CAPSTONE Mission

• CAPSTONE stands for Cislunar Autonomous Positioning System Technology Operations and Navigation Experiment.
• The mission is launched by the NASA.
• The mission’s CubeSat was sent into space to test a unique lunar orbit called a near rectilinear halo orbit (NRHO).
• NRHO is very elongated and is located at a precise balance point between the gravities of the Earth and the Moon.
• The CAPSTONE spacecraft has been navigating an offbeat but efficient deep space path to the moon.
• This route is called a ballistic lunar transfer and it follows the gravitational contours in space to help the spacecraft reach its destination while spending very little energy.

NRHO

• The NRHO orbit exists at a precise balance point between the gravities of the Earth and the Moon, meaning that it can be an ideal staging area for missions to the Moon and beyond.
• By verifying this orbit, CAPSTONE will help reduce risks for future spaceflight, and could also help establish long-term missions like the Gateway space station.
• Apart from NRHO, CAPSTONE will also demonstrate a key software technology— the Cislunar Autonomous Positioning System (CAPS).
• CAPS includes an innovative spacecraft-to-spacecraft navigation solution that will allow future missions to determine their location without having to rely on tracking from Earth.
• CAPSTONE can directly communicate with NASA’s Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter to determine its own position in space.
• This software solution will support NASA’s Artemis missions.

Review Petition

• According to the Constitution, any ruling by the Supreme Court is in the normal course final and binding, and it becomes the law of the land.
• It is considered final because it provides certainty for deciding future cases.
• However, the Constitution also gives, under Article 137, the Supreme Court the power to review its judgments or orders.
• This provision forms the legal basis for the filing of a review petition.

Procedure to file a review petition

• A review petition must be filed within 30 days of pronouncement of the judgment.
• Except in cases of death penalty, review petitions are heard through circulation by judges in their chambers.
• They are usually not heard in open court.
• Lawyers in review petitions usually make their case through written submissions, and not oral arguments.
• The same judges who passed the original verdict usually also hear the review petition.

Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES)

• It is an international agreement that aims to ensure international trade in wild animals and plants does not threaten the species’ survival.

CITES COP 19

• It is currently taking place in Panama and is also known as the World Wildlife Conference.
• The report launched during the CITES COP19 gave insights and analysis into the global trade in animals and plants regulated under the treaty.
• Trade in the CITES-listed species can have a wide range of conservation impacts, it highlighted. 
• India – It has put forward a proposal to better protect a species of freshwater reptile called the red-crowned roofed turtle (Batagur kachuga) under the CITES.
• The turtle, native to India and Bangladesh, is at a high risk of extinction, it said.
• India also put forward proposal to move the turtle to Appendix I.

CITES Appendices

• Appendix I - For species currently threatened with extinction.
• Appendix II - For species not necessarily threatened with extinction but demands intervention to keep a check on trade and avoid its utilisation that may threaten their survival.
• Appendix III – For a given species, when a specific country wants to regulate trade.

Solar Snake

• It is a stream of cooler plasma squeezed between magnetic field lines in the Sun.
• The European Solar Orbiter spacecraft watched an odd snake-like filament crawl across the sun's surface just before a massive plasma eruption.
• The filament originated in a sunspot, a cooler region on the sun's surface where the star's magnetic field is twisted.
• The snake took 3 hours to slither across the sun's disk at a speed of 170 kilometres per second.
• The odd occurrence was followed by a coronal mass ejection (CME), which is an eruption of hot plasma from the sun's upper atmosphere, the corona.
• The plasma of the snake was cooler than its surroundings as it made its way through the convoluted magnetic field lines emanating from the star's surface.

Narco Test

• In a narco test, a drug called sodium pentothal is injected into the body of the accused, which transports them to a hypnotic or sedated state.
• In such a state the accused’s imagination is neutralised and is understood as being incapable of lying, and is expected to divulge information that is true.
• Sodium pentothal or sodium thiopental is a fast-acting, short duration anaesthetic, which is used in larger doses to sedate patients during surgery.
• It belongs to the barbiturate class of drugs that act on the central nervous system as depressants.
• Because the drug is believed to weaken the subject’s resolve to lie, it is sometimes referred to as a truth serum.
• The Supreme Court had ruled that narco analysis, brain mapping and polygraph tests cannot be conducted on any person without his or her consent.
• The apex court had noted in response to petitions questioning the validity of such tests, are illegal and a violation of personal liberty.
• However, statements made during narco analysis test are not admissible in the court, except under certain circumstances when the court thinks that the facts and nature of the case permit it.