[Mission 2023] QUED ( Questions from Editorials ) 10 October 2022

Solution: d)

The Nobel Prize for Medicine was awarded to Swedish academic Svante Pääbo “for his discoveries concerning the genomes of extinct hominins and human evolution”.

Svante Pääbo accomplished something seemingly impossible: sequencing the genome of the Neanderthal, an extinct relative of present-day humans.

Hominins refer to the now-extinct species of apes that are believed to be related to modern humans, as well as modern humans themselves. “Pääbo also found that gene transfer had occurred from these now extinct hominins to Homo sapiens following the migration out of Africa around 70,000 years ago. This ancient flow of genes to present-day humans has physiological relevance today, for example affecting how our immune system reacts to infections.”

Svante Pääbo established an entirely new scientific discipline, called paleogenomics, that focuses on studying the DNA and genetic information of extinct hominins through reconstruction.

What are the challenges in carrying out such research?

There are “extreme technical challenges because with time DNA becomes chemically modified and degrades into short fragments”. The main issue is that only trace amounts of DNA are left after thousands of years, and exposure to the natural environment leads to contamination with DNA from bacteria and contemporary humans, making research complex.

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Solution: b)

Dengue is transmitted by several species of mosquitoes within the genus Aedes. Symptoms include fever, headache, muscle, and joint pain, and a characteristic skin rash that is similar to measles. There are four types of dengue strains, and type II and IV are considered to be more severe and normally require hospitalisation. According to experts, the aedes mosquito breeds in clean stagnant water.

These mosquitoes are also vectors of chikungunya, yellow fever and Zika viruses.

Dengue and chikungunya are caused by the bite of Aedes agypti mosquito, which breeds in clear water. The Anopheles mosquito, which causes malaria, can breed in both fresh and muddy water.

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Solution: b)

The Commission for Air Quality Management (CAQM) said on October 5 that measures under ‘Stage-1’ of the Graded Response Action Plan (GRAP) will be enforced in the NCR with immediate effect.

GRAP is a set of emergency measures that kick in to prevent further deterioration of air quality once it reaches a certain threshold. Stage 1 of GRAP is activated when the AQI is in the ‘poor’ category (201 to 300).

The second, third and fourth stages will be activated three days ahead of the AQI reaching the ‘very poor’ category (301 to 400), ‘severe’ category (401 to 450) and ‘severe +’ category (above 450) respectively. For this, the CAQM is relying on air quality and meteorological forecasts by the Indian Institute of Tropical Meteorology (IITM) and the India Meteorological Department (IMD).

Measures being imposed under the previous categories will continue even when the subsequent category is activated, that is, if measures under Stage-2 are activated, measures under Stage-1 will continue to remain in place.

How is the GRAP different this year?

The CAQM revised the Graded Response Action Plan earlier this year. The GRAP was first notified in January 2017 by the Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate Change. This was based on a plan that was submitted by the Central Pollution Control Board (CPCB) in November 2016. According to the notification, the task of implementing the GRAP fell on the now dissolved Environment Pollution (Prevention and Control) Authority for the NCR. From 2021 onwards, the GRAP is being implemented by the CAQM.

In the version of the GRAP that was notified in 2017, measures kicked in after pollution concentrations reached a certain level. This year, measures are pre-emptive and will kick in based on forecasts in an attempt to prevent the AQI from deteriorating further. The older version of the GRAP was enforced based only on the concentration of PM2.5 and PM10. This year, GRAP is being enforced based on the AQI, which takes other pollutants also into account, such as ozone, sulphur dioxide and oxides of nitrogen.

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Solution: a)

Tornadoes are whirling, vertical air columns that form from thunderstorms and stretch to the ground. They travel with ferocious speed and lay waste to everything in their path.

When winds vary in speed or direction at different altitudes–a condition known as wind shear–the updraft will start to spin.

These changes in winds produce the spin necessary for a tornado. For especially strong tornadoes, changes are needed in both the wind’s speed and direction.

Solution: c)

Wireless charging works by transferring energy from the charger to a receiver in the back of the phone via electromagnetic induction.

The charger uses an induction coil to create an alternating electromagnetic field, which the receiver coil in the phone converts back into electricity, to be fed into the battery.