(Current Affairs) Science & Technology, Defence, Environment | January: 2015

Science & Technology, Defense, Environment

Virgin Galactic spacecraft appears to have broken apart in flight

  • The head of the federal agency examining fatal crash of a Virgin Galactic passenger spaceship during a test flight in California’s Mojave Desert confirmed that the vehicle had broken apart in flight.
  • “The debris field indicates an in-flight breakup,” Christopher Hart, acting chairman of the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB), told Reuters.
  • “We’ll know that for certainty when we look at all the sources we have,” he said.
  • The NTSB is leading the investigation into Friday’s crash of SpaceShip Two, which was undergoing its first powered test flight since January when it crashed, spreading debris over a 5-mile (8 km) swath of the Mojave Desert north of Los Angeles.
  • Citing a source familiar with the nascent investigation, the report said video and early data was focusing on “aerodynamic forces” that could have led to its downing.

Wearing Google Glass may cause ‘blind spots’ in vision: study

  • Wearing Google Glass may partially obstruct peripheral vision, causing blind spots that could interfere with daily tasks such as driving, a new study has found.
  • Peripheral visual field is a main component of vision and essential for daily activities such as driving, pedestrian safety and sports.
  • Conventional spectacle frames can reduce visual field, sometimes causing absolute blind spots, and head mounted devices have even more pronounced frames, researchers said.

Government ‘cautious’ about tapping nuclear energy for power generation

  • Power, Coal and Renewable Energy Minister Piyush Goyal said nuclear energy offers potential, but the government will remain “cautious” about tapping it for power generation.

  • Power, Coal and Renewable Energy Minister Piyush Goyal said nuclear energy offers potential, but the government will remain “cautious” about tapping it for power generation.

  • On nuclear energy, Mr.Goyal pointed out that the US and many European nations have stopped setting up nuclear plants. “This government would like to be cautious so that we are not saddled with something only under the garb of clean energy or alternate energy; something which the West has discarded and is sought to be brought to India,” he said.

  • Asked about the logjam that has emerged due to the Nuclear Liability Law, the minister said, “Nuclear has potential and opportunities for India. This government is opening to all options... in nuclear, we are seized of the problem and we are already trying to see how we can address nuclear liability restrictions.”

  • He also pointed out that as yet there is no estimate on the life-cycle costs of nuclear power right up to de-commissioning stage.

  • Mr. Goyal’s observations assume significance because so far countries promised contracts for nuclear reactors had been pressurising India to change its nuclear liability law.

  • The US, France and, to a lesser extent, Russia are upset because nothing has moved since 2008 when then Prime Minister Manmohan Singh assured 10,000 MW of reactors to two US companies, six reactors to French company Areva and up to 16 plants by Russia’s Atomstroyexport.

  • The commitment was in exchange for ending India’s isolation from the civil nuclear commerce mainstream after the first nuclear explosion in 1974. As a result, the US along with France and Russian helped India secure an exemption from the Nuclear Suppliers’ Group.

French Scientists find mechanism for spontaneous HIV cure

  • As many as 1,482 French scientists unveiled the genetic mechanism by which they believe two men were spontaneously cured of HIV, and said the discovery may offer a new strategy in the fight against AIDS.
  • In both asymptomatic men, the AIDS-causing virus was inactivated due to an altered HIV gene coding integrated into human cells, they wrote in the journal Clinical Microbiology and Infection.
  • This, in turn, was likely due to stimulation of an enzyme that may in future be targeted for drug treatment to induce the same response, they said.
  • “This finding represents an avenue for a cure,” study co-author Didier Raoult of the French Institute of Health and Medical Research (Inserm) told.
  • Neither of the men, one diagnosed HIV positive 30 years ago and the other in 2011, have ever been ill, and the AIDS-causing virus cannot be detected with routine tests of their blood.
  • In both, the virus was unable to replicate due to DNA coding changes that the researchers proposed were the result of a spontaneous evolution between humans and the virus that is called “endogenisation”.
  • “We propose that HIV cure may occur through HIV endogenisation in humans,” they wrote. The teams said they did not believe the two patients were unique or that the phenomenon was new.

The Antarctic ozone hole stands steady: scientists

  • The Antarctic ozone hole reached its peak size in September, stretching to 24.1 million square kilometres, almost the same size as last year’s peak, scientists say.
  • The ozone hole, which forms annually in the August to October period, had peaked to 24 million square kilometres in September last year.
  • In comparison, the largest ozone hole area recorded to date on a single day was on September 9, 2000, at 29.9 million square kilometres.
  • The ozone layer helps shield life on Earth from potentially harmful ultraviolet (UV) radiation that can cause skin cancer, damage plants and phytoplankton — the top of the oceanic food chain.
  • “The good news is that our measurements show less thinning of the ozone over the South Pole during the past three years,” said Bryan Johnson, a researcher with The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA)’s Earth System Research Laboratory in Boulder, Colorado.
  • “However, the rate at which ozone thins during the month of September has remained about the same for the past two decades. A decrease in this rate will be an important sign of recovery,” said Johnson.
  • South Pole balloon-borne ozonesonde observations measured a minimum amount of 120 Dobson Units of ozone this year on September 29. Ozonesonde measurements of 250 Dobson Units in August are common just before the rapid destruction of ozone in September, researchers said.

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