CDS GK Questions 2026

A ribosome contains RNA, but it has no genes of its own; it reads messenger RNA sent from the DNA of the nucleus or an organelle.

A chemical reaction produces only internal forces, which cannot change the motion of the centre of mass but can change internal kinetic energy.

Water is densest at 4 °C, where one cubic metre has a mass of almost exactly 1000 kg.

Lonar Lake in Buldhana district of Maharashtra fills a crater made by a meteorite impact. The Lonar crater was formed in prehistoric times when a meteorite struck the basalt rock of the Deccan Plateau.

Latent heat is absorbed during a change of state while the temperature stays fixed. When water boils at 100 °C, adding more heat does not raise its temperature; the energy goes into breaking the attractions between molecules so that liquid turns into vapour.

The stone takes 2 s to fall 20 m, and in that time it moves 12 × 2 = 24 m sideways.

The heater's resistance is 220/0.5 = 440 Ω, so at 120 V the current is 120/440, about 0.27 A. By Ohm's law, V = IR, and for an ohmic conductor at a steady temperature the resistance stays the same.

Both carry their own DNA and ribosomes and can make some of their own proteins. Mitochondria, the powerhouses of the cell, and plastids such as chloroplasts each contain a small circular DNA molecule and 70S ribosomes, much like bacteria.

Most Harappan seals were carved from steatite, a soft soapstone that hardens when fired. Steatite is easy to cut, so craftsmen could carve fine animal figures and signs of the Harappan script on it.

It gives the direction of the force on a current-carrying conductor placed in a magnetic field. Stretch the thumb, forefinger and middle finger of the left hand so that they are mutually perpendicular.

Two equal forces give a resultant of the same size only when they are 120° apart, and the resultant then makes 60° with each.

All the potential energy at the top turns into kinetic energy at the mean position, so v = √(2gh) = √(2 × 10 × 0.20) = 2 m/s. When the bob is released from rest at height h, it has potential energy mgh and no kinetic energy.

A transformer raises or lowers an AC voltage using electromagnetic induction between two coils. A transformer has a primary and a secondary coil wound on a common soft-iron core.

The Approach Paper to the Twelfth Five Year Plan, released in 2011, aimed at average GDP growth of 9% a year for 2012–17.

Heat, by definition, is energy that flows because of a temperature difference. Thermodynamics recognises two ways in which a system can exchange energy with its surroundings: heat and work.

The Act provided dyarchy at the Centre and autonomy in the provinces, two separate reforms. The Government of India Act, 1935 abolished dyarchy in the provinces, which the 1919 Act had begun, and replaced it with provincial autonomy: provinces got responsible governments with ministers answerable to elected legislatures.

The plasma membrane is made of lipids and proteins and contains no DNA or RNA. The plasma membrane is the outer boundary of the cell.

Rotational kinetic energy is ½Iω², and the ring has the larger moment of inertia. For a thin ring about the axis through its centre and perpendicular to its plane, all the mass sits at distance R, so I = MR².

New Zealand forms the south-western corner of the Polynesian Triangle in the Pacific Ocean. The Pacific islands are grouped into three regions.

A light year is a unit of distance, not of time or brightness. One light year is the distance light travels through a vacuum in one Julian year.