General Science Questions (MCQs) for Competitive Examinations

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Plasma is considered a distinct “fourth state of matter. A plasma is a hot ionized gas consisting of approximately equal numbers of positively charged ions and negatively charged electrons. The characteristics of plasmas are significantly different from those of ordinary neutral gases.

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Heavy water is water that contains heavy hydrogen or deuterium. Deuterium differs from the hydrogen usually found in water, protium, in that each atom of deuterium contains a proton and a neutron. Heavy water may be deuterium oxide, D2O or it may be deuterium protium oxide, DHO.

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Fermentation is an anaerobic chemical process that breaks down glucose molecules. In baking, yeast consumes sugar and converts it into carbon dioxide and alcohol, making the dough rise. This gas gets trapped in the strands of gluten, resulting in air pockets that cause the dough to rise and form the characteristic spongy texture of bread and cakes. Further, the creation of lactic and acetic acids during fermentation augments this dough handling process, improves flavor, enhances the texture, and extends the shelf-life of the baked products.

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The wings of insects, bats and birds, that evolved independently in each lineage separately after diverging from an ancestor without wings, are examples of analogous organs. Analogous organs are the opposite of homologous organs, which have similar functions but different origins.

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Tuberculosis caused by Mycobacterium tuberculie which primarily affects lungs although can affect other body too while early 19th century was called ‘white plague’ because of the large number of the people dying of its infection.

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Newton’s Law of Cooling states that the rate of temperature of the body is proportional to the difference between the temperature of the body and that of the surrounding medium. When a body cools by radiation, then rate of cooling depends on: Nature of the radiating surface, that is, emissivity; Area of the radiating surface; Mass of the radiating surface; Specific heat of the radiating body; Temperature of radiating body and Temperature of the surrounding.

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Barani area are traditionally rain-fed areas. These are any low rain area where the rain-fed dry farming is practiced. Bagar tract, the dry sandy tract of land on the border of Rajasthan state adjoining the states of Haryana and Punjab, is an example of Barani land.

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Humming birds are birds that comprise the family Trochilidae. They are among the smallest of birds, most species measuring in the 7.5–13 cm (3–5 in) range. Indeed, the smallest extinct bird species is a humming bird, the 5-cm Bee Humming bird. These birds being the smallest are, capable of flying both in forward and back direction.

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Anaerobic reactions involve break down of glucose into pyruvic acid, which then reacts to produce lactic acid. As muscle metabolism shifts from aerobic to anaerobic ATP production, lactic acid begins to accumulate in muscles and to appear in the bloodstream. This leads to muscle fatigue with changing pH of muscle cells. C6H12O6 —> 2C3H6O3 + 2ATP

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Conduction is the process by which vital nutrients are transported to the different parts of a plant. This process is independent of the light factor. Respiration process in plants is the intake of carbon-dioxide and exhales oxygen during the day as the plants gets energy through the photosynthesis process in which the carbon-dioxide is converted into sugars using the sun light energy, as this process uses carbon-dioxide and water, the resulting gas oxygen is given out as a waste product. During the night, as the photosynthesis process does not take place it exhales the carbon-dioxide itself.