Vikram S rocket

🔆Vikram S rocket

✅ Why in News:  On November 18, 2022, Hyderabad-based Skyroot Aerospace scripted history by becoming the first private Indian organisation to launch a rocket from Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO)’s launchpad in Sriharikota.

▪️Vikram S rocket:

✅It is a part of Mission Prarambh, which means the beginning.
✅It is a sub-orbital rocket, which reached outer space and then splashed into the sea.
✅Has payload capacity of up to 300 kilograms.
✅Vikram-S used solid fuel-ammonium perchlorate, which is not completely green fuel.
✅With Vikram-2, it is planned to use liquefied natural gas (LNG), which is greener compared with traditional kerosene fuel.

▪️Mechanisms of Vikram S:

✅There are four spin thrusters, which will generate the rocket’s spin and stability so that it doesn’t deviate from the trajectory.
✅Max-Q is the maximum stress on the rocket and is experienced during the lift-off.
✅At around 23 seconds, the rocket achieves five times the speed of sound or Mach 5.
✅‘Apogee’ is the maximum point after which it descends, falls back and splashes down into the sea.
✅It takes around two and a half minutes to reach the Apogee and another two and a half minutes to splash down.

▪️Technologies used:

✅carbon composites: porous structure made of carbon and carbon fibre and four times lighter and has higher strength than steel.
✅The lighter the rocket, the more payload we can use.
✅3D printing: reduces the cycle time by 90 per cent compared with traditional methods and allows to build complex shapes.
✅Cycle time is the time required to manufacture a component.
✅Cost-effectiveness
✅Efficient technology
✅Utilising existing govt infrastructure
✅Operating out of India

▪️About Skyroot Aerospace:

✅It is an Indian private aerospace manufacturer and commercial launch service provider headquartered in Hyderabad.
✅Mandates: cutting-edge innovation and cost-effectiveness
Next launch will be Vikram-1, an orbital vehicle that puts satellites into orbit.
✅Vikram-2 will have a higher capacity than Vikram-1.
✅Skyroot Aerospace focuses on reusability of rockets.

#science_and_technology
#prelims

Gaganyaan Mission

Gaganyaan Mission: भारत के पहले ह्यूमन-स्पेस फ्लाइट 'H1-गगनयान' को वर्ष 2024 के फोर्थ क्वार्टर में लांच किया जायेगा. केन्द्रीय मंत्री डॉ जितेंद्र सिंह ने एक लिखित उत्तर में इस बात की जानकारी दी है.    

उन्होंने कहा कि क्रू मेम्बर की सुरक्षा के लिए गगनयान -1 मिशन से पहले दो मानवरहित उड़ानें निर्धारित की गयी है. इसको विभिन्न उड़ान स्थितियों में टेस्ट किया जायेगा जिससे मुख्य मिशन के समय किसी प्रकार की कोई तकनिकी समस्या ना हो.

ह्यूमन-स्पेस फ्लाइट 'H1-गगनयान' से पूर्व जिन दो मानवरहित उड़ानों को प्रस्तावित किया गया है, उनमे से एक को अगले साल की अंतिम तिमाही में टेस्ट किया जायेगा. इसे G1 मिशन नाम दिया गया है. दूसरे G-2 मिशन को 2024 की दूसरी तिमाही में लांच किय जायेगा.

G1 मिशन का उद्देश्य मानव रेटेड प्रक्षेपण यान, ऑर्बिट मॉड्यूल टेस्ट, मिशन मैनेजमेंट, संचार प्रणाली आदि की टेस्टिंग की जाएगी. यह मिशन एक ह्यूमनॉइड पेलोड को ले जायेगा.

गगनयान मिशन के बारें में:
गगनयान भारतीय अंतरिक्ष अनुसंधान संगठन (ISRO) का एक स्पेस मिशन है. जो 2022 में प्रस्तावित था लेकिन कोविड के कारण यह मिशन 2024 के फोर्थ क्वार्टर में लांच किया जायेगा. इसके तहत तीन स्पेस मिशन को स्पेस में भेजा जायेगा.

इसरो के जियोसिंक्रोनस सैटेलाइट लॉन्च व्हीकल जीएसएलवी एमके III द्वारा इन मिशन को लांच किया जायेगा. इस लॉन्च के साथ भारत,  अमेरिका, रूस, चीन के साथ एक विशेष क्लब में शामिल हो जायेगा.

इन तीन मिशनों में 2 मानवरहित होंगे, जबकि एक मानव युक्त मिशन होगा. मानव मिशन में एक महिला सहित तीन अंतरिक्ष यात्री होंगे. 

भारत के आगामी स्पेस मिशन:
वीनस मिशन: इसरो ने भी शुक्र के लिये एक मिशन की योजना बनायीं है, जो वीनस के लिए भारत का पहला मिशन होगा.

आदित्य L1 मिशन: इसरो ने सूर्य से जुड़े अनुसंधान के लिए आदित्य L1 मिशन की तैयारी कर रहा है. जो सूर्य के लिए भारत का पहला मिशन होगा. यह सूर्य और पृथ्वी के बीच L1 (लैग्रेंजियन पॉइंट तक) के लिए प्रस्तावित है.

XpoSat: इस मिशन को कॉस्मिक एक्स-रे के अध्ययन के लिए डिज़ाइन किया गया है.

Science and technology

🔆THE AI RESEARCH SUPERCLUSTER (RSC)

✅Meta announced in January 2022 that it is building an AI supercomputer, the AI Research SuperCluster (RSC).

✅Meta considers the RSC as a powerful supercomputer capable of quintillions of operations per second. It can perform tasks like translating text between languages and help identify potentially harmful content on Meta's platform.

✅The RSC, compared with Meta’s legacy production and research infrastructure, can run computer vision workflows up to 20 times faster, and train large-scale natural language processing (NLP) models three times faster.

✅Meta estimates that a model with billions of parameters can finish training in three weeks, compared to the nine weeks it was before.

✅RSC today comprises a total of 760 NVIDIA DGX A100 systems as its compute nodes, for a total of 6,080 GPUs.

✅RSC’s storage tier has 175 petabytes of Pure Storage FlashArray, 46 petabytes of cache storage in Penguin Computing Altus systems, and 10 petabytes of Pure Storage FlashBlade.

▪️Supercomputers?

✅A supercomputer can perform high-level processing at a faster rate when compared to a normal computer.

✅Supercomputers are made up of hundreds or thousands of powerful machines which use better artificial intelligence (AI) models to improve operations that process huge amounts of data in less time than normal computers.

✅Supercomputers require high-speed and specialised chip architectures. The chip performs 660 operations per cycle and thus run up to 230 gigaflops at 350 MHz.

✅AI supercomputers are built by combining multiple graphic processing units (GPUs) into compute nodes, which are then connected by a high-performance network fabric to allow fast communication between those GPUs.

◾️What is SWIFT and why is Russia being threatened with its exclusion?

✅As tensions peaks over Ukraine the United States could exclude Russia from the Society for Worldwide Interbank Financial Telecommunication (SWIFT).

◾️What is SWIFT?

✅SWIFT is an international network for banks worldwide to facilitate smooth money transactions globally.

✅It is basically a messaging network used by banks and financial institutions globally for quick and faultless exchange of information pertaining to financial transactions.

✅The Belgium-headquartered SWIFT connects more than 11,000 banking and securities organization in over 200 countries and territories.

✅First used in 1973, it went live in 1977 with 518 institutions from 22 countries, its website states.

◾️What exactly is it?

✅SWIFT is merely a platform that sends messages and does not hold any securities or money.

✅It facilitates standardized and reliable communication to facilitate the transaction.

◾️How does it facilitate banking?

✅Each participant on the platform is assigned a unique eight-digit SWIFT code or a bank identification code (BIC).

✅If a person, say, in New York with a Citibank account, wants to send money to someone with an HSBC account in London, the payee would have to submit to his bank the London-based beneficiary’s account number along with the eight-digit SWIFT code of the latter’s bank.

✅Citibank would then send a SWIFT message to HSBC. Once that is received and approved, the money would be credited to the required account.

◾️What happens if one is excluded from SWIFT?

✅US excluding Russia from SWIFT could have serious repercussions on how Russian banks carry out international financial transactions.

✅If a country is excluded from the most participatory financial facilitating platform, its foreign funding would take a hit, making it entirely reliant on domestic investors.

✅This is particularly troublesome when institutional investors are constantly seeking new markets in newer territories.

✅An alternative system would be cumbersome to build and even more difficult to integrate with an already expansive system.

🔆Society for Worldwide Interbank Financial Telecommunication (SWIFT).

◾️How does it facilitate banking?

✅Each participant on the platform is assigned a unique eight-digit SWIFT code or a bank identification code (BIC).

✅If a person, say, in New York with a Citibank account, wants to send money to someone with an HSBC account in London, the payee would have to submit to his bank the London-based beneficiary’s account number along with the eight-digit SWIFT code of the latter’s bank.

✅Citibank would then send a SWIFT message to HSBC. Once that is received and approved, the money would be credited to the required account.

Types of Blood

Blood

✅It transports substances like digested food from the small intestine to the other parts of the body. It carries oxygen from the lungs to the cells of the body. It also transports waste for removal from the body.

✅Blood is a liquid, which has cells of various kinds suspended in it. The fluid part of the blood is called plasma.

✅One type of cells are the red blood cells (RBC) which contain a red pigment called haemoglobin.

✅Haemoglobin bind with oxygen and transports it to all the parts of the body and ultimately to all the cells. The presence of haemoglobin makes blood appear red.

✅The blood also has white blood cells (WBC) which fight against germs that may enter our body.

✅The clot is formed because of the presence of another type of cells in the blood, called platelets.

Blood Vessels

✅They are two types of blood vessels namely arteries and veins.

✅Veins are the blood vessels that carry carbon dioxide-rich blood [impure blood] from all parts of the body back to the heart. Pulmonary vein is an exception as it carries oxygen-rich blood [pure blood] from lungs to heart. The veins have thin walls.

✅Arteries are the blood vessels that carry oxygen-rich blood from heart to all parts of the body. Pulmonary artery is an exception as it carries carbon dioxide-rich blood from heart to lungs. The arteries have thick walls as the pressure acting on then is high.

Plasma

✅Plasma is a straw coloured, viscous fluid constituting nearly 55 per cent of the blood.

✅90-92 per cent of plasma is water and proteins contribute 6-8 per cent of it.

✅Fibrinogen, globulins and albumins are the major proteins.

✅Fibrinogen are needed for clotting or coagulation of blood.

✅Globulins primarily are involved in defense mechanisms of the body

✅Albumins help in osmotic balance.

✅Plasma also contains small amounts of minerals like Na+, Ca++, Mg++, HCO3-, Cl-, etc. Glucose, amino acids, lipids, etc., are also present in the plasma as they are always in transit in the body.

✅Factors for coagulation or clotting of blood are also present in the plasma in an inactive form. Plasma without the clotting factors is called serum.

Red Blood Cells (RBC)

✅Erythrocytes or red blood cells (RBC) are the most abundant of all the cells in blood.

✅A healthy adult man has, on an average, 5 million to 5.5 million of RBCs mm-3 of blood.

✅RBCs are formed in the red bone marrow in the adults. RBCs are devoid of nucleus in most of the mammals and are biconcave in shape.

✅They have a red coloured, iron containing complex protein called haemoglobin, hence the colour and name of these cells.

✅RBCs have an average life span of 120 days after which they are destroyed in the spleen (graveyard of RBCs).

White Blood Cells (WBC)

✅Leucocytes are also known as white blood cells (WBC) as they are colorless due to the lack of haemoglobin. They are nucleated and are relatively lesser in number which averages 6000-8000 mm-3 of blood. Leucocytes are generally short lived. We have two main categories of WBCs – granulocytes and agranulocytes.

✅Neutrophils, eosinophils and basophils are different types of granulocytes, while lymphocytes and monocytes are the agranulocytes.

✅Neutrophils are the most abundant cells (60-65 per cent) of the total WBCs and basophils are the least (0.5-1 per cent) among them.

✅Neutrophils and monocytes (6-8 per cent) are phagocytic cells which destroy foreign organisms entering the body.

✅Basophils secrete histamine, serotonin, heparin, etc., and are involved in inflammatory reactions.

✅Eosinophils (2-3 per cent) resist infections and are also associated with allergic reactions.

✅Lymphocytes (20-25 per cent) are of two major types – ‘B’ and ‘T’ forms. Both B and T lymphocytes are responsible for immune responses of the body.

Platelets

✅Platelets also called thrombocytes, are cell fragments produced from megakaryocytes (special cells in the bone marrow).

✅Blood normally contains 1,500,00-3,500,00 platelets mm-3.

✅Platelets can release a variety of substances most of which are involved in the coagulation or clotting of blood.

Coagulation of Blood

✅Blood exhibits coagulation or clotting in response to an injury or trauma. This is a mechanism to prevent excessive loss of blood from the body.

✅Dark reddish brown scum is formed at the site of a cut or an injury over a period of time. It is a clot or coagulam formed mainly of a network of threads called fibrins in which dead and damaged formed elements of blood are trapped.

✅Fibrins are formed by the conversion of inactive fibrinogens in the plasma by the enzyme thrombin.

✅Thrombins, in turn are formed from another inactive substance present in the plasma called prothrombin. An enzyme complex, thrombokinase, is required for the above reaction. This complex is formed by a series of linked enzymic reactions (cascade process) involving a number of factors present in the plasma in an inactive state.

✅An injury or a trauma stimulates the platelets in the blood to release certain factors which activate the mechanism of coagulation. Certain factors released by the tissues at the site of injury also can initiate coagulation. Calcium ions play a very important role in clotting.

Lymph (Tissue Fluid)

✅As the blood passes through the capillaries in tissues, some water along with many small water soluble substances move out into the spaces between the cells of tissues leaving the larger proteins and most of the formed elements in the blood vessels. This fluid released out is called the interstitial fluid or tissue fluid.

✅Interstitial fluid or tissue fluid has the same mineral distribution as that in plasma. Exchange of nutrients, gases, etc., between the blood and the cells always occur through this fluid.

✅An elaborate network of vessels called the lymphatic system collects this fluid and drains it back to the major veins. The fluid present in the lymphatic system is called the lymph.

✅Lymph is a colourless fluid containing specialized lymphocytes which are responsible for the immune responses of the body. Lymph is also an important carrier for nutrients, hormones, etc.

✅Fats are absorbed through lymph in the lacteals present in the intestinal villi.

Blood Groups

ABO grouping

✅ABO grouping is based on the presence or absence of two surface antigens (chemicals that can induce immune response) on the RBCs namely A and B.

✅Similarly, the plasma of different individuals contain two natural antibodies (proteins produced in response to antigens).

✅ABO blood groups are controlled by the gene I. The plasma membrane of the red blood cells has sugar polymers that protrude from its surface and the kind of sugar is controlled by the gene. The gene (I) has three alleles IA, IB and i.

✅The alleles IA and IB produce a slightly different form of the sugar while allele i does not produce any sugar.

✅Because humans are diploid organisms, each person possesses any two of the three I gene alleles.

✅IA and IB are completely dominant over i, in other words when IA and i are present only IA expresses (because i does not produce any sugar), and when IB and i are present IB expresses.

✅But when IA and IB are present together they both express their own types of sugars: this is because of co-dominance. Hence red blood cells have both A and B types of sugars.

Rh grouping

✅Another antigen, the Rh antigen similar to one present in Rhesus monkeys (hence Rh), is also observed on the surface of RBCs of majority (nearly 80 per cent) of humans. Such individuals are called Rh positive (Rh+ve) and those in whom this antigen is absent are called Rh negative (Rh-ve).

✅An Rh-ve person, if exposed to Rh+ve blood, will form specific antibodies against the Rh antigens. Therefore, Rh group should also be matched before transfusions.

✅A special case of Rh incompatibility (mismatching) has been observed between the Rh-ve blood of a pregnant mother with Rh+ve blood of the foetus.

✅Rh antigens of the foetus do not get exposed to the Rh-ve blood of the mother in the first pregnancy as the two bloods are well separated by the placenta.

✅However, during the delivery of the first child, there is a possibility of exposure of the maternal blood to small amounts of the Rh+ve blood from the foetus.

✅In such cases, the mother starts preparing antibodies against Rh antigen in her blood.

✅In case of her subsequent pregnancies, the Rh antibodies from the mother (Rh-ve) can leak into the blood of the foetus (Rh+ve) and destroy the foetal RBCs.

✅This could be fatal to the foetus or could cause severe anaemia and jaundice to the baby. This condition is called erythroblastosis foetalis.

✅This can be avoided by administering anti-Rh antibodies to the mother immediately after the delivery of the first child.

Circulatory System

✅The English physician, William Harvey (A.D.1578–1657), discovered the circulation of blood.

✅The circulatory patterns are of two types – open or closed.

✅Open circulatory system is present in arthropods and molluscs in which blood pumped by the heart passes through large vessels into open spaces or body cavities called sinuses.

✅Annelids and chordates have a closed circulatory system in which the blood pumped by the heart is always circulated through a closed network of blood vessels. This pattern is considered to be more advantageous as the flow of fluid can be more precisely regulated.

✅All vertebrates possess a muscular chambered heart. Fishes have a 2-chambered heart with an atrium and a ventricle. Amphibians and the reptiles (except crocodiles) have a 3-chambered heart with two atria and a single ventricle, whereas crocodiles, birds and mammals possess a 4-chambered heart with two atria and two ventricles.

✅In fishes the heart pumps out deoxygenated blood which is oxygenated by the gills and supplied to the body parts from where deoxygenated blood is returned to the heart (single circulation).

✅In amphibians and reptiles, the left atrium receives oxygenated blood from the gills/lungs/skin and the right atrium gets the deoxygenated blood from other body parts. However, they get mixed up in the single ventricle which pumps out mixed blood (incomplete double circulation).