UPSC Key—4th October, 2023: NewsClick, Nanoparticles, Sendai Framework and Attosecond Science

Founder-editor among 2 held under UAPA, 46 questioned in crackdown on news portal

Syllabus:

Preliminary Examination: Current events of national and international importance.

Mains Examination: 

• General Studies II: Government policies and interventions for development in various sectors and issues arising out of their design and implementation.

• General Studies IV: Ethics and Human Interface

Key Points to Ponder:

• What’s the ongoing story- Invoking the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act, the Delhi Police Special Cell Tuesday arrested news portal NewsClick founder and editor-in-chief, Prabir Purkayastha, and head of its human resource department, Amit Chakravarty, after day-long searches at over 50 locations linked to the news portal, its employees and contributors.

• What is NewsClick?

• Why Delhi police took this action?

• Do You Know-Sources said the police action was based on an FIR filed on August 17 based on the Enforcement Directorate’s inputs that NewsClick had allegedly received illegal funding from China, routed through the United States. The ED had searched NewsClick’s premises in February 2021 as part of its probe into foreign remittances allegedly received between 2018 and 2021. Sources added that the FIR has a reference to US businessman Neville Roy Singham and has flagged funding to the tune of Rs 80 crore. In August, an investigation by The New York Times had alleged that NewsClick was among organisations funded by a network tied to Singham for allegedly pushing Chinese propaganda across the world.
The FIR was filed under UAPA Sections 13 (unlawful activities); 16 (terrorist act); 17 (raising funds for terrorist acts); 18 (conspiracy); 22 (C) (offences by companies, trusts); along with IPC Sections 153A (promoting enmity between different group) and 120B (criminal conspiracy).

• What are the main allegation in the FIR?

• But why the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act is invoked?

• For Your Information-The main allegation in the FIR against NewsClick is that the newsportal allegedly received illegal funding from China routed through the United States.
It is learnt that the FIR has been registered under various Sections of the UAPA. Among the key provisions invoked is Section 16, which prescribes punishment for terrorist acts.
Section 15 of the UAPA defines “terrorist act” and is punishable with imprisonment for a term of at least five years to life. In case the terrorist act results in death, the punishment is death or imprisonment for life. This is an offence that describes violent acts that are serious in nature.
The provision reads: “Whoever does any act with intent to threaten or likely to threaten the unity, integrity, security, [economic security], or sovereignty of India or with intent to strike terror or likely to strike terror in the people or any section of the people in India or in any foreign country,…”
The provision describes the use of “bombs, dynamite or other explosive substances; causing death or loss/ damage/ destruction of property; disruption of any supplies or services essential to the life of the community in India; damage to the monetary stability of India by way of production or smuggling or circulation of high quality counterfeit Indian paper currency, coin or of any other material” as terrorist acts.
The other provisions invoked against NewsClick include Section 13 (unlawful activities), 16 (terrorist act), 17 (raising funds for terrorist acts), 18 (conspiracy), and 22 (C) (offences by companies, trusts) of the UAPA, along with IPC sections 153 A (promoting enmity between different group) and 120B (criminal conspiracy).

• Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act (UAPA)-Key Highlights

• Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act (UAPA) and Human Rights-Connect the dots

• Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act (UAPA) and Article 22 of the Constitution-Connect the Dot

• For Your Information-UAPA presents an alternate criminal law framework where the general principles of criminal law are reversed. By relaxing timelines for the state to file chargesheets and its stringent conditions for bail, the UAPA gives the state more powers compared with the Indian Penal Code (IPC).
Enacted in 1967, the UAPA was strengthened by the Congress-led UPA government in 2008 and 2012. The test for denying bail under the UAPA is that the court must be satisfied that a “prima facie” case exists against the accused. In 2019, the SC defined prima facie narrowly to mean that the courts must not analyse evidence or circumstances, but look at the “totality of the case” presented by the state. In NIA v Zahoor Ahmed Watali, the SC read the bail provisions strictly, holding that courts must only be satisfied that a prima facie case can be made out to deny bail, and not consider the merit or the admissibility of the evidence.
Section 43D(5) reads: “Notwithstanding anything contained in the Code, no person accused of an offence punishable under Chapters IV and VI of this Act shall, if in custody, be released on bail or on his own bond unless the Public Prosecutor has been given an opportunity of being heard on the application for such release.”
It adds: “Provided that such accused person shall not be released on bail or on his own bond if the Court, on a perusal of the case diary or the report made under section 173 of the Code is of the opinion that there are reasonable grounds for believing that the accusation against such person is prima facie true.”

Other Important Articles Covering the same topic:

📍What UAPA sections have been invoked against NewsClick

New proposal: States say will settle for lower, but an assured pension

Syllabus:

Preliminary Examination: Economic and Social Development-Sustainable Development, Poverty, Inclusion, Demographics, Social Sector Initiatives, etc.

Main Examination: General Studies II: Welfare schemes for vulnerable sections of the population by the Centre and States and the performance of these schemes; mechanisms, laws, institutions and Bodies constituted for the protection and betterment of these vulnerable sections.

Key Points to Ponder:

• What’s the ongoing story- IN A NEW proposal before the Finance Secretary-led committee set up to review the New Pension System for government employees, some states have proposed a middle path which entails a lower pension, but one that is assured.

• “Some states have specifically demanded an assured pension linked to the minimum of a pay level, and not the last-drawn salary as it is under the Old Pension Scheme (OPS)”-What exactly is this demand?

• For Your Information-Some states have specifically demanded an assured pension linked to the minimum of a pay level, and not the last-drawn salary as it is under the Old Pension Scheme (OPS). “One issue that is coming up from OPS is that the minimum pension need not be 50 per cent of the last drawn salary, but a minimum pension at a certain level which is 50 per cent of the lowest (entry-level pay) salary in the pay matrix. This is one of the demands coming up,” a person aware of the development said.
Under the Seventh Pay Commission, the earlier system of pay bands and grade pay was replaced with a pay matrix, with an employee’s status being determined by their level within the pay matrix. The 7th Pay Matrix consists of 760 cells, with 19 columns and 40 rows signifying different pay levels for various functional roles of employees and the salary increments they may earn through their career.
So far, Rajasthan, Chhattisgarh, Jharkhand, Punjab and Himachal Pradesh have already reverted to the Old Pension Scheme from NPS. In March, even the BJP-Sena (Shinde faction) government in Maharashtra gave an approval in principle to extend monetary benefits of OPS to those under the NPS, with the state government likely to increase its share towards pension to 20 per cent of the basic salary plus dearness allowance from 14 per cent now.
At present, while the government contribution is 14 per cent under NPS, an employee contributes 10 per cent of his salary plus DA.

• What is the Old Pension Scheme?

• Can there be the middle path?

• What is the Guaranteed Pension Scheme?

• Is the Guaranteed Pension Scheme middle path?

• What is Old Pension Scheme?

• What is New Pension Scheme?

• How is old pension scheme different from new pension scheme?

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📍Two civil servants write: New pension reform must reduce burden on future generations

J&K terror spike prompts relook at pre-winter strategy, deployment

Syllabus:

Preliminary Examination: Current events of national and international importance.

Mains Examination: General Studies III: Security challenges and their management in border areas – linkages of organized crime with terrorism.

Key Points to Ponder:

• What’s the ongoing story- The new spurt in terror incidents in J&K, where infiltration peaks before the onset of winter, has prompted security forces to reassess their counter-terror strategy in the Union Territory, and plans to redistribute Rashtriya Rifles (RR) units might not be implemented immediately, top security sources have told The Indian Express.

• Why security forces are reassessing their counter-terror strategy in the Union Territory of J&K?

• What reassessment will include?

• What is counter-infiltration grid?

• A number of terror incidents have taken place in recent months in J&K-Why sudden spike?

• Despite the numbers pointing to more terror attacks and casualties in the Valley than in the Jammu region, the security establishment has taken note of a changing trend-What changing trend?

• Why this change is happening?

• For Your Information-“Fewer but high-impact incidents, especially involving casualties of security personnel and civilians, give the terrorists the publicity they seek,” said an official in the security establishment, adding, “The areas to the south of the Pir Panjal range can be accessed through easier and all-weather infiltration routes. However, since the terrorists lack adequate logistics support in this region, the ones who are eventually chosen to infiltrate here are more hardened and target security forces and civilians.” The attacks in Jammu tend to have a higher impact, the official said, because of the “routine nature of small-scale incidents in the Valley… As a result, at times, even fairly bigger incidents (in the Valley) fail to capture public attention which they would have if they had taken place to the south of the Pir Panjal”.

• Who are called militants?

• What is terrorism in Indian law?

• Militant and Terrorist-What are the differences?

• What are the types of terrorism?

• What are the reason for terrorism especially in the Jammu and Kashmir?

• What are the components of terrorism?

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📍Centre’s Kashmir policy ignores that prolonged exposure to insurgency situations takes its toll on military personnel

THE CITY

Nanoparticles from vehicle fumes can cause acute illness

Syllabus:

Preliminary Examination: General issues on Environmental ecology, Bio-diversity and Climate Change

Main Examination: General Studies III: Conservation, environmental pollution and degradation, environmental impact assessment.

Key Points to Ponder:

• What’s the ongoing story- Nanoparticles in Delhi’s air, a major chunk of which comes from vehicular emissions, can potentially be transported from the respiratory system to other parts of the human body, creating more chronic and acute illnesses, according to a study.

• The study, by Rajeev Kumar Mishra and Kanagaraj Rajagopal at the Department of Enviro-nmental Engineering, Delhi Technological University (DTU), and S Ramachandran at the Space and Atmospheric Sciences Division, Physical Research Laboratory, Ahmedabad, was recently published in the journal ‘Urban Climate’-What the recent study said?

• For Your Information-The study analysed nanoparticles (10 to 1090 nanometers in diameter) in the city in 2021, over two periods — from April to June, and October to November. These “very small particles” may come from natural sources or from human activities.
In urban road environments, nanoparticles come mainly from the combustion process in automobiles, the study noted, adding that the concentration of these particles in urban roadside environments varies with human activity, particularly vehicular emissions.
Noting that nanoparticles in the road environment can penetrate deeper into the respiratory system than other pollutants, the study stated that in urban environments, ultrafine particles of 1 to 100 nanometers can contribute up to 90% to the total particle number concentration.
For the study, researchers drew data from a monitoring station located adjacent to the DTU campus on Bawana Road in Northwest Delhi. The April to June 2021 period, which saw Covid-related restrictions, experienced around 31% less concentration of particles, the study found. The recorded vehicle fleet was found to be 49% less than the normal period during this time.
In the second period, which included Diwali, particle concentration increased by 35% compared to normal conditions due to “sudden rise in firework emissions,” according to the study.
Researchers also found that the size of these particles varies depending on sources. In the second period, when emission sources were more complex, the size of the particles ranged from 20 nm (nanometers) to 200 nm, while it was 15 to 80 nm in the first period, when emission sources were restricted on account of Covid restrictions.
Meteorology and other factors can also influence concentration of these particles: With rise in relative humidity, coagulation of these particles results in their concentration becoming high; high concentrations of these pollutants are found during peak morning and evening hours due to vehicular emissions; and higher wind speed can result in dispersion of these particles.
The study stated: “The PNC (particle number concentration) estimates will be useful to determine deposition of particles in the human respiratory system based on various inhalation rates and associated physical activities. The particles in the nano-size range, after deposition, can potentially be transported to other parts of the body, creating more chronic and acute illnesses. The quantitative outcomes of the present study can be used to estimate human health impacts, develop policies/standards, and initiate mitigation measures for pollution events with implications to climate change, and help move towards sustainability measures.

• What is nanoparticles?

• What are examples of nanoparticles?

• What concerns are associated to Nanoparticles?

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📍War rooms, bio decomposers and anti-smog guns: What’s part of Delhi CM Arvind Kejriwal’s 15-point winter action plan

EXPRESS NETWORK

107 MPs and MLAs have hate speech cases against them: ADR

Syllabus:

Preliminary Examination: Indian Polity and Governance-Constitution, Political System, Panchayati Raj, Public Policy, Rights Issues, etc

Mains Examination: General Studies II: Development processes and the development industry —the role of NGOs, SHGs, various groups and associations, donors, charities, institutional and other stakeholders.

Key Points to Ponder:

• What’s the ongoing story- A total of 107 MPs and MLAs have hate speech cases against them and 480 candidates with such cases have contested elections in the last five years, according to poll rights body Association for Democratic Reforms (ADR).

The ADR and National Election Watch (NEW) have analysed the self-sworn affidavits of all the incumbent MPs and MLAs, besides the unsuccessful candidates in the Assembly and Lok Sabha polls held in the country in the said period.

• What exactly Association for Democratic Reforms (ADR) has analysed?

• Do You Know-The ADR and National Election Watch (NEW) have analysed the self-sworn affidavits of all the incumbent MPs and MLAs, besides the unsuccessful candidates in the Assembly and Lok Sabha polls held in the country in the said period.
The analysis reveals that many of the MPs and MLAs, who are designated lawmakers, have actually declared cases related to “hate speech” against themselves. The analysis is based on the affidavits submitted by the MPs and MLAs prior to the last election they contested.
According to the analysis, 33 MPs have declared cases related to hate speech against themselves — seven from Uttar Pradesh, four from Tamil Nadu, three each from Bihar, Karnataka and Telangana, two each from Assam, Gujarat, Maharashtra and West Bengal and one each from Jharkhand, Madhya Pradesh, Kerala, Odisha and Punjab.
In the last five years, 480 candidates with declared cases related to hate speech have contested elections to state assemblies, the Lok Sabha and the Rajya Sabha, the ADR said.
It said 22 MPs with cases related to hate speech are from the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), two from the Congress and one each from the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP), AIMIM, AIUDF, DMK, MDMK, PMK, Shiv Sena (Uddhav Balasaheb Thackeray) and the VCK, besides one Independent MP.
Seventy-four MLAs have declared cases related to hate speech against themselves. Nine each are from Bihar and Uttar Pradesh, six each from Andhra Pradesh, Maharashtra and Telangana, five each from Assam and Tamil Nadu, four each from Delhi, Gujarat and West Bengal, three each from Jharkhand and Uttarakhand, two each from Karnataka, Punjab, Rajasthan and Tripura and one each from Madhya Pradesh and Odisha.
Twenty MLAs with cases related to hate speech against them are from the BJP, 13 from the Congress, six from the AAP, five each from the SP and YSRCP, four each from the DMK and RJD, three each from the AITC and SHS, two from the AIUDF and one each from the AIMIM, CPI(M), NCP, Suheldev Bharatiya Samaj Party, TDP, Tipra Motha Party and TRS, besides two Independent MLAs.

• What is Association of Democratic Reforms?

• What is the purpose of the Association of Democratic Reforms?

• What is ‘Hate Speech’?

• Free Speech, Hate Speech and Hurting religious sentiments- Where and what is that thin line drawn between these three?

• In the context of Fundamental Rights, what do you understand by the term “Absolute” and “Reasonable Restrictions”?

• Absolute and Reasonable Restrictions-Where and what is that thin line drawn between the two?

• Laws restricting the freedom of expression

• Impact of Hate Speech on Freedom of Expression, Free speech and on the Right to Freedom of Religion

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📍Definition of hate speech complex, real problem is implementation and execution of law: SC

World Congress on Disaster Management in Dehradun

Syllabus:

Preliminary Examination: Current events of national and international importance.

Mains Examination: General Studies III: Disaster and disaster management

Key Points to Ponder:

• What’s the ongoing story- Uttarakhand Chief Minister Pushkar Singh Dhami on Tuesday informed that the 6th World Congress on Disaster Management will be held from November 28 to December 1 in Dehradun at the Uttarakhand State Disaster Management Authority. The event is organised jointly by the Hyderabad and Uttarakhand State Council of Science and Technology.

• What is the World Congress on disaster management?

• What is the primary objective of the 6th World Congress on disaster management?

• For Your Information-“The primary objective of the 6th World Conference is to discuss and solve the challenges of climate change and disaster resilience along with focusing on the Himalayan ecosystem and communities. Apart from this, the objective of the conference is to develop Uttarakhand as a center of climate adaptive solutions for disaster resilience and preparedness,” said Dhami.
He also said that the event held days before the Global Investors’ Summit-2023 which is to be held on December 8 and 9, will spread the message of “Safe Investment- Resilient Uttarakhand” in the country and abroad.

• What is disaster?

• What is Disaster Management?

• What is Sendai Framework for Disaster Risk Reduction (SFDRR)?

• Do You Know-According to the United Nations Office for Disaster Risk Reduction website, Sendai Framework for Disaster Risk Reduction 2015-2030 (Sendai Framework) was the first major agreement of the post-2015 development agenda and provides Member States with concrete actions to protect development gains from the risk of disaster.
The Sendai Framework works hand in hand with the other 2030 Agenda agreements, including The Paris Agreement on Climate Change, The Addis Ababa Action Agenda on Financing for Development, the New Urban Agenda, and ultimately the Sustainable Development Goals.
It was endorsed by the UN General Assembly following the 2015 Third UN World Conference on Disaster Risk Reduction (WCDRR), and advocates for:
The substantial reduction of disaster risk and losses in lives, livelihoods and health and in the economic, physical, social, cultural and environmental assets of persons, businesses, communities and countries.
It recognizes that the State has the primary role to reduce disaster risk but that responsibility should be shared with other stakeholders including local government, the private sector and other stakeholders.
The Sendai Framework is the successor instrument to the Hyogo Framework for Action (HFA) 2005-2015: Building the Resilience of Nations and Communities to Disasters. It is the outcome of stakeholder consultations initiated in March 2012 and inter-governmental negotiations held from July 2014 to March 2015, which were supported by the UNDRR upon the request of the UN General Assembly.

• Some aspects of the Sendai Framework — for example, priority access to early warning — are achievable-How?

• Sendai Framework and Hyogo framework-compare

• What is priority of the Sendai Framework for Disaster Risk Reduction?

• What are the main targets of Sendai Framework?

• What are the types of hazard as per Sendai Framework?

• What are the steps taken by India for disaster management?

• What are the pre disaster measures taken in India for any disaster?

• What is post-disaster management?

Other Important Articles Covering the same topic:

📍Spirit Of Sendai

THE EDITORIAL PAGE

Historic with a small ‘h’

Syllabus:

Preliminary Examination: Indian Polity and Governance-Constitution, Political System, Panchayati Raj, Public Policy, Rights Issues, etc.

Mains Examination: General Studies II: Welfare schemes for vulnerable sections of the population by the Centre and States and the performance of these schemes; mechanisms, laws, institutions and Bodies constituted for the protection and betterment of these vulnerable sections.

Key Points to Ponder:

• What’s the ongoing story Satish Deshpande writes: For far too long, any decision to collect caste data has been seen as self-evidently “political”, whereas the equally deliberate decision to not collect it has somehow been placed outside or beyond politics. Now that the results of the Bihar caste count (officially termed a comprehensive caste survey, or CCS) are out — and the skies have not fallen, nor is the earth shaking — let us ask the questions that can no longer be silenced: What is the politics of not counting caste? Who benefits from the absence of caste numbers and data?

• According to the author, the Bihar comprehensive caste survey is indeed a historic event-why?

• Why the states of Tamil Nadu and Karnataka, as well as the Union government itself (in the ill-fated Socio Economic and Caste Census 2011), have collected comprehensive caste data in the past, but never revealed it?

• “So, until further notice, the Bihar CCS is historic but only with a small “h”-Decode the sentence

• What is Max Weber’s theory of a modern state?

• Why Caste data are important?

• How Caste data helps policy makers to frame policies?

• What are the key findings of the Bihar caste survey?

• For Your Information-The EBCs are the biggest social group comprising 4,70,80,514 individuals, or 36.01% of the state’s population. The OBCs number 3,54,63,936 (27.12%), and the Scheduled Castes (SCs) 2,56,89,820 (19.65%).’
Scheduled Tribes (STs) number only 21,99,361 (1.68%), the bulk of the tribal population having become part of Jharkhand after the bifurcation of the state in 2000. The “unreserved” category comprises 2,02,91,679 individuals (15.52%).
Bihar’s population, according to the survey, is 13,07,25,310, compared to the 10.41 crore recorded in the 2011 census. Hindus comprise 81.99% of the population, and Muslims 17.72%. The populations of Buddhists, Christians, Sikhs, Jains, and other religious denominations are minuscule.
According to data released by Development Commissioner Vivek Singh, Bihar’s total population now stands at a little over 13.07 crore, up from 10-odd crore in the 2011 Census. The EBCs make up 36.01% of this, and OBCs an additional 27.13%. The survey also found that Yadavs, the main vote base of the RJD, are the largest group, accounting for 14.27% of the total population.
The Dalits, or Scheduled Castes, account for 19.65%, higher than expected, while STs comprise 1.68%.
Those belonging to the “unreserved” category, or the “upper castes”, who dominated politics till the Mandal wave of 1990s, comprise 15.52% of the total population. These groups, who are believed to be BJP voters, are 2-3% more in number than the general opinion regarding their numbers.
The Muslims, the second leg of the RJD’s M-Y plank, comprise 17.70% of the population. The other religious minorities have a minuscule presence.

• When and how was the survey undertaken?

• Why Bihar conducted caste census?

• What is meant by caste census?

• What is the purpose of caste census?

• What is the importance of caste census?

• Has a caste census ever been conducted?

• What is the significance of the Bihar caste survey findings?

• How can the caste survey findings impact the coming elections to Lok Sabha and the Bihar Assembly?

• The EBCs & Why they matter?

• For Your Information-It was in February 2020 that Nitish first came up with the decision to conduct a caste survey. A resolution was moved in the Assembly, with no party daring to oppose the move in a state where caste dictates politics, including the BJP. While the BJP at the Centre was opposed to a caste census, its state unit voted along with the Nitish government in the Assembly, leading to a unanimous resolution.
Then, in August 2021, the Bihar CM led a 10-party delegation, including the state BJP, to meet Prime Minister Narendra Modi and demand a caste census. It was the first hint of political change in the air in Bihar as Nitish chose to share prime space with RJD leader Tejashwi Yadav on the move.
In June 2022, the Nitish government – now a Mahagathbandhan government, led by him – gave the nod to a caste survey, with estimated expenses of Rs 500 crore.
In the Opposition by then, the BJP opposed this, saying the party was not taken into confidence over “modalities of the survey” and over “several sub-castes not being covered”.
However, the huge population of EBCs in the state, seen as floating voters wooed by all parties, meant the Bihar BJP didn’t press the matter.
The survey finally started on January 7 this year.
In May this year, while the survey was midway through its last phase, a set of five PILs were filed challenging it, as a violation of privacy and on the argument that only the Centre had the authority to conduct a “census”. The matter went to the Supreme Court, which asked the Patna High Court to look into the matter in July.
The High Court finally upheld the survey in August, finding the “action of the state to be perfectly valid, initiated with due competence, with the legitimate aim of providing development with justice”. The state government, which argued that it was conducting a “survey” and not a “census”, completed the exercise by mid-September.

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EXPLAINED

Watching superfast subatomic particles move

Syllabus:

Preliminary Examination: General Science

Mains Examination: General Studies III: Science and Technology- developments and their applications and effects in everyday life.

Key Points to Ponder:

• What’s the ongoing story- In our everyday lives, we are familiar with processes that happen so fast we are unable to observe them completely. For example, when a bullet is fired at an apple, we see the outcome — the smashed apple — but are unable to capture the entire process, which takes barely a few milliseconds. With the help of a camera that has a very high shutter-speed, it is possible to see every step of the bullet piercing the apple and coming out of it, destroying the apple in the process.

• What is an Atom?

• What is a Molecule?

• What is the Size of an Atom?

• What are Atoms made of?

• Atoms or molecules make movements, or changes, that take just a few picoseconds (a trillionth of a second, or 10-12 seconds) or femtoseconds (10-15 seconds) and scientists found innovative ways to observe these processes, using unimaginably short pulses of light, similar to using extremely high shutter-speed cameras-Know more

• There were processes that were even faster, happening within a few attoseconds-What’s that?

• “For a long time, femtosecond ‘photography’ was considered the limit. Production of shorter pulses of light, in the attosecond range, did not seem possible. Till the works of Pierre Agostini, Ferenc Krausz and Anne L’Huillier made it possible”- What exactly Pierre Agostini, Ferenc Krausz and Anne L’Huillier did?

• For Your Information-The 58-year-old Frenchman Agostini, 61-year-old Hungarian Krausz, and 65-year-old L’Huillier, also French, were on Tuesday awarded the 2023 Nobel Prize in Physics “for experimental methods that generate attosecond pulses of light for the study of electron dynamics in matter”. In the process, L’Huillier became just the fifth woman to win the Physics Nobel. “This is a fantastic recognition. All the three have produced some wonderful science which can be very transformative.

• What exactly is attosecond science?

• For Your Information-To observe any process, the measurement must be made at a pace quicker than the rate of change. That is how clear images of moving objects are generated: for example, by making the shutter open and close faster than the motion being captured. But there is a limit to how fast the shutter speed can be.
Light pulses, the only plausible tool to capture processes at the atomic level, cannot be made indefinitely shorter. Light consists of waves, or vibrations in the electromagnetic field. The shortest possible pulse would have to be at least one cycle long, equivalent to its wavelength. For all sorts of light produced by laser systems, this cycle used to take at least a few femtoseconds to complete. This was longer than the sub-atomic motion that was happening in a matter of attoseconds. Scientists were therefore unable to glimpse the motion of electrons with existing technologies.
“Femtosecond pulses had enabled scientists to observe the processes happening at the atomic or molecular level. But when one moves further down, at the sub-atomic level, things start to happen even faster. The dynamics of the electron, for example, are 100 to 1,000 times faster than that of the atom. A lot of that has to do with inertia. The atom is heavier, because of the nucleus, and has greater inertia. Lower the inertia, faster the dynamics,” said Sivarama Krishnan, an associate professor at IIT Madras, who uses femtosecond and attosecond light pulses to study the dynamics in nano-scale systems.
Working independently, Agostini, Krausz and L’Huillier developed innovative methods, usually by mixing lights of different wavelengths, to produce attosecond pulses, which, the Nobel Prize committee said, “opens windows… to explore phenomena that were previously impossible to observe”.
It is natural for scientists to try and observe every step of a process, so they can fully understand it. More importantly, it allows scientists to control the process by tweaking the intermediate steps and obtaining desired results.
In fact, this is the third Nobel Prize in this field in the last three decades, underscoring the potential benefits of the science. The 1998 Nobel Prize in Chemistry to Egyptian scientist Ahmed Zewail, and the 2018 Nobel Prize for Physics to Gerard Mourou, Donna Strickland and Arthur Ashkin, were for breakthroughs in related science.

• What are the potential uses of Attosecond science?

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📍Nobel Prize in Physics 2023: What the three scientists have been awarded for

THE WORLD

TWO QUAKES RATTLE NEPAL

Syllabus:

Preliminary Examination: Indian and World Geography-Physical, Social, Economic Geography of India and the World.

Mains Examination: General Studies I: Important Geophysical phenomena such as earthquakes, Tsunami, Volcanic activity, cyclone etc., geographical features and their location-changes in critical geographical features (including water-bodies and ice-caps) and in flora and fauna and the effects of such changes.

Key Points to Ponder:

• What’s the ongoing story- The strongest earthquake in Nepal in more than eight years, originating quite close to the border districts in Uttar Pradesh and Uttarakhand, triggered strong tremors across north India Tuesday afternoon. The area, about 200 km southeast of Joshimath in Uttarakhand, and 280 km north of Lucknow experienced two back-to-back earthquakes within half an hour, the first one at 2.25 pm and the other at 2.51 pm. The first one was measured to be 4.7 in magnitude, while the second was 6.2, according to the National Centre for Seismology in New Delhi.
It was the second earthquake whose tremors were felt in north India. It was also a very shallow earthquake, originating just five km below the earth’s surface, thereby increasing its chances of causing damage and destruction.
The first earthquake was also shallow, originating about 10 km below the surface.

• Why the earthquake in Nepal has occured?

• Why earthquakes remain unpredictable?

• What exactly causes earthquakes?

• Can earthquakes be predicted?

• What is focus or seismic focus of Earthquake?

• What is epicentre of Earthquake?

• The intensity of earthquake is highest in the epicentre and decreases as one moves away-True or False?

• Earthquakes take place in the lithosphere-True or False?

• What is seismic waves or earthquake waves?

• What is Body waves and Surface waves?

• Know in detail-Primary waves (p-waves), Secondary waves (s-waves), L-waves and Rayleigh waves

• Map Work-Earthquake-prone areas in India and in the World

• Do shallow earthquakes cause greater damage?

• What are the pre disaster measures taken to manage earthquake disaster?

• What is post-disaster management of earthquakes?

Other Important Articles Covering the same topic:

📍Nepal earthquake: A year later, looking back how the country fought against all odds

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