Daily Current Affairs MCQ- September 1, 2023 - UPSC MCQ

Indian Railways’ Kolkata Metro plans to replace steel third rail with composite Aluminium third rail Current Collector.

• The third rail systems are a means of providing electric power to a train through a conductor placed alongside the rails.
• Kolkata Metro Railway using steel Third Rail for the last 40 years.
• Kolkata Metro Railway has now decided to use composite Aluminium Third Rail in all the upcoming corridors being undertaken for construction along with retro fitment in existing corridor with steel Third Rail.
• With this Metro Railway, Kolkata would become the member of elite club of London, Moscow, Berlin, Munich, and Istanbul Metro who have also shifted from steel Third Rail to Aluminium Third Rail.
• The obvious advantages of aluminium composite Third Rail over steel Third Rail are
• Reduction in resistive current loss and improved Traction voltage level.
• Reduced maintenance and life cycle cost.
• Improvement in the efficiency of train operations.
• Huge     improvement       in    Energy     Efficiency.   
• Reduction in carbon footprint.

Hence both statements are correct.

Recently, Oncologist Ravi Kannan, has been named one of the four winners of the 2023 Ramon Magsaysay Award.

• It is Asia’s premier prize and highest honor, celebrates greatness of spirit and transformative leadership in Asia.
• The Ramon Magsaysay Awardees, annually selected by the RMAF board of trustees, are presented with a certificate and a medallion with an embossed image of Ramon Magsaysay facing right in profile.
• From 1958 to 2008, the Award was given in six categories annually:
• Government Service: To recognize outstanding service in the public interest in any branch of government, including the executive, judicial, legislative, or military;
• Public Service: To recognize outstanding service for the public good by a private citizen;
• Community Leadership: To recognize leadership of a community toward helping the disadvantaged have fuller opportunities and a better life;
• Journalism, Literature, and Creative Communication Arts: To recognize effective writing, publishing, or photography or the use of radio, television, cinema, or the performing arts as a power for the public good;
• Peace and International Understanding: To recognize contributions to the advancement of friendship, tolerance, peace, and solidarity as the foundations for sustainable development within and across countries; and
• Emergent Leadership: To recognize an individual, forty years of age or younger, for outstanding work on issues of social change in his or her community, but whose leadership may not yet be broadly recognized outside of this community.
• It is presented in formal ceremonies in Manila, Philippines on August 31st, the birth anniversary of the much-esteemed Philippine President whose ideals inspired the Award’s creation in 1957.

Indian winners on the list

• Prominent Indians who have won the award include Vinoba Bhave in 1958, Mother Teresa in 1962, Kamaladevi Chattopadhyay in 1966, Satyajit Ray in 1967, Mahasweta Devi in 1997.
• In recent years, Arvind Kejriwal (2006), Anshu Gupta of Goonj (2015), human rights activist Bezwada Wilson (2016), and journalist Ravish Kumar (2019) have won the award. 

Hence only statement 1 is correct.

Recently, a unit of Abu Dhabi AI company G42, has released 'Jais', the world's most advanced Arabic large language model.

• It is a bilingual Arabic-English model that has been trained on a massive dataset of text and code.
• It can be used for a variety of tasks, such as machine translation, text summarization, and question answering.
• It was trained on the Condor Galaxy, the world's largest AI supercomputer, using 116 billion Arabic tokens and 279 billion English tokens.
• It is also open-source, which means that anyone can use it or contribute to its development.
• It is available to download on the Hugging Face machine learning platform.
• The release of Jais is a significant step forward for the development of AI in the Arabic world.
• Applications
• Potential applications of Jais include machine translation which can be used to translate text from Arabic to English and vice versa.
• This could be used to improve the accessibility of information to Arabic speakers, as well as to facilitate communication between Arabic speakers and speakers of other languages.
• It adeptly distills extensive textual content, from news articles to research papers, into succinct and comprehensible summaries, enhancing accessibility and comprehension.
• It also gives response to queries about text, enabling educational tools like responsive chatbots for students or robust customer service applications for client inquiries.

Hence both statements are correct.

For the Aditya-L1 mission, ISRO will be using Liquid Apogee Motor (LAM) identical to the one used in the Mars and moon missions.

• It is a small but powerful engine. ‘LAM’ will have a critical role to play in the Indian Space Research Organisation’s (ISRO) upcoming Aditya-L1 mission meant to study the sun.
• The successful operation of LAM is vital to ISRO’s plans to place the Aditya spacecraft in a halo orbit at Lagrangian point L1.
• Such engines are used for orbital adjustment manoeuvres of satellites/spacecraft in orbit.
• It is developed by the Liquid Propulsion Systems Centre (LPSC), the ISRO centre for liquid and cryogenic propulsion in Thiruvananthapuram.

Hence only statement 1 is correct.

Iceland’s government recently said it will resume hunting fin whales after a two-month halt, but with new guidelines aimed at killing them as quickly as possible to reduce suffering.

About Fin Whales:

• Next to the blue whale, the fin whale is the second largest mammal in the world.
• It gets its name from an easy-to-spot fin on its back, near its tail.
• It is the fastest swimming of the large whales, known as the greyhound of the seas.
• Scientific Name: Balaenoptera physalus
• Other Names: Finner; Razorback; Finback; Flathead; Common rorqual; Herring whale
• Distribution:
• They inhabit the temperate and polar zones of all major oceans and open seas and, less commonly, in tropical oceans and seas.
• Some populations are migratory, moving into colder waters during the spring and summer months to feed. In autumn, they return to temperate or tropical oceans.
• Features:
• It is very streamlined in shape, but rather "fuller" than the blue whale, although it isn't as long.
• They grow to 20 meters in length and weigh approximately 70,000 kilograms.
• They are dark grey to brownish-black in colour along the top of the body, with an asymmetrically pigmented head.
• They have a distinct ridge along their back behind the dorsal fin, which gives it the nickname "razorback.
• Fin whales have a very unusual feature: the lower right jaw is bright white and the lower left jaw is black.
• Lifespan: They can live for 80 to 90 years.
• Females are slightly longer than males.
• Conservation Status:
• IUCN Red List: Vulnerable

Hence only statement 1 is correct.

FMC India recently announced the launch of its latest product, ENTAZIA biofungicide.

About ENTAZIA:

• It is a biofungicide crop protection product formulated with Bacillus subtilis.
• It was developed by FMC India.
• It will provide farmers with a powerful and sustainable tool to protect their crops from fungi while maintaining environmental integrity.
• Advantages:
• It leverages the natural capabilities of Bacillus subtilis to control bacterial leaf blight, one of the most serious diseases of rice.
• By activating the crop’s defense system against plant pathogens, it acts to prevent and control bacterial leaf blight, while staying harmless to natural predators and parasites.
• The biological product promotes natural pest defense by utilizing the naturally occurring Bacillus subtilis to establish a robust line of defense against bacterial leaf blight.
• By fostering a healthy plant microbiome, it bolsters plants’ resilience to stress factors and contributes to overall growth and vigor.
• It can be applied in an integrated pest management program with FMC’s bio-stimulants and synthetic fungicides for additional plant benefits.

Hence option b is the correct answer.

Kerala recently introduced India's first-ever AI (artificial intelligence) school.

About India’s First AI School:

• Location: It was launched by Santhigiri Vidhyabhavan in Thiruvananthapuram, Kerala.
• The establishment of this AI school is the result of a collaboration between iLearning Engines (ILE) USA and Vedhik eSchool.
• The school’s curriculum aligns with the National School Accreditation Standards, which are based on the New National Education Policy (NEP 2020).
• The school's unique approach centers on deepening students' understanding of Artificial Intelligence (AI) and advanced technologies, enhancing their learning journey.
• It seamlessly integrates AI components such as machine learning, natural language processing, and data analysis into various educational facets like curriculum design, personalized assessments, and student support.
• Features:
• It caters to students from 8 to 12 grade with various multifaceted support services. They will get many benefits like support from a multitude of teachers, different test levels, aptitude tests, career planning, memory techniques and counselling.
• Besides academics, this AI system nurtures the skills like interview techniques, group discussion aptitude, mathematical prowess, writing finesse, etiquette, English proficiency and emotional well-being as well.
• It equips its students to prepare for competitive exams like JEE, NEET, CUET, CLAT GMAT and IELTS, for a better higher education.
• It helps students get opportunities for esteemed foreign universities and paves the way for students to pursue their higher studies in foreign countries.

Hence option d is the correct answer.

The Chhattisgarh High Court recently dismissed a public interest litigation (PIL) that aimed to designate the Bhoramdeo Wildlife Sanctuary (BWS) as a tiger reserve.

About Bhoramdeo Wildlife Sanctuary:

• Location: It is situated in the Kawardha district of Chhattisgarh.
• It is named after the famous 11^th- century Bhoramdeo Temple situated near the Sanctuary.
• It shares a border with Kanha National Park in Madhya Pradesh, making it an important tiger habitat in central India.
• Size: The sanctuary covers an area of approximately 325 square kilometers (125 square miles).
• Rivers: This wildlife sanctuary is the origin of the Fen and Sankari rivers.
• Landscape: The sanctuary is characterized by its lush green forests, rolling hills, and the Maikal Range of the Satpura Hills.
• Vegetation: It offers a mix of dense forests and open grasslands.
• Flora: The main species of plants in the Sanctuary include sal, saja, tinsa, kara and haldu.
• Fauna: It is home to a variety of wildlife species, including tigers, leopards, wild dogs, sloth bears, sambar deer, barking deer, chital (spotted deer), gaur (Indian bison), and various species of birds and reptiles.

Hence option c is the correct answer.

Recently, the INDIAai and Meta India signed a memorandum of understanding (MoU) to establish a framework for collaboration and cooperation in the field of artificial intelligence (AI) and emerging technologies.

• It is the National artificial intelligence Portal of India which was launched on 28th May 2020.
• It is a knowledge portal, research organisation, and an ecosystem-building initiative.
• It stands to unite and promote collaborations with various entities in India’s AI ecosystem.
• It is a joint initiative by the Ministry of Electronics and IT (MeitY), National e-Governance Division (NeGD) and NASSCOM.
• NeGD: It was created in 2009 as an Independent Business Division under the Digital India Corporation (a not-for-profit company set up by MeitY).
• NASSCOM: It is a not-for-profit industry association and the apex body for the IT and IT-enabled products and services sector in India.
• It is the single central knowledge hub on artificial intelligence and allied fields for aspiring entrepreneurs, students, professionals, academics, and everyone else.

Hence only statement 1 is correct.

Recently, a new species of millipede has been discovered crawling underneath the city of Los Angeles in the United States.

About New Millipede species:

• The newly found species is a thread Millipede.
• It is about the length of a paperclip but skinny as pencil lead.
• Its scientific name is Illacme socal.
• It is translucent and sinuous like a jellyfish tentacle.
• The creature burrows four inches below ground, secretes unusual chemicals and is blind.
• It relays on hornlike antennas protruding from its head to find its way.

Key facts about Millipede

• These are member of the arthropod(Phylum) class Diplopoda.
• They are cylindrical or slightly flattened invertebrates.
• The word “millipede” translates to “a thousand feet”—but while millipedes have many feet, none of them quite have a thousand.
• Their bodies are split into a number of segments, and each segment has two sets of legs that attach to the body's underside. 
• Diet: It is a detritivore, which means that it eats dead organic matter in the earth like damp wood pieces, decayed leaves, and other materials that naturally exists in their moist habitat underground.

Hence both statements are correct.