The greatest danger for most of us is not that our aim is too high and we miss it, but that it is too low and we reach it.– Michelangelo
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7th Oct Current Affairs News Analysis | Prelims & Mains 2020
Kamchatka beach
HEADLINES:
‘Eco disaster’ unfolding on Kamchatka beach
WHY IN NEWS:
Straight from DownToEarth
SYLLABUS COVERED: GS 3: Oil spill
ISSUE:
ECOLOGICAL DISASTER UNFOLDED
The largest town in Kamchatka reported of burning eyes, throat ache, headache, fever and a fear of losing eyesight on emerging from the water.
- Then, sea animals begin to die in large numbers, their bodies littering the beach.
- These included octopuses, seals, sea urchins, stars, crabs and fish.
- Another theory being speculated is that ships carrying oil in the vicinity had leaked it into the sea water.
IASbhai WINDUP:
- The river displayed a yellow colour.
- There is a training camp of the Russian military upstream.
SOURCES:DownToEarth | 7th Oct Current Affairs News Analysis
Microplastics : Threat to marine environment
HEADLINES:
Microplastics again: Report flags threat to marine environment along Kanyakumari coast
WHY IN NEWS:
Microplastics are among major pollutants of the marine environment along the Kanyakumari coast.
SYLLABUS COVERED: GS 3: Conservation of Biodiversity
ISSUE:
MICROPLASTICS AT KANYAKUMARI
STUDIED BY
- The Department of Remote Sensing, Bharathidasan University.
- The study covered eight different sampling stations along a 71 kilometre coastline comprising both urbanised beaches and undisturbed coastal areas along the Indian Ocean.
- It yielded baseline data that helped understand occurrence and distribution of microplastics in near-shore sediments.
- Such tiny particles — less than 5 millimetres — are transported and evaluate their interaction with the region’s marine ecosystem.
- Primary and secondary microplastics are found in coastal environments all over the world.
- They are much more hazardous than larget plastic particles as they get into all levels of marine food webs.
RESEARCH ANALYSIS
- Researchers found an overall higher abundance of microplastics at urbanised beaches due to significant human influence.
- While tourist beaches had high levels, remote beaches and fishing ports also had large volumes of such debris, affecting the marine food web.
- Harbour beaches with 99 particles (28.5 per cent) and coastal stretches along the undisturbed areas with 15 particles (4.3 per cent).
- These items also likely to contain fibres from clothing and other synthetic textiles .
- Scientists tracked microplastics samples from different beach sediments, the average of which is found to be up to 43 particles per 50 g dry sediments.
IASbhai WINDUP:
- New research would help to identify mechanisms that influence their transport and deposition in the coastal sediments as well as evaluate the possible interaction between microplastic particles and marine ecosystems.
- The authors urged policymakers and consumers to take proactive actions focusing on measures that can stop the plastics from intruding and polluting the ocean.
SOURCES:THE HINDU & PIB | 7th Oct Current Affairs News Analysis
LEDs emitting high-quality white light
HEADLINES:
Scientists at CeNS find new insights into LEDs emitting high-quality white light
WHY IN NEWS:
Scientists in their search for methods to produce high-quality white light have unearthed crucial reaction insights that can help design white LEDs.
SYLLABUS COVERED: GS 3: Science and Technology
ISSUE:
RESEARCHERS
Centre for Nano and Soft Matter Sciences (CeNS) is an autonomous research institute under the Department of Science and Technology (DST).
HIGH-QUALITY WHITE LIGHT : LED
- It is a very odd behaviour of the nanocrystals prevented them from keeping that promise.
- The capability of white light emission rests in the fact that the emission from these crystals can be easily tuned over the entire visible spectrum by varying their halide compositions.
- However, they failed to emit white light due to an interparticle mixing between the nanocrystals that resulted in a single emission.
- So, once the crystals give a single emission, they miss the chance of creation of white light.
IASbhai WINDUP:
- The findings from the present work were recently published in the journal ‘Nanoscale’.
- The understanding of this reaction kinetics will help in developing strategies to prevent interparticle mixing,
- and the team is pursuing research to create LED that produce good quality white light.
SOURCES:THE HINDU & PIB | 7th Oct Current Affairs News Analysis
Afghans fear return of Taliban
HEADLINES:
As peace talks continue, Afghans fear return of Taliban
WHY IN NEWS:
With U.S. planning to withdraw, people worry Taliban has changed little since darkest days of its regime
SYLLABUS COVERED: GS 2 : IR
ISSUE:
AFGHAN PEACE TALKS
- The invasion that followed those October 7, 2001 strikes quickly toppled the militants, who had harboured the Al-Qaeda, the group behind the September 11 attacks that killed nearly 3,000 people in America just weeks earlier.
- 19 years since the collapse of their brutal Islamist regime, the Taliban is pushing for a return to power.
- Having signed a landmark troop withdrawal deal with Washington in February and currently holding peace talks with the Afghan government.
- Fearful that the Taliban has changed little since the darkest days of its regime — when it killed women accused of adultery, attacked minority religious groups and barred girls from going to school .
- Kabul’s streets are following amputations for petty crimes under the Taliban’s strict interpretation of Sharia law.
IASbhai WINDUP:
ENDURING IMPROVEMENTS
- The 2001 invasion heralded some enduring improvements for young Afghans — particularly girls — and ushered in a Constitution guaranteeing certain freedoms, including the right to education.
- But so far in peace talks in Doha, which started last month, the Taliban has said little about issues such as women’s rights or freedom of expression.
- The hardline group and Washington shows the militants have not changed.
SOURCES:THE HINDU & PIB | 7th Oct Current Affairs News Analysis
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