TNPSC Current Affairs July 31, 2020

www.tnpsc.academy – TNPSC Current Affairs July 31, 2020 (31/07/2020)

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Topic: International Events

International Thermonuclear Experimental Reactor (ITER) Assembly

Recently, the International Thermonuclear Experimental Reactor (ITER) celebrated the start of Assembly of the ITER Tokamak at Saint-Paul-Lez-Durance, France.

The Celebration was hosted virtually by the French President and all ITER member countries participated either in person, or electronically through remote mode.

India’s Contribution:

India also mentioned about its fair share in terms of its in-kind contributions, viz., the cryostat, cryogenic and cryo-distribution systems, auxiliary heating devices, multi megawatt power supplies, etc.

ITER cryostat is manufactured by India (Larsen and Tourbo). Cryostat is a chamber that can maintain very low temperatures.

It is the largest stainless steel high-vacuum pressure chamber ever built (16,000 m3) providing the high vacuum, ultra cool environment for the ITER vacuum vessel and the superconducting magnets.

The target for the first plasma is 2025. At extreme temperatures, electrons are separated from nuclei and a gas becomes a plasma—an ionized state of matter similar to a gas.

European Union (EU) is responsible for the largest portion of construction costs (45.6%); the remainder is shared equally by China, Japan, South Korea, Russia, USA including India (9.1% each).

International Thermonuclear Experimental Reactor:

International Thermonuclear Experimental Reactor (ITER) is a collaboration of 35 nations launched in 1985. It is located in France.

It aims to build the world’s largest tokamak to prove the feasibility of fusion as a large-scale and carbon-free source of energy.

The tokamak is an experimental machine designed to harness the energy of fusion. Inside a tokamak, the energy produced through the fusion of atoms is absorbed as heat in the walls of the vessel.

Like a conventional power plant, a fusion power plant uses this heat to produce steam and then electricity by way of turbines and generators.

Principle:

The project is based on fusion which is also an energy source for the Sun and stars.

Every fusion reaction in the Sun, in which two hydrogen atoms fuse into one helium atom, releases two neutrinos.

The project is funded and run by seven member entities:

The European Union, China, India, Japan, Russia, South Korea and the United States.

What will ITER do?

Produce 500 MW of fusion power

Demonstrate the integrated operation of technologies for a fusion power plant

Achieve a deuterium-tritium plasma in which the reaction is sustained through internal heating

Test tritium breeding

Demonstrate the safety characteristics of a fusion device.

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Topic: Latest inventions on Science and Technology

Perseverance- NASA’s mission to Mars

National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) has launched its Mars 2020 Perseverance rover aboard a United Launch Alliance Atlas V. The launch took place from Cape Canaveral Air Force Station in Florida.

This is the third launch to Mars this month, following the UAE’s Hope and China’s Tianwen-1 spacecraft.

Key facts:

The rover’s Mars arrival is set for 18, 2021.  The mission is planned to last for at least one Mars year, which works out to about 687 days on Earth (it takes longer for Mars to go around the sun).

Landing site: Jezero crater.

Perseverance is loaded with seven instruments chosen to help it achieve its mission objectives.

Perseverance

Perseverance will carry a unique instrument, MOXIE or Mars Oxygen ISRU Experiment:

which for the first time will manufacture molecular oxygen on Mars using carbon dioxide from the carbon-dioxide-rich atmosphere (ISRU means In Situ Resource Utilization: or the use of local resources to meet human needs or requirements of the spacecraft).

It will carry Ingenuity, the first ever helicopter to fly on Mars.

This is the first time NASA will fly a helicopter on another planet or satellite.

It is the planned first step to bring back rock samples from Mars for analysis in sophisticated laboratories on Earth: with the goal of looking for biosignatures: or signatures of present or past life.

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Topic: International Events

Gandhi-King Scholarly Exchange Initiative Act

US House panel passes bill to promote legacies of Mahatma Gandhi, Martin Luther King Jr.

It was authored by John Lewis, the civil rights leader Democratic member of the House who passed away last week.

Key Facts:

It will establish annual scholar and student exchange programs for Indians and Americans to study the leaders’ legacies and visit historic sites in India and the U.S., relevant to the India’s freedom struggle and the U.S.’s civil rights movement.

The bill also seeks to establish the Gandhi-King Global Academy, a conflict resolution initiative based on the principles of nonviolence.

It proposes the establishment of the United States-India Gandhi-King Development Foundation set up by the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) and the government of India, organized under Indian law.

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Topic: Political System in India

Article 239A(4) of the Constitution

Lt Governor Anil Baijal has reversed the Delhi cabinet’s decision to reject the Delhi Police’s panel of lawyers for the riots cases in the High Court and the Supreme Court.

L-G used his special powers under Article 239A(4) of the Constitution to overturn the cabinet’s decision.

Under this Article, the Delhi government is bound to follow the L-G’s orders.