Science & Technology Current Affairs MCQs

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On March 22, 2025, NASA’s Parker Solar Probe reached 6 million km from the Sun, setting a new record for the closest spacecraft approach. It was launched on August 12, 2018, from Cape Canaveral, Florida. It aims to study the Sun’s corona, solar wind, and magnetic field. The probe follows a highly elliptical orbit, using Venus’ gravity to move closer to the Sun. It is the fastest human-made object, reaching speeds of 692,000 km/hr. It will ultimately come within 6.16 million km of the Sun, about seven times closer than any previous spacecraft.

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Dryad Networks, a Berlin-based environmental Internet of Things (IoT) startup, introduced the Silvaguard drone for ultra-early wildfire detection. The Artificial Intelligence (AI)-based drone enhances fire detection, location, and monitoring using infrared imaging. It works with Silvanet, a solar-powered gas sensor network, detecting fires at the smoldering stage. Each sensor protects an area equal to a football field and attaches to trees. Once Silvanet detects a fire, Silvaguard flies to the location, captures video and infrared images, and sends real-time data to firefighters.

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Artificial Intelligence (AI) could help speed up the diagnosis of Coeliac Disease, an inherited autoimmune disorder. It is caused by an immune reaction to gluten, a protein found in wheat, barley, and rye. Eating gluten triggers intestinal damage, leading to malabsorption of nutrients. Symptoms include diarrhea, fatigue, weight loss, bloating, and anemia. In children, it can affect growth and development. 1 in 10 people with a first-degree relative having the disease are at risk. 1 in 100 people worldwide are affected. The only treatment is a strict gluten-free diet.

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Researchers at the Indian Institute of Science (IISc) have developed a bacteria-based technique to repair bricks for lunar habitats. Future lunar missions, like NASA’s Artemis programme, aim to establish permanent settlements on the Moon. Instead of transporting materials from Earth, astronauts will use lunar soil, or regolith, to build structures. IISc developed a method using the bacterium Sporosarcina pasteurii to create bricks from lunar and Martian soil simulants. The bacterium converts urea and calcium into calcium carbonate crystals, binding soil particles with guar gum. This method is eco-friendly and cost-effective compared to cement.

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China has launched the “Three Gorges Antarctic Eye,” a 3.2-metre aperture radio and millimetre-wave telescope at Zhongshan Station in Antarctica. It is designed to study interstellar gas like hydrogen and ammonia and to explore star formation in deep space. The telescope can operate in Antarctica’s extreme cold and strong winds, making it a major engineering success. It builds on China’s earlier Antarctic Survey Telescopes (AST3) projects. The telescope was developed by China Three Gorges University and Shanghai Normal University to boost China’s space science research.

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POEM-4, or PSLV Orbital Experiment Module-4, recently re-entered Earth’s atmosphere and fell into the Indian Ocean, as tracked by ISRO’s IS4OM (System for Safe and Sustainable Space Operations Management). It is a space research platform developed by ISRO (Indian Space Research Organisation) using the spent fourth stage (PS4) of the PSLV (Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle) rocket as an orbiting lab. POEM-4 is part of the SpaDeX (Space Docking Experiment) mission and is the fourth in the POEM series, after POEM-3. It has three times more payload capacity than POEM-3, showing major progress in reusing rocket stages for science.

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Scientists at Sree Chitra Tirunal Institute for Medical Sciences and Technology (SCTIMST) in Thiruvananthapuram have developed a new real-time test for Tuberculosis (TB) called the real-time Loop-Mediated Isothermal Amplification (rt-LAMP) assay. The rt-LAMP assay is similar to GeneXpert and Truenat, with high sensitivity to detect even 10 TB DNA copies per microlitre. Unlike Reverse Transcription Polymerase Chain Reaction (RT-PCR), which needs three temperature cycles, rt-LAMP works at a single temperature, making it simpler and faster. It uses six primers for stronger DNA detection, compared to two in RT-PCR. The use of Syto 16 fluorescent dye avoids false negatives. Results are available in just 10–20 minutes, helping in early TB diagnosis.

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BatEchoMon stands for Bat Echolocation Monitoring, India’s first real-time automated bat monitoring system. It was developed by Kadambari Deshpande and Vedant Barje under Jagdish Krishnaswamy at the Indian Institute for Human Settlements (IIHS), Bengaluru. It is part of the Long-Term Urban Ecological Observatory at IIHS’s School of Environment and Sustainability. BatEchoMon detects, records, analyses, and classifies bat sounds using echolocation. It uses an ultrasonic microphone, a Raspberry Pi microprocessor, solar-powered battery, and Wi-Fi unit. It activates at sunset and works through the night using a Convolutional Neural Network (CNN) to identify bat calls.

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The International Diabetes Federation (IDF) has recently acknowledged Type 5 diabetes as a distinct form of the disease. This recognition came at the 75th Diabetes World Congress in Bangkok. Type 5 diabetes is a form of malnutrition-related diabetes that affects lean, undernourished teenagers and young adults, mostly in low- and middle-income regions. Around 20 to 25 million people globally are estimated to suffer from this type, mainly in Asia and Africa. It is caused by a severe defect in insulin secretion due to chronic undernutrition, not by insulin resistance like in Type 1 or Type 2 diabetes. It was first identified in Jamaica in 1955 as J-type diabetes. The World Health Organization (WHO) recognised it in 1985 but later withdrew support in 1999 because of limited research.

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Scientists from Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) Bombay have developed lotus leaf-like solar evaporators called Dual-Sided Laser-Induced Graphene (DSLIG) for saltwater treatment. The material is made using polyvinylidene fluoride (PVDF) and polyether sulfone (PES), with graphene engraved using laser. DSLIG is superhydrophobic, meaning it repels water like lotus leaves, helping prevent salt from sticking on its surface. It uses both solar heating and electricity-based Joule heating, making it work even on cloudy days. It improves desalination by reducing heat loss and maintaining efficiency. It also works well with highly salty water and has low carbon footprint and toxicity.