RELEVANT TOPICS IN TODAY’S NEWS
Uranium Contamination [ Prelims ]
- Many parts of Rajasthan may have high uranium levels in their groundwater.
- The main source of uranium contamination was “natural,” but human factors such as groundwater table decline and nitrate pollution could be worsening the problem.
- The WHO has set a provisional safe drinking water standard of 30 micrograms of uranium per litre.Despite this, uranium is not yet included in the list of contaminants monitored under the Bureau of Indian Standards’ Drinking Water Specifications.
UNSC [ Prelims ]
- The Maldives failed to get elected to the UN Security Council as a non-permanent member.
- Maldives and Indonesia had contested for a seat in the UNSC, but, Indonesia won the seat.
- The winning members had to get more than two-thirds majority or 127 votes.
Deocha-Pachami [ Prelims ]
- The Centre has handed over the Deocha-Pachami coal mines, said to be second largest coal block in the world, to the West Bengal government.
- The coal block, located in Birbhum district, is spread over an area of almost 9 sq. km.
- The Centre had first intended to allot the coal block jointly to Bihar, Karnataka, Punjab, Uttar Pradesh, Tamil Nadu and West Bengal along with PSU Satluj Jal Vidyut Nigam Ltd. However, apart from West Bengal, no State showed any interest.
New Planet [ Prelims ]
- For the first time, India joined a select group of countries which have found planets around stars with the discovery of what is known as a sub-Saturn or super-Neptune-sized planet having a radius that is six times that of earth.
- The discovery was made by measuring the mass of the planet using the indigenously designed ‘PRL Advance Radial-velocity Abu-sky Search’ (PARAS) spectrograph.
- This is the first of its kind spectrograph in the country, which can measure the mass of a planet going around a star. Very few such spectrographs exist around the world that can do such precise measurements.
