General Science Questions (MCQs) for Competitive Examinations

Notes:
Jhum is a traditional form of shifting cultivation that is common in the North-East of India. Also known as slash and burn agriculture, it is practiced by the tribal groups in Arunachal Pradesh, Meghalaya, Mizoram and Nagaland and the hilly areas of Assam. Jhum involves clearing a piece of land by setting fire or clear felling and using the area for growing crops.

Notes:
Glycolysis, part of cellular respiration, is a series of reactions that constitute the first phase of most carbohydrate catabolism, catabolism meaning the breaking down of larger molecules into smaller ones. Glycolysis breaks down glucose and forms pyruvate with the production of two molecules of ATP. The entire process from conversion of glucose to pyruvate is anaerobic that is it does not take place in presence of oxygen.

Notes:
The stapes or stirrup is a bone in the middle ear of humans which is involved in the conduction of sound vibrations to the inner ear. The stapes transmits sound vibrations from the incus, another little bone in the middle ear, to the oval window adjacent to the inner ear. The stapes is the smallest bone in the body.

Notes:
A virus has a simple structure. It has no internal cellular structure, no cell wall or cell membrane, just the protein coat that holds the string of nucleic acid. It is made only of a nucleic acid + a protein coat. A cell wall is a layer located outside the cell membrane found in plants, fungi, bacteria, algae, and archaea.

Notes:
Pond silk is the common name of Spirogyra (algae) because it is very slimy in shape. It is also known as pond silk, water silk, pond scum or mermaid’s trees because of its bright green silky appearance. Its filaments shine like silk due to the presence of mucilage and spiral shaped chloroplast.

Notes:
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.

Notes:
Enzymes are defined as biological catalysts. Chemically all enzymes are globular proteins. Each enzyme catalyses only one chemical reaction. Protein part of enzyme is known as Apoenzyme. It forms an active enzyme system by combination with a coenzyme and determines the specificity of this system for a substrate.

Notes:
Vermicomposting is the process of using worms also called red worms and micro-organisms to turn kitchen waste into black, earthy-smelling, nutrient-rich humus. Vermicompost is an excellent, nutrient-rich organic fertilizer and soil conditioner.

Notes:
The ball and socket joint (or spheroidal joint) is a type of synovial joint in which the ball-shaped surface of one rounded bone fits into the cup-like depression of another bone. One of its example is hip joint, in which a partially spherical end lies in a socket, allowing multidirectional movement and rotation.

Notes:
In the blood the key minerals are iron, copper, zinc, sodium, potassium, calcium and magnesium. Minerals constitute important part of blood plasma that constitutes almost 55% of blood. In the blood, iron is found in larger amounts than any other mineral.