🔆Researchers at IIT Madras have demonstrated a novel method to create mineral nanoparticles using microdroplets of water

The research reveals that microdroplets of water can break down minerals into nanoparticles, a process that is not possible with bulk water.

Due to their small size and closely packed water molecules, microdroplets are more reactive and capable of engaging in chemical reactions at a much faster rate, sometimes up to a million times faster than bulk water.

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🔆Hurricane beryl

✅Hurricane Beryl became the earliest storm on record during the Atlantic hurricane season to reach Category 5.
✅Typically, the first major hurricanes in the Atlantic form in September due to ocean temperatures.
✅Beryl’s early formation as a Category 5 hurricane is linked to unusually warm ocean temperatures.
✅Record-breaking ocean heat content (OHC) has contributed to the storm’s intensity.
✅Deep warm water prevented cooling at the surface, allowing the storm to maintain its strength.
✅Hurricanes form over warm ocean waters near the equator when warm, moist air rises, creating a low-pressure area.
✅As air from surrounding areas fills in and rises, it cools, forming clouds and thunderstorms.

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🔆Why Europe’s late stone age population crashed

✅A new study, ‘Repeated plague infections across six generations of Neolithic Farmers’, published by the journal Nature, suggests that disease, specifically the plague, may have been the primary driver.

✅The researchers reconstructed full genomes of the different strains of the plague-causing bacterium Yersinia pestis responsible for these waves. They determined that the last one may have been more virulent than the others, and identified traits indicating the disease could have spread from person to person to cause an epidemi

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🔆Quantum Navigation:

✅While satellite navigation relies on the signal bouncing back from space, quantum navigation focuses on the movement of a single atom tracked under cryogenic conditions.

✅Instead of a satellite floating in space, a quantum navigation system is within each individual vehicle, with measurements being made “at point of use”.

✅This means the signal “doesn’t drift”, making interception much harder to achieve.

✅Global navigation satellite systems(GNSS) like GPS are susceptible to accidental and deliberate outages, whereas quantum navigation is ‘unjammable’.

✅But quantum navigation systems are unlikely to replace GNSSs any time soon. 

✅This is because, ultra-cold atoms are needed to achieve quantum navigation, and the equipment is currently sizable.

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🔆Researchers at IIT Madras have demonstrated a novel method to create mineral nanoparticles using microdroplets of water

The research reveals that microdroplets of water can break down minerals into nanoparticles, a process that is not possible with bulk water.

Due to their small size and closely packed water molecules, microdroplets are more reactive and capable of engaging in chemical reactions at a much faster rate, sometimes up to a million times faster than bulk water.

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🔆Many rockets, but too few satellites to launch

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🔆Chaperones

✅Chaperones are a group of proteins that have functional similarity and assist in protein folding.

✅They are proteins that can prevent non-specific aggregation by binding to non-native proteins.

✅After the new protein chain has been shaped correctly, chaperones move on. Or else the new chain is eliminated.

✅Without chaperones, newly synthesised proteins would soon become a tangled mess of insoluble aggregates, hindering cellular processes.

✅Chaperones are needed under physiological conditions too, for normal cellular function.

✅There are several families of chaperones and each possesses different functions. Example of chaperon proteins are the “heat shock proteins” (Hsps).

✅Major chaperones in humans include HSP70, HSC70 and HSP90: the numbers express the size of the proteins in kilodaltons.

✅In normal cells 1%–2% of all proteins present are heat shock proteins. This number rises threefold during stressful conditions.

📍Misfolding of proteins can cause a number of diseases namely:

✅Parkinson's disease: In which Alpha-synuclein protein, present in neurons, is wrongly folded.

✅Alzheimer: Brains of Alzheimer's patients have plaques formed from aggregates of amyloid beta-peptide. This accumulation of amyloid fibrils is toxic, leading to widespread destruction of neurons – a 'neurodegenerative’ disorder.

✅Autosomal dominant congenital cataract: In the eye lens, an abundant subset of proteins called alpha-crystallins themselves serve as chaperones – a single R116G mutation in human alpha crystallin is responsible for this.

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🔆Syphilis:

✅It is a sexually transmitted infection (STI) that can cause serious health problems if you do not treat it. 
✅It is caused by the bacteria, Treponema pallidum.
✅After the infection happens, syphilis bacteria can stay in the body for many years without causing symptoms. But the infection can become active again.

✅Transmission:
🔰People usually get syphilis from sexual contact with someone who has it.
🔰It can also pass from mother to baby during pregnancy, childbirth, and sometimes through breastfeeding.

✅Symptoms:
🔰Syphilis develops in stages. 🔰The symptoms vary with each stage and is often painless.
🔰The disease starts as a sore that's often painless and typically appears on the genitals, rectum, or mouth.
🔰Sometimes it causes swelling in nearby lymph nodes.
🔰If you do not treat it, syphilis usually causes a non-itchy skin rash, often on your hands and feet.
🔰Many people do not notice symptoms for years. Symptoms can go away and come back.
🔰If left untreated, it can cause serious health issues. It can permanently damage your heart, brain, muscles, bones, and eyes.

✅Treatment:
🔰Syphilis is treatable and curable. It is easy to cure with antibiotics, especially during in the early stages.
🔰Penicillin is the most commonly used medication for syphilis.

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🔆Chandipura virus

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🔆Elephant endotheliotropic herpesvirus (EEHV)

✅The Haemorrhagic disease (HD) affecting the Asian elephant population, caused by the elephant endotheliotropic herpesvirus (EEHV), has raised concerns due to increased mortality among elephant calves in both captive and free-range environments in India.

✅EEHV belongs to the Herpesviridae family and specifically affects elephants.
It comprises several subtypes, with EEHV1A being the most common and associated with severe disease in young Asian elephants. EEHV1B and EEHV2 are also identified but with varying prevalence and impact.

✅EEHV spreads primarily through contact with infected bodily fluids like saliva, blood, or urine. Additionally, indirect transmission via contaminated objects, including equipment and surfaces, poses a risk.

✅Infected elephants can shed the virus intermittently, even when not displaying clinical symptoms, making detection and prevention challenging.

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🔆Magic mushrooms

A recent study found, Psilocybin the hallucinogenic compound found in magic mushrooms cam temporarily reset entire network of neurons in the brain

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🔆Dyson sphere

✅A Dyson Sphere is a hypothetical megastructure proposed by physicist Freeman Dyson in 1960.

✅It's essentially a massive, spherical structure constructed around a star to harness its energy output.

✅While often depicted as a solid shell encasing the star completely, various designs and configurations have been theorized over the years.

📍Concept and Purpose:

✅Energy Harvesting:The primary purpose of a Dyson Sphere is to capture and utilize the energy emitted by a star. This energy can be used for various purposes, including powering advanced civilizations, interstellar travel, or even terraforming planets.

✅Sustainability:Dyson Spheres offer the potential for nearly unlimited energy, making them attractive for civilizations seeking long-term sustainability and growth.

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🔆Nipah virus

✅Nipah Virus Infection: A zoonotic virus transmitted from animals to humans, causing severe disease in both animals and humans

📍Transmission:
✅The disease spreads through fruit bats or ‘flying foxes,’ of the genus Pteropus, who are natural reservoir hosts of the Nipah and Hendra viruses.

✅The virus is present in bat urine and potentially, bat faeces, saliva, and birthing fluids.

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🔆Marburg Virus Disease (MVD):

✅It is a rare but severe hemorrhagic fever which affects both people and non-human primates.
✅ It is caused by the Marburg virus, a genetically unique zoonotic (or, animal-borne) RNA virus of the filovirus family.
It is in the same family as the virus that causes the Ebola virus

📍Transmission:

✅Human infection with MVD initially results from prolonged exposure to mines or caves inhabited by Rousettus bats.
✅Once an individual is infected with the virus, Marburg can spread through human-to-human transmission via direct contact (through broken skin or mucous membranes) with the blood, secretions, organs or other bodily fluids of infected people, and with surfaces and materials (e.g., bedding, clothing) contaminated with these fluids. 

📍Symptoms:
✅After an incubation period of 2-21 days, symptom onset is sudden and marked by fever, chills, headache, and myalgia.
✅Around the fifth day after the onset of symptoms, a maculopapular rash, most prominent on the trunk (chest, back, stomach), may occur.
✅Nausea, vomiting, chest pain, a sore throat, abdominal pain, and diarrhea may appear.
✅Symptoms become increasingly severe and can include jaundice, inflammation of the pancreas, severe weight loss, delirium, shock, liver failure, massive hemorrhaging, and multi-organ dysfunction.
✅The average MVD case fatality rate is around 50%. Case fatality rates have varied from 24% to 88% in past outbreaks, depending on the virus strain and case management.
✅There is no specific treatment for MVD. Early supportive care with rehydration, and symptomatic treatment improves survival.

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🔆ICMR has developed CRISPR cas based TB detection system

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🔆Pink Bollworm (PBW) Menace And project sanvardhan

✅Pink Bollworm (PBW) Menace
PBW pests have severely damaged cotton crops over the past 3-4 years.

📍Pink Bollworm

✅Pink Bollworm is considered possibly the most destructive pest on cotton worldwide. 
It is native to India but is now found in nearly all the cotton-growing countries of the globe.
✅Description: The larvae have distinctive pink bands, and the larval stage, is the most destructive and identifiable stage. The adults are small moths about 3/8 inch long. 

📍Threat:
✅Adults lay eggs on cotton bolls; once hatched, the larvae burrow into the developing fruits (bolls) of cotton plants, eat the seeds and damage the fibres of the cotton. 
✅The damage affects both the weight and quality of the harvested bolls containing the lint fibre and seeds inside, thus, reducing both the yield and quality.
✅When the larvae mature, they cut out the boll and drop to the ground and cocoon near the soil surface. 
✅The larvae can also survive in the seed after the ginning process and if the seed is not fumigated, they will emerge from the stored seed the next spring.
✅Apart from cotton, they can also attack hibiscus and okra.

📍Project San-Vardhan (Cotton You Can Trust)

✅Purpose: Promote CREMIT technology in Punjab and Haryana.
✅Objective: Eco-friendly population control through "Insect Family Planning" by disrupting mating of PBW.
✅Mechanism: Uses synthetic sex pheromones to confuse male moths during mating season, reducing PBW incidence.

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🔆Decentralised genome sequencing

Kerala's Institute of Advanced Virology (IAV) successfully tested a Nipah virus sample in four hours

The decentralised model, as seen in Kerala, enables a quick response to emerging pathogens, contrasting with delays experienced when relying solely on centralised facilities.

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