(Current Affairs) Science & Technology, Defence, Environment | May: 2016

Science & Technology, Defense, Environment

The global surface temperatures in February were 1.35 degree Celsius warmer

  • Global temperatures in February smashed previous monthly records by an unprecedented amount, according to NASA data, sparking warnings of a climate emergency.
  • It confirms preliminary analysis from earlier in March, indicating the record-breaking temperatures.
  • The global surface temperatures across land and ocean in February were 1.35 degree Celsius warmer than the average temperature for the month, from the baseline period of 1951-1980.
  • The global record was set just one month earlier, with January already beating the average for that month by 1.15 degree Celsius above the average for the baseline period.
  • Although the temperatures have been spurred on by a very large El Nino in the Pacific Ocean, the temperature smashed records set during the last large El Nino from 1998, which was at least as strong as the current one.
  • The month did not break the record for hottest month, since that is only likely to happen during a northern hemisphere summer, when most of the world’s land mass heats up.

New findings will reduce power consumption by computers’

  • In a breakthrough for energy-efficient computing, engineers at the University of California-Berkeley have shown for the first time that magnetic chips can operate with the lowest fundamental level of energy dissipation possible under the laws of thermodynamics.
  • The findings mean that dramatic reductions in power consumption are possible — as much as one-millionth the amount of energy per operation used by transistors in modern computers.
  • This is critical for mobile devices, which demand powerful processors that can run for a day or more on small, lightweight batteries.
  • On a larger industrial scale, as computing increasingly moves into ‘the cloud’, the electricity demands of the giant cloud data centres are multiplying, collectively taking an increasing share of the country’s — and world’s — electrical grid.
  • Magnetic computing emerged as a promising candidate because the magnetic bits can be differentiated by direction, and it takes just as much energy to get the magnet to point left as it does to point right.

Finally, a bacterium that degrades polluting plastics identified

  • bacterium species capable of breaking down plastic — polyethylene terephthalate (PET) — has been identified by a team of Japanese researchers. The bacterium uses two enzymes in sequence to break down the highly biodegradation-resist- ant polymer PET.
  • Except for rare instances of two fungi that have been found to grow on a mineral medium of PET yarns, there are no reports any bacteria biologically degrading PET or growing on the chemically inert substance.
  • looked for microorganisms that relied on PET film as a primary source of carbon for growth.
  • At first they identified a distinct microbial consortium that contained a mixture of bacteria species that degraded the PET film surface at 30 degree C; 75 per cent of the PET film surface was broken down into carbon dioxide at 28 degree C
  • From the microbial consortium, the researchers isolated a unique bacterium — Ideonellasakaiensis 201-F6 — that could almost completely de- grade a thin film of PET in a short span of six weeks at 30 degree C. “The PET film was almost fully degraded after six weeks at 30 degree C
  • The bacterium degrades PET using two enzymes that act on it in sequence. First, the bacterium adheres to PET and produces an intermediate sub- stance through hydrolysis.
  • The second enzyme then works with water and acts on this intermediate substance to produce the two monomers — ethylene glycol and terephthalic acid — used for making PET through polymerisation

IRNSS-1F placed in orbit

  • ISRO successfully put into orbit India’s sixth dedicated navigation satellite, the IRNSS-1F. The satellite was launched on-board India’s workhorse launch vehicle, the Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle (PSLV).
  • The Independent Regional Navigation Satellite System (IRNSS) is designed to pro- vide accurate position information service to users in India and the region extending up to 1,500 km from the border.
  • The IRNSS-1F carrying two payloads — the navigation payload and ranging payload — was put into orbit 20 minutes after take-of from the second launch pad at the Satish Dhawan Space Centre, Sriharikota.
  • [PSLV] has taken the satellite into the right orbit. We have only one more satellite in this constellation to complete our sequence of seven satellites for the regional navigation system
  • The satellite had a lift-of mass of 1,425 kg and was powered by two solar panels generating 1660 W and one Lithium-ion battery of 90 Ampere-hour capacity
  • With this launch, India inches closer to having its own navigation system (like a GPS).
  • The navigation payload of IRNSS-1F will transmit navigation service signals and will operate in the L5 band and S band. The ranging payload consists of a C-band trans- ponder that facilitates accurate determination of the range of the satellites.
  • ISRO is now preparing to launch the last satellite in the IRNSS series, the IRNSS-1G, and work has already begun on it.

Artificial fingertip for texture

  • A team of Swiss scientists has enabled an amputee feel smoothness and roughness in real-time with an artificial fingertip that was surgically connected to nerves in his upper arm.
  • The nerves of non-amputees were also stimulated to feel roughness, meaning that prosthetic touch for amputees can now be developed and safely tested on anyone, said the team from the Swiss Federal Institutes of Technology (EPFL).
  • Mr. Sorensen is the first person in the world to recognise texture using a bionic fingertip connected to electrodes that were surgically implanted above his stump.
  • Nerves in his arm were wired to an artificial fingertip equipped with sensors.
  • As the fingertip moved across textured plastic, the sensors generated an electrical signal. This signal was translated into a series of electrical spikes, imitating the language of the nervous system, then delivered to the nerves.

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