•  This service is based on AMR (Adaptive Multi Rate) wideband technology (W-AMR) which operates with nine different bit rates, providing high quality voice calls. 
• Compared to the current narrow-band speech codec device, the W-AMR speech-compression algorithm doubles voice bandwidth and produces better results.

EUROPA

Moon of Jupiter

6th closest moon of Jupiter

Discovered in 1610 by Galileo Galilei

Slightly smaller than Earth’s Moon

Composition:

• - Primarily made of silicate rock
• - Likely has an iron core
• - Thin atmosphere composed mainly of oxygen
• - Surface is composed of water ice and is one of the smoothest in the Solar System.

Time Line:

• 1610 – Discovered by Galileo Galilei
• 1989 – The Galileo mission was launched which provided the bulk of the present data that we have on Europa.
• 2022 – JUICE (Jupiter Icy Moon Explorer), the next mission to Europa by the European Space Agency.

“Europa” is most promising in habitability in universe after Earth: NASA
It could be habitable. Europa which bears an ocean, a thin shelf of ice and oxidants on its surface is far more likely to be habitable than the desert-covered Mars.
Europa’s evident youth and smoothness of the surface have led to the theory that a water ocean exists underneath it, which could possibly be a home for extraterrestrial life.

This theory suggests that the heat energy from tidal flexing is the reason behind the ocean to stay in liquid state and causes geological activity very similar to the plate tectonics.

NASA Mission “Clipper”:

• The mission follows the success of Cassini, a probe that closely explored Titan, a moon of Saturn.
• NASA will send a spacecraft to Jupiter’s orbit and conduct a number of fly-bys to study Europa in its entirety.
• Clipper could be launched by 2021 and would take a further three-six years to reach Europa.

* As per scientists, Enceladus, the 6^th largest moon of Saturn, could also be habitable.

Mercury Treaty

Objective: The Treaty aims at reducing global emission levels of the toxic heavy metal also known as quicksilver, which poses risks to human health and the environment.

Nations will be asked to ink the treaty next October in Minamata, Japan, in honour of the town’s inhabitants who for decades have suffered the consequences of serious mercury contamination.

Mercury is found in products ranging from electrical switches to thermometers to light-bulbs, to amalgam dental fillings and even facial creams, and large amounts of the heavy metal are released from small-scale gold mining, coal-burning power plants, metal smelters and cement production.

Mercury poisoning affects the body’s immune system and can lead to problems including psychological disorders, loss of teeth and problems with the digestive, cardiovascular and respiratory tracts. It also affects development of the brain and nervous system and poses the greatest risk to fetuses and infants.

As per UNEP : 

• Concentrations in deeper waters have increased by up to 25%
• Much human exposure to mercury is through the consumption of contaminated fish.
• Around 200 tonnes of the substance are deposited in the Arctic every year.

My India Initiative-A Digital Volunteer Programme

The Ministry of I&B (Information and Broadcasting) launched the ‘My India Initiative-A Digital Volunteer Programme’. 

Objective: To disseminate the development messages across the Social Media platforms by registering citizens as volunteers in an effort to contribute positively towards nation building. The programme will have real time engagement through the Social Media tools.