Psyche Mission
NASA has sent a spacecraft named ‘Psyche’ on a six-year journey towards a unique metal-rich asteroid Psyche, orbiting the Sun between Mars and Jupiter.
Goals and objectives –
- Understand a previously unexplored building block of planet formation: iron cores.
- For the first time, examine a world made not of rock and ice, but metal.
- Look inside terrestrial planets, including Earth, by directly examining the interior of a differentiated body, which otherwise could not be seen.
Kanwar lake
Kanwar Lake (Kabartal Wetland) is facing threat of running dry.
- Location – Bihar
- A freshwater natural wetland and an ox-bow lake.
- It draws water from confluence of the Gandak, Bia and Kareh river.
- It is an important stopover along the Central Asian Flyway.
- In 2020, it was designated as Ramsar wetland site.
Dampa Tiger Reserve
A new species of toad (Frog) is found in Dampa tiger reserve.
- Location: western flank (Lushai Hills) of Mizoram.
- On the West, it is bound by the Chittagong hill tracts (Sazek hill range) of Bangladesh.
- declared a tiger reserve under the Project Tiger initiative in 1994.
- Drained by the River Khawthlangtuipui in the West and the Teirei River to the East.
Aestivation
What is it? | Estivation: summer urge to nap | The Hindu
- It is a biological phenomenon whereby the animal enters a long period of dormancy, or inactivity, in response to high temperature or maybe even drought-like conditions.
- It is a survival strategy that helps the animal conserve energy and water in a difficult time.
- Examples – West African lungfish, Desert tortoises, Snails etc.