Current Affairs Oct 12

Rose-breasted Grosbeak

• Biologists have found a rare Rose-breasted Grosbeak, a bird with both female and male plumage colours, in the United States’
• The Rose-breasted Grosbeak derives its name from the male of the species who have a ruby-red triangular marking on a white chest and dark black wings with pink wing pits.
• The females are much less showy, with no patches on its beige body, brown wings and yellow wing pits.
• Rose-breasted grosbeaks are sexually dimorphic, meaning they have both males and females have different colour plumage.
• Researchers said the condition is called bilateral gynandromorphism, means the bird is both male and female, with one ovary and one testis.
• This occurs when two sperm fertilize an egg that has two nuclei instead of one, which results in the egg to develop a chromosome from each sex.
• Since these birds have left functional ovaries, they could potentially lay eggs.
• However, it’s survival may depend on whether it makes male mating calls and risk getting attacked by other competitor males in the future.

What is a gynandromorph?

• A gynandromorph is an organism that has both male and female characteristics – or, a male-female chimaera.
• It is often seen in insects, though gynandromorphic birds, snakes, lobsters and other animals have been observed, too.
• The extremely rare phenomenon occurs when two sperm fertilize an egg that has two nuclei instead of one.
• The egg can develop male sex chromosomes on one side and female on the other, leading to a bird with testis and other male characteristics on one half of its body and an ovary and other female characteristics on the other.
• Gynandromorphs are not all that uncommon in the wild, though the colouration or markings of some species make the results more striking than others.

HT

‘Murder Hornets’ And ‘Furry Puss Caterpillars’

• Months after the Asian giant hornet — a vicious predatory insect popularly dubbed the ‘murder hornet’ —
• was first spotted in the US state of Washington,
• health officials in Virginia are now warning residents to watch out for another dangerous critter — the highly venomous furry puss caterpillar.
• Ever since the first murder hornet was spotted in the Washington state late last year, these insects have destroyed entire beehives and decapitated tens of thousands of bees, threatening crops that rely on pollination.
• These ferocious creatures have also been known to kill about 50 people in Japan every year, mostly as a result of allergic reactions.

But what are these insects and what has led to their sudden resurgence in the United States?

• The furry puss caterpillar, named after the far less vicious house cat, is essentially a southern flannel moth in its larva stage.
• According to experts, after metamorphosis, the insect no longer poses a threat.
• Closely resembling a wig or toupée, the caterpillar is widely regarded as one of the most poisonous of its kind in the United States.
• Touching or accidentally brushing against the hairy coat of these insects could cause a painful reaction and trigger symptoms such as fever, muscle cramps or swollen glands.
• The bristly hair that coats it, hides small and toxic spikes that can get lodged in a person’s skin and cause immediate and intensely burning pain.
• The severity of the sting depends on its location as well as how many spines get embedded in the skin.
• The caterpillar can also sometimes leave its victim with an itchy rash that appears in a red grid-like pattern.
• The caterpillars, which subsist solely on oak and elm leaves, are commonly found in parks and near structures.

What is the ‘murder hornet’ and what is the threat it poses to agriculture?

• In November last year, two unusual hornets were spotted near Blaine, Washington.
• After studying the insects closely, scientists identified them as the Asian giant hornets, the world’s largest wasps, which are known to grow up to nearly two inches in length.
• Native to East Asia and Japan, these predators are infamous for ruthlessly ripping apart honeybees and decimating their hives.
• However, they also pose a threat to human beings.
• Their potent stingers deliver venom that has killed hundreds of people across the world.
• Researchers and foresters fear the impact of these insects on the country’s agriculture that is dependent on honey bee pollination.
• Pollination is a very significant part of the agricultural process and a vast number of crops are dependent on honeybees, which serve as primary pollinators.
• European honey bees, commonly found in North America, are no match for the Asian giant hornet.
• A small group of hornets can destroy an entire colony of bees in less than 90 minutes with their shark-fin shaped mandibles.

What has led to a rise in the population of both insects in the United States?

• According to experts, climate change has a significant role to play in the sudden appearance and subsequent rise in population of several different insects over the last decade.
• Scientists believe that the population of the furry puss caterpillar will be kept in check by its natural predators.
• But they will be forced to intervene if the numbers surge suddenly and dramatically.
• Meanwhile, in the case of the ‘murder hornets’, many believe that they spread across the western parts of Washington due to the expansive wooded landscapes and mild, wet climate that the state offers.

IE

Gateway Programme

• European space officials will this week unveil detailed plans for a series of ambitious missions aimed at returning humans to the moon in the next few years.
• Projects will include construction of crew quarters for an orbiting lunar space station, making the power and propulsion units for America’s Orion spacecraft, and designing and building a sophisticated communication and refuelling unit, known as Esprit, to serve astronauts on the lunar surface.
• These missions will be carried out jointly with Nasa and the Japanese and Canadian space agencies.
• Planning for the programme – known as Gateway – has been going on for years, but now final contracts with European aerospace companies are about to be signed and will be announced at International Astronautical Congress.
• The aim of the programme was to get the first astronauts to the moon by 2024.
• The first sets of astronauts who will fly to the moon were very likely to include a European.
• The aim of the Gateway programme is to open up the moon to scientific scrutiny in the same way that Antarctica was opened up in the second half of the last century.
• One key aim of Gateway will be to explore the moon’s south pole for the presence of frozen water.
• Evidence from robot probes suggest that ice exists there and finding it would have a crucial bearing on the construction of future lunar colonies.
• Separating water into its constituent elements of oxygen and hydrogen by electrolysis could then provide fuel and air for astronauts.
• The main vehicle used to ferry astronauts to the moon will be the Orion spacecraft, which is scheduled to make its uncrewed maiden flight on Nasa’s giant Space Launch System (SLS) rocket next year.
• Esa has already provided the power and propulsion units for the first Orion flight and is set to build a further five units.

THE GUARDIAN

Dust causing rapid snow and ice melt in western Himalayas

• Dust blowing in from the Thar desert in northwestern India, from Saudi Arabia and the Sahara desert in north Africa is causing a rapid melting of snow in the western Himalayas, according to a new study.
• The researchers found that due to climate change, wind patterns had changed, which were blowing dust in the direction of the Himalayas.
• Due to human-induced land use changes, there were no longer enough trees in the area that could stop the dust as there used to be.
• Pure white snow reflects all heat. However, that is not the case with ‘dirty snow’.
• This is called the ‘albedo effect’, which is the measure of an object to reflect sunlight.
• Because the dust travelling to the Himalayas deposits on the snow and ice, it causes it to reflect sunlight poorly. This, in turn, causes it to melt.
• The increase in dust in the Himalayas could have catastrophic consequences for people living in parts of India, China and southeast Asia, who depend on Himalayan glacial melt for their water needs.

DTE

World’s oldest tropical peatland found in Indonesia

• A team of researchers claimed to have discovered what could possibly be the oldest tropical peatland in the world.
• Peatlands are a type of soil made from organic matter such as wood and leaves.
• The site was found near the city of Putussibau, on the Indonesian-administered area of the island of Borneo.
• It was dated to be formed at least 47,800 years ago, according to radiocarbon dating.
• The discovery of the site suggested that the region had remained sufficiently wet and warm enough during the last ice age to support the growth of peat.
• The site was found to be 17 to 18 metres deep. The average peat depth in Indonesia is 5 to 6 metres.
• Peatlands store a lot of carbon and play an important role in the carbon cycle.
• Indonesia’s ancient peatlands are increasingly becoming threatened due to changes in land use.

DTE

Two relatives of the Rubella virus found

• Two teams of scientists have discovered two new relatives of the Rubella virus.
• The Rubella virus was first described by George Maton in 1814.
• Henry Veale gave it the name ‘Rubella’ in 1866. However, it was only in 1962 that its full impact was identified.
• An airborne, it can cause miscarriage, stillbirth and fetal development defects during pregnancy. It is not known in animals.
• It has largely been eradicated due to an effective vaccine.
• Till now, it was thought the Rubella virus was the sole member in its family Matonaviridae.
• A team of African and American scientists discovered the ‘ruhugu’ virus in insect-eating, cyclops leaf-nosed bats in the Ruteete Sub County in Uganda.
• Meanwhile, another team of researchers discovered the ‘rustrela’ virus in mice in Germany.
• It was at Kibale that one of the two new viral relatives was found in the aptly named cyclops leaf-nosed bat.
• The bat virus has been named ruhugu.
• Rustrela was found at an unidentified German zoo in three animals — a donkey, a Bennett’s tree-kangaroo and a capybara, the largest rodent in the world. All three zoo animals died after suffering severe neurological disease.
• The virus also was found in yellow-necked field mice in and around the zoo. The mice appear to have remained healthy.
• The discovery of the two rubella relatives may also aid efforts to develop treatment for more than 100,000 babies around the world stricken each year with congenital rubella syndrome.
• The syndrome, in which the virus passes from mother to fetus during pregnancy, can result in the baby suffering loss of hearing, loss of sight, heart disease or other birth defects.
• Many cases of congenital rubella syndrome result in stillbirths, miscarriages and fetal malformations.
• The rubella vaccine was approved for widespread use in 1969, and infections then declined rapidly.

DTE

 Delhi girl is British high commissioner for a day

• Delhi girl Chaitanya Venkateswaran recently became the British high commissioner to India for a day.
• The 18-year-old won the ‘High Commissioner for the Day’ contest organised by the mission in the run-up to the International Day of the Girl Child, which is on October 11.
• A student of international studies and economics at Washington’s American University, Venkateswaran has been an active volunteer in the field of disability, working with visually challenged students, acid attack survivors and marginalised LGBT groups.
• The contest has been organised annually by the British high commission since 2017.
• The annual competition is open to Indian women aged 18 to 23.
• This year, entrants were invited to submit a one-minute video on social media on the question – ‘What global challenges and opportunities do you see for gender equality in the age of Covid-19?’

TOI

Blocking key protein may guard against severe Covid-19

• A new study suggests that blocking a human protein may curtail the potentially deadly inflammatory reactions that many patients have to the novel coronavirus.
• The protein is known as factor D, and the researchers say there may already be drugs in development for other diseases that can block this protein.
• Scientists already know that spike proteins on the surface of SARS-CoV-2 are the means by which it attaches to cells targeted for infection.
• The spikes first grab hold of a molecule called heparan sulfate, then uses the human protein ACE2 as its doorway into the attacked cell.
• In a series of experiments, researchers in the new study used normal human blood serum and three subunits of the SARS-CoV-2 spike protein to discover exactly how the virus hijacks the immune system and endangers normal cells.
• The team found that by blocking factor D, they were able to stop the destructive chain of events triggered by SARS-CoV-2.

IE

‘Asteroid’ hurtling towards Earth may be a piece of rocket

• Back in 1966, the Nasa team behind an attempted Moon landing thought they would never see their rocket again after it was swept into the Sun’s orbit.
• Now, however, it would appear to be hurtling back towards Earth at 1,500mph.
• A telescope in Hawaii discovered the mystery object last month.
• It’s estimated to be about 26ft long – roughly the length of a bus.
• It was initially thought to be an asteroid and was given the name ‘Asteroid 2020 SO’, but it is now believed to be part of a Centaur rocket that propelled America’s Surveyor 2 lander to the Moon 54 years ago.
• After releasing its payload, the rocket swept past the Moon and went into orbit around the Sun.
• The lander, meanwhile, ended up crashing into the Moon after one of its thrusters failed to ignite.

DailyMail

Healing touch of Homoeopathy for Skin Diseases

• There are many who certify that Homoeopathy can do wonders in cases of skin related viral diseases.
• Treatment of five patients suffering with five different skin diseases with Homoeopathy has given notable results which give a boost to the conviction of the positive effects of Homoeopathic medicine on such skin disorders.
• Skin diseases are numerous and frequently occurring health problem affecting all ages not only India, but globally also.
• The Global Burden of Disease project has shown the skin diseases continue to be the 4th leading cause of non-fatal disease burden world-wide.
• Experts engaged with Homoeopathy treatment opine that Homeopathic approach to common viral skin diseases can be a game changer in offering affordable and effective solutions to a large number of people.
• The case study was done on five patients with Wart, Herpes Zoster and Molluscan Contagiosum.
• Skin warts are benign tumours caused by infection of keratinocytes. Herpes Zoster results from reactivation of varicella-zoster virus (that also causes chickenpox).
• On the other hand, Molluscan contagiosum is a viral skin infection caused by closely related types of Pox Virus, and is common with children worldwide, especially in warm climates.
• It is known that Homoeopathy treats the patient, not the disease.
• Thus, the skin manifestations were treated by the means of internal medication following the principles of Homoeopathy, in these cases.
• It has come out that the medicines were able to not only remove or dissolute the skin lesion efficiently, but also to provide relief to the associated symptoms of the patient.
• Not only that, none of the patients complained about any adverse effect during the treatment.

PIB

Nobel Prize in Economics

• The Nobel prize for economics was awarded to two US game theory specialists, 26 years after John Nash – the Princeton academic depicted by Russell Crowe in the 2001 film A Beautiful Mind – won for his groundbreaking work on the same subject.
• Americans Paul R Milgrom and Robert B Wilson won for the designs of mathematical models that promote “improvements to auction theory and inventions of new auction formats.
• The discoveries of Paul R. Milgrom and Robert B. Wilson “have benefitted sellers, buyers and taxpayers around the world.
• The auction formats developed by the winners have been used to sell radio frequencies, fishing quotas and airport landing slots.
• Auction theory, which is a branch of game theory, was developed during the late 1970s and early 1980s
• after a group of researchers set about building mathematical models
• that could introduce incentives and information into the auction bidding process
• to maintain a fair market and prevent collusion among the bidders.

• John Nash developed the Nash equilibrium to analyse situations of conflict and co-operation and produce predictions about how people will behave.
• Nash’s famous equilibrium has found application in fields as diverse as computing, evolutionary biology and artificial intelligence.
• The award, which comes with 10m krona (£850,000) cash prize and a gold medal, caps a week of Nobel prizes and is technically known as the Sveriges Riksbank Prize in Economic Sciences in Memory of Alfred Nobel.
• Since its establishment in 1969, it has been awarded 51 times and is widely considered one of the Nobel prizes.
• Last year’s award went to two researchers from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and a third from Harvard University for pioneering on-the-ground experiments to discover the most effective ways to tackle poverty in the developing world.
• There was speculation ahead of the award that American Claudia Goldin, whose research has focused on inequality and the female labour force, would become the third woman to receive the prize.

The Guardian

Nirbhay Missile

• The Nirbhay subsonic cruise missile, having a range of around 1,000 km, developed a technical snag during a test firing at a facility in Odisha, forcing its developer DRDO to abort the trial.
• The missile was test-fired by the Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO) from an integrated test range in Balasore in Odisha.
• The DRDO has already carried out several successful trials of the ‘Nirbhay’ missile since October 2014.
• The state-of-the-art missile, which can be deployed from multiple platforms, has a speed less than that of sound (Mach 0.8).
• Powered by a solid rocket motor booster developed by the Advanced Systems Laboratory (ASL), the missile has an operational range of 1000 km.
• India has test-fired a number of missiles including a new version of the surface-to-surface supersonic cruise missile BrahMos and anti-radiation missile Rudram-1.
• India also carried out successful test-firing of a laser-guided anti-tank missile and nuclear-capable hypersonic missile ‘Shaurya’.
• The successful test firing of Rudram-1 is seen as a major milestone as it is India’s first indigenously developed anti-radiation weapon.
• The flight testing of the missiles comes in the midst of India’s bitter border row with China in eastern Ladakh.

The Hindu