Keeling Curve, sometimes seen in the news recently, is associated with?

a.   Concentration of Carbon dioxide (CO2)

b.   Impact of Education in Societal Wellbeing

c.   Economic inequality against Income per capita

d.   A chain of volcanoes formed above a subducting plate

2)Which of the following is the first country in the world to adopt Bitcoin as legal tender?

a.   Austria

b.   Colombia

c.   Venezuela

d.   El Salvador

3)Which of the following agencies is responsible for conducting Operation Pangea?

a.   World Trade Organization (WTO)

b.   International Criminal Police Organization (INTERPOL)

c.   Drug Enforcement Administration

d.   Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI)

The Keeling Curve is a graph of the accumulation of carbon dioxide in the Earth’s atmosphere based on continuous measurements taken at the Mauna Loa Observatory on the island of Hawaii from 1958 to the present day.

Prelims Specific News Items

India wind energy market outlook was released by Global Wind Energy Council. As per the report, India has a pipeline of 10.3 GW in Central and State markets. These pipelines will drive installations until 2023. Report highlights India will install 20 GW of wind energy capacity by 2021-25.

GWEC was established in 2005. It provides credible and representative forum for entire wind energy sector at international level.

2)The World Health Organization (WHO) has developed a handbook for countries to measure their foodborne disease burden.

The guide aims to help nations identify food safety system needs and data gaps so they can strengthen national infrastructure and better protect public health.

It does not cover chemical hazards, including food allergens. Data requirements and methods for these hazards will be dealt with in a future publication.

Foodborne diseases are caused by contamination of food and occur at any stage of the food production, delivery and consumption chain. 

3)A team of scientists at IIT- Kharagpur has devised a novel method for early detection of tropical cyclones. The method aims to identify initial traces of pre-cyclonic eddy vortices in the atmospheric column, prior to satellite detection over ocean surface, and track its spatio-temporal evolution, the Department of Science and Technology (DST) said.

So far, remote sensing techniques have detected them the earliest. However, this detection was possible only after system developed as a well-marked low-pressure system over the warm ocean surface.

Prior to the formation of cyclonic system over the warm oceanic environment, the initial atmospheric instability mechanism, as well as the vortex development, is triggered at higher atmospheric levels.

These cyclonic eddies are prominent features in the vertical atmospheric column encompassing the disturbance environment with a potential to induce and develop into a well-marked cyclonic depression over the warm ocean surface. They could be used for detection of prediction of cyclones.

4) London-based global think tank Overseas Development Institute published its report called “Costs of Climate change in India”. The report analyses economic costs of climate-related risks in country and possibility of increased inequality & poverty. 

As per report, climate change will affect India’s economy.

India might lose about 3 to 10 percent of its GDP annually by 2100.

Poverty rate may also rise by 3.5 per cent in 2040.

India is already experiencing consequences of 1°C of global warming in the form of heavy rainfall. extreme heat waves, severe flooding, rising sea levels and catastrophic storms.

5) Airbnb, EaseMyTrip, OYO and Yatra have established a new industry association called “Confederation of Hospitality, Technology & Tourism Industry (CHATT)”. CHATT will help small companies and travel & hospitality technology players. CHATT association It will promote domestic tourism and help in digital transformation of domestic tourism.

6) India and Thailand started 31st edition of Coordinated Patrols or CORPAT, with the aim of reinforcing maritime links between two countries and to keep Indian Ocean safe and secure for international trade. 

7)CHIME telescope yields unprecedented results :- Scientists with the Canadian Hydrogen Intensity Mapping Experiment (CHIME) Collaboration, who include researchers at the Pune based Tata Institute for Fundamental Research (TIFR) and the National Centre for Radio Astrophysics (NCRA), have assembled the largest collection of fast radio bursts (FRBs) in the telescope’s first FRB catalogue.

While catching sight of an FRB is considered a rare thing in the field of radio astronomy, prior to the CHIME project, radio astronomers had only caught sight of around 140 bursts in their scopes since the first FRB was spotted in
2007.
FRBs are oddly bright flashes of light, registering in the radio band of the electromagnetic spectrum, which blaze for a few milliseconds before vanishing without a trace.
But the advent of the CHIME project — a large stationary radio telescope in British Columbia, Canada — has been a game changer and has nearly quadrupled the number of fast radio bursts discovered to date.
With more observations, astronomers hope soon to pin down the extreme origins of these curiously bright signals.

EDITORIAL OF THE DAY

Author says that the Centre is having centralising tendencies and is continuously usurping the domain of state governments. Author says that States that though centre has definitely more powers provided by the constitution but still the states are not subordinate in all the aspects. Centre has encroached upon the domain of state government in many aspects.

Author says that the recent episode of Chief secretary where the Chief Secy. of Bengal was given a show cause notice and brought to deputation was not correct. Author gives the logic that since the AIS officers when work in a state cadre the state government has control over that and the officer also should not show his/her allegience to the centre. The Central govt. should have consulted the state govt. i.e the chief minister before bringing him in deputation.

Further, action has been initiated against Mr. Bandyopadhyay under Section 51(b) of the Disaster Management Act for failing to comply with the Centre’s direction to attend the review meeting taken by the Prime Minister.
This is an absurd interpretation of the provision that is meant to deal with cases of defiance of the lawful orders or action of the competent authorities (handling disaster management) under the Act.