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Prelim Bits 16-02-2019

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February 16, 2019

Kawal Tiger Reserve

  • Kawal tiger reserve is situated in Northern part of the Telegana state.
  • The wildlife sanctuary in Kawal is the catchment area of river Godavari and Kadam.
  • The indiactor species of the sanctuary are Tiger and Nilgai.
  • The reserve forms the southern end of the central Indian Tiger Reserve Landscpe.
  • It is also linked to the Tadoba Andhari Tiger Reserve in Maharastra to it north and Indrvathi Tiger reerve to its east
  • The forest area found here is the southern tropical mixed dry deciduous forest and dry teak forest.

Waste to Energy (WTE) Plants

  • Waste to Energy (WTE), is a term that is used to describe various technologies that convert non-recyclable waste into usable forms of energy including heat, fuels and electricity.
  • WTE can occur through a number of processes such as incineration, gasification, pyrolysis, anaerobic digestion, and landfill gas recovery.
  • As per the Union Ministry of Environment and Forests, MSW generation will reach 4.5 lakh TPD by 2031 and 11.9 lakh TPD by 2050.
  • Nearly half of India’s waste-to-energy (WTE) plants, meant to convert non-biodegradable waste, are defunct.
  • The key reasons for closure are
  1. The plants’ inability to handle mixed solid waste
  2. The high cost of electricity generated by them that renders it unattractive to power companies.
  • The fundamental reason for the inefficiency of WTE plants is the quality and composition of waste.
  • MSW (municipal solid waste) in India has low calorific value and high moisture content.

Kelp forest

  • Climate change could lead to declines of underwater kelp forests through impacts on their micro biome.
  • It was predicted that ocean warming and acidification can change microbes on the kelp surface, leading to disease and potentially putting fisheries at risk.
  • Kelp Forests are underwater ecosystems formed in shallow water by the dense growth of several different species known as kelps.
  • Kelps are actually extremely large brown algae, although they look like plants.
  • They thrive in cold, nutrient-rich waters.
  • Kelp attaches to the seafloor and eventually grows to the water’s surface and relies on sunlight to generate food and energy.
  • Kelps live further from the tropics than coral reefs, mangrove forests, and warm-water seagrass beds, so kelp forests do not overlap with those systems.

Unicode Consortium

  • Unicode Consortium These is planning to release a new emojis list.
  • Emoji are pictographs (pictorial symbols) that are typically presented in a colorful form and used inline in text.
  • They represent things such as faces, weather, vehicles and buildings, food and drink, animals and plants, or icons that represent emotions, feelings, or activities.
  • The Unicode Consortium is a non-profit corporation.
  • It is devoted to developing, maintaining, and promoting software internationalization standards and data.
  • It deals particularly with the Unicode Standard, which specifies the representation of text in all modern software products and standards.

Corps of Signal

  • The Indian army Corps of Signals celebrated its 108th Anniversary recently.
  • It is an arm of Indian army and was raised in 1911.
  • It is well poised to exploit the state-of-art modern communication techniques for meeting the requirements of the Indian Army in the 21st century.
  • Generally a signal corps is a military branch, responsible for military communications (signals).
  • Military communication usually consists of radio, telephone, and digital communications.
  • It works closely with Defense Research and Development Organization (DRDO).
  • It has developed command and control software, notably Samyukta Electronic Warfare System.

 

Source: PIB, The Hindu, Indian Express

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