General Awareness

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY - January 2019

Jan 2019

Apr 21, 2023

North Korea's 1st Spy Satellite is Ready for Launch

North Korean leader Kim Jong Un said that his country has completed the development of its first military spy satellite and ordered officials to go ahead with its launch at an undisclosed date. Establishing a space-based surveillance system is one of Kim's key objectives to advance his military capability to pressure the United States to abandon what he called its hostile policies, such as its military drills with ally South Korea and international economic sanctions on North Korea.

Apr 20, 2023

IIT Roorkee Signs pact with Taiwanese Centre for Developing Tech Solutions for Earthquakes, Floods

Indian Institute of Technology Roorkee (IIT Roorkee) signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with the National Science and Technology Centre for Disaster Reduction (NCDR), Taiwan, while the scientists and faculty members of NCDR, along with their Director Dr. Hongey Chen visited the institute.
This MoU aims to develop scientific and academic cooperation and scientific research to promote relations and mutual understanding between NCDR and the Centre of Excellence in Disaster Mitigation and Management (CoEDMM) of IIT Roorkee.
The key objective of the MoU is mutually developing technology solutions to natural hazards, including earthquakes, landslides, floods, debris flow, and compound disasters. The researchers from IIT Roorkee and NCDR aim to co-establish an early warning sensor network equipped with P-Alert sensors at selected locations in Uttarakhand.

India Becomes 6th Country Globally to Begin Quantum Technology Mission

The Indian government gave its approval to the National Quantum Mission (NQM), which aims to nurture and scale up scientific and industrial research and development in quantum technology. The NQM will involve a cost of Rs. 6,003.65 crore from 2023–24 to 2030–31. With this approval India became the sixth country to have a dedicated quantum mission after the US, Austria, Finland, France, and China.
The NQM is expected to accelerate quantum technology-led economic growth and nurture the ecosystem in India. The mission targets developing intermediate scale quantum computers with 50–1000 physical qubits in eight years, and it will also support the development of satellite-based secure quantum communications, long-distance secure quantum communications with other countries, inter-city quantum key distribution, multi-node quantum networks, magnetometers with high sensitivity in atomic systems, atomic clocks, quantum materials, single photon sources/detectors, entangled photon sources, and more.
The NQM is expected to benefit the communication, health, financial, and energy sectors, as well as drug design and space applications. It will also provide a huge boost to national priorities like Digital India, Make in India, Skill India, Stand-up India, Start-up India, Self-Reliant India, and Sustainable Development Goals (SDG).

Apr 18, 2023

Kenya Launches First Operational Satellite

Kenya launched its first operational earth observation satellite onboard a SpaceX rocket from the United States.
The satellite, developed by nine Kenyan engineers, will collect agricultural and environmental data, including on floods, drought and wildfires, that authorities plan to use for disaster management and to combat food insecurity.
The Falcon 9 rocket carrying the Taifa-1 satellite, took off from Vandenberg Base in California, after three postponements due to bad weather.

Apr 17, 2023

Juice mission launches to explore Jupiter's icy ocean worlds

The European Space Agency has sent a spacecraft to explore Jupiter and three of its largest and most intriguing moons.
The Jupiter Icy Moons Explorer mission, or Juice, launched Friday at 8:14 a.m. ET aboard an Ariane 5 rocket from Europe's spaceport in Kourou, French Guiana.
The spacecraft separated from the Ariane 5 rocket 28 minutes after launch, and ESA received a signal from Juice about an hour after liftoff, confirming that Earth-based mission control is able to "talk" to the vehicle.
Over the course of the next 17 days, Juice will deploy its solar arrays, antennas and other instruments, followed by three months of testing and preparing the instruments.
Juice will take eight years to reach Jupiter, the largest planet in our solar system. During its lengthy cruise, the spacecraft will utilize some gravitational slingshots as it flies by Earth, our moon and Venus to help with the journey.

Europe's most powerful nuclear reactor kicks off in Finland

The turbine hall of the nuclear power plant Olkiluoto 3 'OL3' is pictured under construction in Eurajoki, south-western Finland, March 23, 2011. The Olkiluoto 3 reactor, which has 1,600-megawatt capacity, was connected into the Finnish national power grid in March 2022 and kicked off regular production on Sunday, April 16, 2023.
Finland's much-delayed and costly new nuclear reactor, Europe's most powerful by production capacity, has completed a test phase lasting over a year and started regular output, boosting the Nordic country's electricity self-sufficiency significantly.
The Olkiluoto 3 reactor, which has 1,600-megawatt capacity, was connected into the Finnish national power grid in March 2022 and kicked off regular production on Sunday.
Operator Teollisuuden Voima, or TVO, tweeted that "Olkiluoto 3 is now ready" after a delay of 14 years from the original plan.
It will help Finland to achieve its carbon neutrality targets and increase energy security at a time when European countries have cut oil, gas and other power supplies from Russia, Finland's neighbour.

Apr 16, 2023

European Space Agency Mission to Jupiter's Icy Moons Postponed

After weather experts warned of the potential for lightning strikes at the European Space Agency's spaceport in French Guiana, the JUICE spacecraft's scheduled launch for an eight-year trip was postponed.
Mission controllers scrapped the launch about 10 minutes before the Jupiter Icy Moons Explorer, or Juice, spacecraft was due to blast off on an eight-year voyage to survey a trio of Jovian moons where life may once have gained a foothold.

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