3. Q1. A Boy And His X is a 2013 stop-motion animated short film released on
YouTube by IBM Research. The movie tells the story of a boy and a
wayward X who meet and become friends. It depicts a boy playing with an
X that takes various forms. One minute in length, it was made by using a
scanning tunnelling microscope, a device that magnifies them 100 million
times. The movie has been recognized by the Guinness Book of World
Records as the World's Smallest Stop-Motion Film.
5. Q2. X is an organic compound that contains only carbon, chlorine, and
fluorine, produced as a volatile derivative of methane and ethane. They
are also commonly known by the DuPont brand name Freon. Many of
these compounds have been widely used as propellants, and solvents
among other usages. The manufacture of such compounds has been
however phased out by the Montreal Protocol.
7. Q3. X is a rare blood group also known as Hh. This blood phenotype was
first discovered in India, by Dr. Y.M. Bhende in 1952. People who has this
phenotype can donate to any member of the ABO blood group system
(unless some other blood factor gene, such as Rhesus, is incompatible), but
they cannot receive any member of the ABO blood group system's blood
(which always contains one or more of A and B and H antigens), but only
from other people who have X phenotype. This very rare Phenotype is
generally present in about 0.0004% (about 4 per million) of the human
population, though in some places locals can have occurrences in as much
as 0.01% (1 in 10,000) of inhabitants and 1 in a million people in Europe.
9. Q4. X was discovered in 1658 by Minora Tarazaemon in Japan and was first
used in microbiology in 1892 by the German microbiologist Walter
Hesse, at Robert Koch’s laboratory. He discovered that it was more useful
as a solidifying agent than gelatin, due to its better solidifying
temperature. The name X comes from the Malay name for red algae
(Gigartina, Gracilaria) from which the jelly is produced. It is also known as
kanten, China grass, Japanese isinglass, Ceylon moss or Jaffna moss.
Throughout history into modern times, X has been chiefly used as an
ingredient in desserts throughout Asia. It can be used as a laxative, an
appetite suppressant, a thickener for soups, in fruit preserves, icecream, and other desserts, as a clarifying agent in brewing, and for sizing
paper and fabrics.
Clue: The name is making headlines recently in Australian Cricket
10. A4. Agar
used as a solid substrate to contain culture medium for microbiological work
11. Q5. X is a polymer made of hexamethylenediamine and adipic acid, which
gives it a total of 12 carbon atoms in each repeating unit, and its name. X is
frequently used when high mechanical strength, great rigidity, and good
stability under heat is required. It is used for ball bearing cages, electroinsulating elements, pipes, profiles and various machine parts.
Clue: This polymer made the headlines in Goa in the mid-90s
13. Q6. We are all very familiar with Facebook and its blue scheme. However
the blue scheme was not randomly chosen but there is a specific reason
behind picking it. Apparently, Facebook founder and CEO Mark Zuckerberg
suffers from X medical condition and thus ‘Blue’ is the colour he can best
see which explains the blue scheme. What medical condition?
15. Q7. X is an organic carbon based molecule formed of five rings, of which
four are benzene rings, joined in the shape of the 5 rings.
The molecule was conceived in March 2010 by Graham Richards of
University of Oxford and Antony Williams and named after 2012 London
sporting event. It was first synthesized by researchers Anish Mistry and
David Fox of the University of Warwick in the UK.
17. Q8. Depicted in the picture below are different types of X. What?
18. A8: Types of Microscopes
Optical
Transmission Electron Microscope
Scanning Electron Microscope
Scanning Probe Microscope
Atomic Force Microscope
Scanning Tunneling Microscopy
Scanning Near-field Optical Microscopy
19. Q9. What in this world is:
• A character played by Boman Irani in the movie ‘3 Idiots’
• A type of malicious computer program
• A parasitic agent that is smaller than a bacterium and that can only
reproduce after infecting a host cell
• Name of many music bands, songs, video game et al
23. Q11. Concentrated X spores were
used for bioterrorism in the 2001
attacks in the United
States, delivered by mailing postal
letters containing the spores. Also
known as Amerithrax from its FBI
case name, this occurred over the
course of several weeks beginning
on Tuesday, September
18, 2001, one week after the
September 11 attacks. What ‘white
powder’ was used for these
attacks?
25. Q12. Ethanethiol, commonly known as ethyl mercaptan, is a colorless gas
or clear liquid with a distinct odour which I am confidently everyone of us
must have smelled. In what situation you must have come across it?
26. A12: Gas leaks
added to otherwise odourless gaseous products such as liquefied
petroleum gas (LPG) to help warn of gas leaks
27. Q13. Julius Richard Petri (May 31, 1852 – December 20, 1921) was a
German microbiologist who was assistant to pioneering bacteriologist
Robert Koch. What ‘eponymous’ item is he generally credited with
inventing which is pivotal to microbiologists even today?
29. Q14. Google recently released the following doodle to commemorate
whose contribution in the field of micro-biology. What first was achieved
thus by that person?
30. A14: Rosalind Franklin
Google Doodle celebrates what would have been Rosalind Franklin’s 93rd
birthday with an image of Mr. Watson and Mr. Crick’s double helix – and
Franklin’s Photo 51. She was the first to have photographed a DNA
31. Q15. one of the classification of prokaryotic cells is
Cocci,
Bacilli,
Spirochaete,
Vibrio.
What is the basis of this classification?
32. A15: Based on Shape
Cocci – spherical
Bacilli – rod-shaped
Spirochaete – spiral-shaped
Vibrio – comma-shaped
33. Q16. This new species of iron-oxide consuming bacteria was discovered on
a rusticle and subsequently named Halomonas titanicae. Studies show that
it sticks to steel surfaces creating knob-like mounds of corrosion products
that have contributed, along with other microorganisms, to the
deterioration process of the Metal. This bacterium could be useful to
perform studies related to the disposal of old naval and merchant ships
that have sunk in the deep ocean. Where was this bacteria discovered?
35. Q17. What was the end result of this process? What first?
36. A17: Dolly
a female domestic sheep, and the first mammal to be cloned from an adult
somatic cell, using the process of nuclear transfer.
37. Q18. After being driven to mass extinction in the 1970s, the last members
of this species are located in captivity in Atlanta and at Russia. Their
existence has been a subject of controversy ever since. Name this species
(common name would do).
38. A18: Small Pox Virus
Last few laboratory samples of the deadly virus are preserved, apparently
for research.
39. Q19. The logo is that of an Indian biopharmaceutical company based in
Bangalore. Within biopharmaceuticals, the Company manufactures generic
active pharmaceutical ingredients (APIs) that are sold in the developed
markets of the United States and Europe. It also manufactures biosimilar
Insulin, which are sold in India as branded formulations and in both bulk
and formulation forms. Recently they have also forayed into cancer
research. Name this pioneering Indian company.
40. A19: Biocon
CMD Kiran Mazumdar–Shaw has nurtured Biocon since its inception in
1978. She has been pioneer in the biotech sector and recipient of
numerous awards and adulations.
41. Q20. What you see in the picture below is a result of a experiment
conducted by professor Mark Post at Maastricht University in Holland.
Sergey Brin, Google’s co-founder bankrolled the €250,000 (~ $331,450)
project. What was this experiment about or what did it create?
42. A20: First synthetic hamburger.
Cultured meat was grown in the lab which was then used inside a patty.
43. Q21. This metallo-beta-lactamase-1 enzyme subsequently named ‘NDM1’, was first detected in a Klebsiella pneumoniae bacterial isolate which
makes bacteria resistant to a broad range of beta-lactam antibiotics which
are a mainstay for the treatment of antibiotic-resistant bacterial infections.
This enzyme named after a city it was first detected in December 2009 in a
Swedish national who fell ill with an antibiotic-resistant bacterial infection
that he acquired. The discovery was reported in Lancet Infectious Diseases
journal in 2010.
What two-words in the name of this enzyme caused a furore in India?
45. Q22. According to a 2013 paper by Harminder Singh Dua's group at the
University of Nottingham, there is a layer of the cornea that had not been
detected previously. It is hypothetically 15 micrometres (0.00059 inches)
thick, the fourth layer from the front, and located between the corneal
stroma and Descemet's membrane. Despite its thinness, the layer is very
strong and impervious to air. It is strong enough to withstand up to 2 bars
(200 kPa) of pressure. What ‘eponymous’ name did he gave it?
46. A22: Dua’s Layer
The findings were published in Ophthalmology in May 2013. The paper
named the layer after the lead author, Harminder Dua.
47. Q23. The logo is of a wiki-based online project supported by the Wikimedia
Foundation. Its aim is to create a comprehensive free content catalogue of
all species and is directed at scientists, rather than at the general public.
Started in September 2004, with biologists across the world invited to
contribute,[ the project had grown a framework encompassing the
Linnaean taxonomy with links to Wikipedia articles on individual species
by April 2005.
49. Q24. IUCN is an international organization dedicated to finding "pragmatic
solutions to our most pressing environment and development challenges".
IUCN supports scientific research, manages field projects globally and
brings governments, non-government organizations, United Nations
agencies, companies and local communities together to develop and
implement policy.
The organization publishes the IUCN Red List, which assesses the
_________ _______ of species. You would see this very often when you
access the wikipedia page for any animal. What does it indicate?
50. A24: Conservation Status
indicates whether the group is extant (members of it are still alive) and
how likely the group is to become extinct in the near future.
55. Q27. The origin of X lies in the traditional Ayurvedic digestive medicine
Shudhabardhak bati. It is a mix of herb, spices and edible salts commonly
used in home remedies to treat stomach ailments like
flatulence, indigestion and flatulent dyspepsia.
As part of its effort to make innovative products based on traditional
formulations, it was launched in 1978. This was the first time an Ayurvedic
medicine was introduced into the market as a consumer health care brand.
What product that we have tasted was marketed thus?
57. Q28. Bacteria were first observed by Antonie van Leeuwenhoek in 1676,
using a single-lens microscope of his own design and published his
observations in a series of letters to the Royal Society. However a more
‘notable’ contribution in the field was made by by Christian Gottfried
Ehrenberg. What did he contribute?
58. A28: The name Bacterium
was introduced by Christian Gottfried Ehrenberg much later, in 1828.
Antonie van Leeuwenhoek called them "animalcules"
59. Q29. Actinomycetes are a type of filamentous bacteria found in soil which
thrive when conditions are damp and warm. However when dry conditions
prevail, these form spores/cysts. Upon contact with moisture (which acts
like an aerosol) these spores burst open resulting in what?
This phenomenon is named after the fluid that is supposed to be flowing in
the veins of Greek Gods.
