Daily Prelims Notes 18 April 2021

April 18, 2021
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Category: DPN

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Daily Prelims Notes

18 April 2021

Table Of Contents

1. PM KISAN

Subject: Government Schemes

Context: Amid anger over middlemen, Bengal’s rice bowl keeps ear out for Delhi farmer protests.

Concept:

Pradhan Mantri Kisan Samman Nidhi:

It is implemented as a central sector scheme by the Government of India.
This scheme was introduced to augment the source of income of many small and marginal farmers.
Under the Scheme an amount of Rs.6000/- per year is transferred directly into the bank accounts of the farmers, subject to certain exclusion criteria relating to higher income status.
The entire responsibility of identification of beneficiaries rests with the State / UT Governments.
The Scheme initially provided income support to all Small and Marginal Farmers’ families across the country, holding cultivable land upto 2 hectares.
Its ambit was later expanded w.e.f. 01.06.2019 to cover all farmer families in the country irrespective of the size of their land holdings.
Affluent farmers have been excluded from the scheme such as Income Tax payers in last assessment year, professionals like Doctors, Engineers, Lawyers, Chartered Accountants etc and pensioners pensioners drawing at least Rs.10,000/- per month (excluding MTS/Class IV/Group D employees).

Similar programmes by states:

BhavantarBhugtanYojana- MP.
The RythuBandhu scheme- Telangana.
Krushak Assistance for Livelihood and Income augmentation (KALIA)- Odisha.

2. BORDER ROAD ORGANISATION

Subject: Security

Context: Delhi High Court directs Centre to pay the family of missing BRO engineer.

Concept:

About BRO:

Functioning under the control of the Ministry of Defence since 2015, the BRO is engaged in road construction to provide connectivity to difficult and inaccessible regions in the border areas of the country.
It is staffed by officers and troops drawn from the Indian Army’s Corps of Engineers, Electrical and Mechanical Engineers, Army Service Corps, Military Police and army personnel on extra regimental employment.
Engineering Service and personnel from the General Reserve Engineer Force (GREF) form the parent cadre of the Border Roads Organisation.
Currently, the organisation maintains operations in twenty-one states, one UT (Andaman and Nicobar Islands), and neighbouring countries such as Afghanistan, Bhutan, Myanmar, and Sri Lanka.

3. STARSHIP

Subject : Science & tech

Context :NASA picks SpaceX and Starship to send Artemis astronauts to the moon

Concept :

Starship is a spacecraft and super-heavy booster rocket.
It acts as a reusable transportation system for crew and cargo to the Earth’s orbit, Moon and Mars.
SpaceX has described Starship as “the world’s most powerful launch vehicle” with an ability to carry over 100 metric tonnes to the Earth’s orbit.
Starship has been under development since 2012 which is a part of Space X’s central mission to make interplanetary travel accessible and affordable. The company is working on building a fleet of reusable launch vehicles.
SpaceX is planning its first cargo mission to the red planet by 2022 and by 2024.

Significance:

Starship can ferry both cargo and crew to the International Space Station (ISS) and other destinations in the solar system.
Starship is also expected to help in carrying large amounts of cargo to the Moon for human spaceflight development and research.
It could reduce the cost of travelling to space by a hundredfold.

4. NATIONAL CLIMATE VULNERABILITY ASSESSMENT REPORT

Subject : Environment

Context : National climate vulnerability assessment released.

Concept :

The report is titled ‘Climate Vulnerability Assessment for Adaptation Planning in India Using a Common Framework’.
It identifies the most vulnerable states and districts in India with respect to current climate risk and key drivers of vulnerability.
The report has been submitted by the Indian Institute of Technology Mandi and the Indian Institute of Technology Guwahati in collaboration with the Indian Institute of Science, Bengaluru.

Key findings of the vulnerability assessment:

Based on an all-India assessment, this report identifies the most vulnerable states and districts in India with respect to current climate risk and the main drivers of vulnerability.
The states with a relatively high vulnerability, Jharkhand, Mizoram, Odisha, Chhattisgarh, Assam, Bihar, Arunachal Pradesh, and West Bengal, are mostly in the eastern part of the country, requiring prioritisation of adaptation interventions.
Assam, Bihar, and Jharkhand have over 60% of districts in the category of highly vulnerable districts.

5. SANCHI STUPA

Subject : Art & Architecture

Context : Built by emperor Ashoka, in the third century BC to accommodate the relics of Gautam Buddha, the Sanchi Stupa is taken into account one of the greatest surviving examples of Buddhist structure.

Concept :

Sanchi Stupa is a UNESCO world heritage site since 1989. Sanchi is in Madhya Pradesh.
There are many small stupas here with three mains ones – stupa 1, stupa 2 and stupa 3. Stupa 1 is also called the Great Stupa at Sanchi. It is the most prominent and the oldest and is believed to have the Buddha’s relics.
It was built by Ashoka in the 3rd century BCE.
Originally, it was smaller than its present dimensions. It was expanded in later periods.
The original structure was made out of bricks. Later on, it was covered with stone, vedica, and the torana (gateway).
There are four gateways to the stupa with the southern one being built first. The others were later added.
The gateways are adorned with beautiful sculptures and carvings. Each torana consists of two vertical pillars and three horizontal bars on top. The bars contain exquisite carvings on front and back.
They contain images of shalbhanjikas – lady holding the branch of a tree. Stories from the Jataka tales are carved here.
The structure has a lower and upper pradakshinapatha or circumambulatory path. The upper pradakshinapatha is unique to this stupa.
On the southern side of the stupa, the Ashokan Lion Capital pillar is found with inscriptions on it.
The hemispherical dome of the stupa is called the anda. It contains the relics of the Buddha.
The harmika is a square railing on top of the dome/mound.
The chhatra is an umbrella on top of the harmika. There is a sandstone pillar in the site on which Ashoka’s Schism Edict is inscribed.
The original brick dome was expanded into double its size during the reign of the Shunga dynasty with stone slabs covering the original dome.

6. CERT-IN

Subject : Science & tech

Context : The Indian Computer Emergency Response Team (CERT-In) has warned WhatsApp users in India of multiple vulnerabilities it detected in the instant messaging platform, which could lead to breach of sensitive user data and personal information.

Concept :

Computer Emergency Response Team – India (CERT-IN)

It is an organisation of the Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology, Government of India, with the objective of securing Indian cyberspace.
It is the nodal agency which deals with cybersecurity threats like hacking and phishing.
It collects, analyses and disseminates information on cyber incidents, and also issues alert on cybersecurity incidents.
CERT-IN provides Incident Prevention and Response Services as well as Security Quality Management Services.

Additional Facts:

Budapest Convention on Cybercrime: It is the first international treaty that seeks to address Internet and cybercrime by harmonizing national laws, improving investigative techniques and increasing cooperation among nations. It came into force in 2004.India is not a signatory to this convention.
Cyber Surakshit Bharat Yojana: It was launched in 2018 by Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology in association with National e-Governance Division(NeGD) and industry players.It includes awareness programs on cyber security; workshops on best practices and enablement of the officials with cyber security health tool kits.
Cyber Swachhta Kendra (Botnet Cleaning and Malware Analysis Centre): It provides for the detection of malicious programs and free tools to remove such programs.
Indian Cyber Crime Coordination Centre(I4C): It was established in 2018 to combat cybercrime in India in a comprehensive and coordinated manner. It functions under the Ministry of Home Affairs.

7. BLACK SEA

Subject : Geography

Context : Russia beefs up warship presence in Black Sea as Ukraine tensions simmer.

Concept :

The Black Sea is a marginal sea of the Atlantic Ocean lying between Europe and Asia. It is bordered by Bulgaria, Georgia, Romania, Russia, Turkey, and Ukraine.
It is supplied by major rivers, principally the Danube, Dnieper, and Don.
The Black Sea ultimately drains into the Mediterranean Sea, via the Turkish Straits and the Aegean Sea.
The Bosporus Strait connects it to the small Sea of Marmara which in turn is connected to the Aegean Sea via the Strait of the Dardanelles.
To the north, the Black Sea is connected to the Sea of Azov by the Kerch Strait.
The Black Sea covers 436,400 km2 (not including the Sea of Azov), making it the world’s largest inland body of water.

8. ADITYA-L1 SUPPORT CENTRE (ASC)

Subject : Science & tech

Context : The Indian programme to study the Sun and the region between the Sun and the Earth from space – Aditya-L1 – is due to be launched next year.

Concept :

It will carry seven payloads which have been developed by various institutions across the country. Once the mission is launched, there will be a need for a ground support centre to monitor and coordinate the work on its various payloads.
This role will be played by the ARIES facility (short for Aryabhata Research Institute for observational Sciences) which is situated near Nainital.
In January 2021, an agreement was signed to this effect based on the proposal submitted by the ARIES team. With about four to five personnel, this centre will come up at Haldawani, where ARIES is setting up a data centre also.
The Aditya-L1 Support Centre (ASC) will provide training through regular workshops for the guest users. Apart from this, it will provide ready-to-use Python and Java apps for the satellite data and demos and handouts to facilitate the guest users.

Aditya L1 Mission

Aditya L1 will be launched using the Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle (PSLV) XL with 7 payloads (instruments) on board.
Aditya-L1 would be placed into a point in space known as the L1 Lagrange point.
Aditya L1 will study the Sun’s corona (Visible and Near infrared rays), Sun’s photosphere (soft and hard X-ray), chromosphere (Ultra Violet ), solar emissions, solar winds and flares, and Coronal Mass Ejections (CMEs), and will carry out round-the-clock imaging of the Sun.

9. CHOLISTAN DESERT

Subject : Geography

Context : The recent shooting of two Great Indian Bustards (GIBs) in Pakistan’s Cholistan desert has left wildlife activists in Rajasthan shocked and outraged.

Concept :

The Cholistan Desert, also locally known as Rohi, is a large desert in the southern part of Punjab, Pakistan.
It forms part of the Greater Thar Desert, which extends to Sindh province and the Indian state of Rajasthan.
It is one of two large deserts in Punjab, the other being Thal Desert.
Derawar Fort is located in the Cholistan Desert.

10. REWACONODON INDICUS

Subject : Environment

Context : The Tiki Formation in Madhya Pradesh, a treasure trove of vertebrate fossils, has now yielded a new species and two genera of cynodonts, small rat-like animals that lived about 220 million years ago.

Concept :

The researchers from the Indian Institute of Technology Kharagpur, used scanning electron microscopy to study about 10 teeth samples collected from the village of Tihki in Shahdol District, Madhya Pradesh.
The results showed that they had found a new species, and they named it Rewaconodonindicus, indicating India, the country it was discovered from.
The team also identified two new genera from the area. The first was named Inditheriumfloris, after India and the Latin word therium meaning beast. As the teeth had a flower-shaped crown, it earned the species name floris.
The second was named Tikiodoncromptoni, after Tiki Formation and Greek word odon meaning tooth. The species name is after paleontologist A.W. Crompton.

11. STAR DUST

Subject : Science & tech

Context : In six expeditions led over the last two decades, researchers led by those from CNRS in Paris have made an estimate of the amount of extraterrestrial dust falling on the Earth every year.

Concept :

Stardust is formed by the material ejected from stars and carried by stellar winds, getting blown into interstellar space.
The stellar wind is a flow of gas ejected from the upper atmosphere of a star.
Interstellar space is defined as that which lies beyond a magnetic region that extends about 122 Astronomical Unit (AU) from the sun.
During the solar system’s birth, this dust was incorporated into everything that formed including the planets and the sun but survived intact until now only in asteroids and comets.

12. CLASS EFFECT

Subject : Science & tech

Context :J&J scientists refute ‘class effect’ to blame for clots in those who got its vaccine

Concept :

Class effect is usually taken to mean similar therapeutic effects and similar adverse effects, both in nature and extent.
Criteria for drugs to be grouped together as a class involve some or all of the following:

Drugs with similar chemical structure

Drugs with similar mechanism of action

Drugs with similar pharmacological effects

13. COVAXIN

Subject : Science & tech

Context : In a meeting held on March 24, the Subject Expert Committee of the India drug regulator permitted Bharat Biotech to carry out a phase-2 trial of Covaxin wherein a booster dose is to be administered six months after the second dose to further improve vaccine efficacy. Currently, two doses of Covaxin are administered 28 days apart.

Concept :

COVAXIN is an inactivated vaccine, created from a strain of the infectious SARS-CoV-2 virus, that has shown promise in preclinical studies, demonstrating extensive safety and effective immune responses.
COVAXIN has been developed by Bharat Biotech in collaboration with the Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR) and the National Institute of Virology (NIV).
The SARS-CoV-2 strain was isolated in NIV, Pune and transferred to Bharat Biotech. The indigenous, inactivated vaccine will be developed and manufactured by Bharat Biotech’s BSL-3 (Bio-Safety Level 3) High Containment facility located in Genome Valley, Hyderabad, India.
Bharat Biotech’s track record in developing Vero cell culture platform technologies has been proven in several vaccines for polio, rabies, rotavirus, Japanese Encephalitis, Chikungunya and Zika.