General Awareness

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY - December 2024

Dec 2024

Mar 21, 2025

ISRO Develops High-Speed Microprocessors: Vikram 3201 and Kalpana 3201

The Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO), in collaboration with the Semiconductor Laboratory (SCL) in Chandigarh, developed two advanced 32-bit microprocessors, Vikram 3201 and Kalpana 3201. These processors are specifically designed for space applications and mark a major milestone in India's efforts to achieve self-reliance in high-performance computing for launch vehicles.
Vikram 3201
India's first fully indigenous 32-bit microprocessor qualified for space missions
Processes 32-bit data at a time, enabling efficient computations
Supports floating-point arithmetic, improving performance in complex calculations
Backward compatible with Vikram 1601, which has been in use since 2009
Fabricated at SCL's 180nm CMOS semiconductor fab, reinforcing the Make in India initiative
Successfully validated in space during the PSLV-C60 mission
Kalpana 3201
A 32-bit SPARC V8 RISC microprocessor, based on IEEE 1754 Instruction Set Architecture
Compatible with open-source software toolsets
Tested with flight software, making it versatile for various space applications
Designed for efficiency and high-speed processing, with an emphasis on simple instructions

Mar 19, 2025

Sunita Williams' Return to Earth

NASA astronauts Butch Wilmore and Sunita Williams safely returned to Earth on March 18, 2025 (March 19 in India) after spending over nine months in space due to delays in the Boeing Starliner Crew Flight Test (CFT) mission. Their SpaceX Crew Dragon capsule, Freedom, splashed down in the Gulf of Mexico near Tallahassee, Florida, concluding a mission that garnered global attention.

Mar 18, 2025

Sunita Williams Spacex Crew-9 Return

After a prolonged nine-month stay aboard the International Space Station (ISS), NASA astronauts Sunita Williams and Butch Wilmore are finally embarking on their return journey. Their SpaceX Dragon spacecraft successfully undocked on Wednesday, initiating a 17-hour voyage back to Earth. The astronaut crew will travel back to Earth alongside Nick Hague and Roscosmos cosmonaut Aleksandr Gorbunov aboard a SpaceX Crew Dragon spacecraft.
Wilmore and Williams have been stranded on the ISS for nine months after reaching there in June last year. They were supposed to stay there for about a week. The astronauts were transported from Earth to the ISS aboard Boeing's Starliner spacecraft.

Mar 17, 2025

Centre Approves Chandrayaan-5 Mission

India's space ambitions reached new heights with the approval of the Chandrayaan-5 mission, announced by ISRO Chairman V. Narayanan. This mission will be executed in collaboration with Japan and aims to conduct an advanced study of the Moon's surface. Unlike Chandrayaan-3, which carried the 25 kg rover 'Pragyan', Chandrayaan-5 will deploy a heavier 250 kg rover, enhancing India's lunar exploration capabilities.

Mar 16, 2025

Fourth Form of Water Confirmed

Scientists confirmed a fourth form of ice, called Plastic Ice VII. This rare phase allows water molecules to rotate freely while staying in a solid structure. The discovery, led by Livia Bove from Sorbonne University, helps scientists understand how water behaves in extreme planetary environments.
This discovery changes our understanding of water in space. Ice VII, another extreme phase, exists on Jupiter's and Saturn's icy moons, such as Ganymede and Titan. The existence of Plastic Ice VII suggests that water behaves even more unpredictably in space.

Google Introduces New AI Models for Rapidly Growing Robotics Industry

Google launched two new AI models tailored for robotics applications based on its Gemini 2.0 model, as it looks to cater to the rapidly growing robotics industry.
Google's launch comes a month after robotics start-up Figure AI exited its collaboration agreement with ChatGPT-maker OpenAI after it made an internal breakthrough in AI for robots.
The search engine giant's Gemini Robotics is an advanced vision-language-action model that will have physical actions as a way to provide output.
The second model, named Gemini Robotics-ER, will enable a robot to have an advanced understanding of the space around it and lets developers run their own programs using reasoning abilities offered by Gemini 2.0.

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