1) Dokra Metal Crafts: Lalbazar, on the boundary with Jharkhand, is becoming a hub for dokra metalcraft, which is about 5000 years old. it is a form of ancient bell metal craft practiced by the Ojha metal smiths living in states like Jharkhand, Chhattisgarh, Odisha, West Bengal and Telangana.
- Making dokra art is a difficult process. Each figurine takes about a month to make.
- Dokra artifacts are mainly made in brass and are highly unique wherein the pieces do not have any form of joints. The whole object is fully handcrafted.
- The method of making Dokra is done by combining the metallurgical skills with that of the lost wax technique.
- There are two process of lost wax casting. The first one is Solid casting which is the method followed in the South and hollow casting, practiced in other states.
2) Chillai Kalan: One of the harshest winter periods of 40 days, called Chillai Kalan, has begun in Kashmir. It is a Persian term that means ‘major cold’. Use of Pheran (Kashmiri dress) and a traditional firing pot called Kanger increases during this time.
3) BF.7 variant: The BF.7 sub-variant has a 4.4-fold higher neutralisation resistance than the original D614G variant — meaning that in a lab setting, antibodies from a vaccinated or infected individual were less likely to destroy BF.7 than the original Wuhan virus that spread worldwide in 2020.
- 7 is a sub-lineage of the Omicron variant BA.5 and has the strongest infection ability since it is highly transmissible, has a shorter incubation period, and a higher capacity to cause reinfection or infect even those vaccinated.
4) Samudrayaan Mission: It is aimed to develop a self-propelled manned submersible to carry three human beings to a water depth of 6,000 meters in the ocean with a suite of scientific sensors and tools for deep ocean exploration. The manned submersible vehicle is called ‘MATSYA 6000’.
- This vehicle is being designed and developed by the National Institute of Ocean Technology (NIOT), Chennai under the Ministry of Earth Sciences.
- With the launch of ‘Samudrayaan’ in October 2021, India joined the elite club of nations such as the US, Russia, Japan, France, and China to have niche technology and vehicles to carry out subsea activities.
- Manned submersible provides a feel of direct physical presence for researchers and has better intervention capability.
5) Acclimatization vs Adaptation:
