Science & Technology Mixed Quiz: Set 3

The correct answer is B, GSLV Mark Three. Chandrayaan 2 lifted off on 22 July 2019 on the heaviest Indian rocket then flying, the Geosynchronous Satellite Launch Vehicle Mark Three, which has since been renamed LVM3. The extra lifting power was needed because the mission carried three craft together: an orbiter, the lander Vikram and the rover Pragyan.

Option A, PSLV C25, carried the Mars Orbiter Mission in 2013. Option C, the ASLV, was the Augmented Satellite Launch Vehicle of the nineteen eighties, a small experimental rocket long retired. Option D, PSLV C11, carried Chandrayaan 1 in 2008. The pattern worth remembering is that the Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle carried the first Moon mission and the Mars mission, while the heavy rocket carried the two later Moon missions with landers.

The correct answer is D, Ability. Bias in an artificial intelligence system is traced to three sources, the data it learns from, the algorithm that learns, and the people who build and use it; ability is not one of them, because the skill of a model is a measure of how well it performs, not a place where unfairness enters. Data bias appears when the training set leaves out or under-represents a group, as with a face recognition system trained mostly on one kind of face. Algorithmic bias comes from the choices made in designing a model, such as the features it is allowed to use. Human bias enters through labelling, sampling and the assumptions of the team. Options A, B and C are therefore wrong answers to this question because each one is a genuine source of bias. Exam tip: remember data, algorithm and people as the three sources of AI bias.

The correct answer is B, the crew escape system. TV-D1, the first test vehicle abort mission, was launched from Sriharikota on 21 October 2023. A single stage test vehicle carried the crew module and the crew escape system to about transonic speed, the abort was commanded, the escape motors pulled the crew module clear, and the module came down under parachutes and was recovered from the sea.

Option A is wrong because the cryogenic stage was not part of the test vehicle at all. Option C is wrong because docking is being proved separately, notably through the SpaDeX experiment, and is not part of the first Gaganyaan flight plan. Option D is wrong because a lunar lander belongs to the Chandrayaan programme and has nothing to do with this test. An earlier pad abort test in 2018 had already shown the same escape system working from a stationary rocket on the pad.

The correct answer is D, 1.6 W/kg. The Specific Absorption Rate measures how much radio energy from a handset the body takes in, in watts per kilogram of tissue. From 1 September 2012 the Department of Telecommunications made 1.6 W/kg, averaged over one gram of human tissue, the limit for every new mobile handset design sold in India. Before that India followed the older figure of 2.0 W/kg averaged over ten grams. The rules also require the SAR value to be printed on the handset and its box, and a buyer can check it by dialling a code given by the maker. India's limit matches the standard used in the United States. Option A is wrong because 1.8 W/kg is not a prescribed limit anywhere. Option B is wrong because 2.1 W/kg is not a SAR standard. Option C is wrong because 2.2 W/kg is only a distractor. Exam tip: India's SAR limit is 1.6 W/kg over 1 gram of tissue, in force from 1 September 2012.

The correct answer is B, Vikram and Pragyan. The lander is named Vikram after Vikram Sarabhai, the physicist who founded the Indian space programme and is called its father. The six wheeled rover is named Pragyan, a Sanskrit word meaning wisdom. Both names were used for Chandrayaan 2 in 2019 and again for Chandrayaan 3 in 2023.

Option A names Aryabhata, India's first satellite of 1975, and Bhaskara, an early Earth observation satellite. Option C names Rohini, the satellite put in orbit by the SLV 3 in 1980, and Apple, an experimental communication satellite of 1981. Option D mixes Aditya, the solar observatory launched in 2023, with a word for Mars. All are real Indian space names, which is exactly why they are placed here.

The correct answer is B, 2008. Chandrayaan 1 was launched on 22 October 2008 from the Satish Dhawan Space Centre at Sriharikota and reached lunar orbit within a fortnight. It carried eleven payloads, five Indian and six foreign, and its data led to the confirmation of water molecules on the lunar surface. Contact was lost in August 2009.

Option A, 2005, is too early; India had no lunar mission in that year. Option C, 2013, is the year the Mars Orbiter Mission was launched, on 5 November, which makes it the strongest distractor in this set. Option D, 2019, is the year of Chandrayaan 2, launched on 22 July. Learn the four dates as a chain: 2008 for the first Moon mission, 2013 for Mars, 2019 for the second Moon mission and 2023 for the third.

The correct answer is A, the crew module and the service module. The crew module is the pressurised double walled cabin where the astronauts live, and it is the only part that returns to Earth, protected by a heat shield and lowered by parachutes. The service module is an unpressurised section carrying propulsion, power generation, thermal control and other support systems, and it is separated before re-entry.

Option B, lander and rover, describes Chandrayaan-3, where Vikram and Pragyan worked on the Moon. Option C, orbiter and propulsion module, describes the earlier lunar missions, which had to place a spacecraft in lunar orbit. Option D is wrong because the cryogenic stage belongs to the launch vehicle and burns out long before orbit is reached, so it is never part of the spacecraft. Knowing which part comes back is the detail most often tested.

The correct answer is C, the human-rated LVM3. Gaganyaan will fly on the LVM3, the heaviest Indian launch vehicle, modified and certified for carrying human beings and then written as HLVM3. It is a three stage vehicle with two solid strap-on boosters, a liquid core stage and a cryogenic upper stage, and human rating adds wider structural margins, redundant systems and extra checks.

Option A, the PSLV-XL, is the workhorse used for remote sensing satellites and for Chandrayaan-1 and Mangalyaan, but it cannot lift a crewed spacecraft. Option B, the GSLV Mk II, carries communication satellites of about two tonnes to geosynchronous transfer orbit and is too small for this payload. Option D, the SSLV, is the small satellite launch vehicle meant for payloads of a few hundred kilograms. The LVM3 was earlier called the GSLV Mk III, which is why both names appear in question papers.

The correct answer is B, 23 August 2023. The Vikram lander of Chandrayaan 3 touched down safely in the high latitude region near the lunar south pole on that evening, and the rover Pragyan rolled out soon afterwards. The landing point was named Shiv Shakti Point, and 23 August is now observed every year as National Space Day.

Option A, 14 July 2023, is the launch date of Chandrayaan 3, and mixing the launch with the landing is the commonest error on this topic. Option C, 2 September 2023, is the launch date of Aditya L1, the solar mission. Option D, 7 September 2019, is the date on which the Chandrayaan 2 lander lost contact during its descent and the earlier landing attempt failed, four years before this success.

The correct answer is C, Pinaka. Pinaka is the multi-barrel rocket launcher built for the Indian Army by DRDO's Armament Research and Development Establishment, Pune, and named after the bow of Lord Shiva. One launcher fires twelve rockets in about forty-four seconds, so a battery can saturate a large patch of ground in a single salvo. The first version reaches about forty kilometres and later versions go considerably further. Pinaka was used in the Kargil conflict of 1999 and is now exported as well. Option A is wrong because Dhanush is a naval, ship-launched version of the Prithvi ballistic missile, and the name is also used for a towed artillery gun. Option B is wrong because Trishul was a short-range surface-to-air missile of the Integrated Guided Missile Development Programme. Option D is wrong because Prithvi is a surface-to-surface ballistic missile, a guided weapon rather than a rocket system. Exam tip: the IGMDP gave Prithvi, Agni, Trishul, Akash and Nag; Pinaka is a rocket launcher outside that list.

The correct answer is B, Bengaluru. The Human Space Flight Centre, set up in 2019 as the ISRO centre responsible for the Gaganyaan programme, works from Bengaluru, which is also the location of the ISRO headquarters, the U R Rao Satellite Centre and the ISRO Telemetry, Tracking and Command Network.

Option A, Thiruvananthapuram, is the home of the Vikram Sarabhai Space Centre, where launch vehicles are developed, and of the Liquid Propulsion Systems Centre at Valiamala. Option C, Ahmedabad, is the home of the Space Applications Centre and of the Physical Research Laboratory founded by Vikram Sarabhai. Option D, Sriharikota in Andhra Pradesh, is the Satish Dhawan Space Centre, the launch site, and Gaganyaan will lift off from there even though the programme is directed from Bengaluru.

The correct answer is C, four. The PSLV is unusual in alternating propellants between its stages: the first and third stages burn solid propellant and the second and fourth burn liquid propellant. The liquid fourth stage can be restarted and throttled, which is what lets the vehicle drop satellites into more than one orbit on the same flight.

Option B, three, is the number of stages in GSLV Mk II and in LVM3, and is the answer candidates give when they mix the vehicles up. Option A, two, matches no Indian orbital vehicle. Option D, five, is closer to the Augmented Satellite Launch Vehicle, which is counted as a five-stage rocket because of its strap-on boosters. Note that the six strap-on motors on the larger PSLV versions are not counted as a separate stage, since they burn alongside the first stage.

The correct answer is C, fourth. The Soviet Union was the first to place a craft gently on the lunar surface, the United States followed, and China became the third. India joined them on 23 August 2023 with the landing of the Vikram lander of Chandrayaan 3. India also became the first country of any to land in the south polar region, which is the separate record often asked in the same paper.

Option A, second, and option B, third, understate the position and belong to the United States and China. Option D, fifth, overstates it. Keep the two claims apart in memory: fourth country to soft land anywhere on the Moon, and first country to land near the lunar south pole. A question may test either, and the wording will tell you which.

The correct answer is B, Kalpana-1. Launched in 2002 as METSAT, it was the first Indian satellite built only for weather work, and it was renamed Kalpana-1 in memory of Kalpana Chawla, the India-born astronaut who died in the Columbia accident of 2003. Its instruments watched cloud cover, water vapour and sea surface temperature for cyclone warning.

Option A, INSAT-1B of 1983, carried meteorological instruments but was primarily a communication satellite, which is the distinction the word exclusively tests. Option C, Bhaskara-2, belonged to the early experimental earth observation series of 1979 and 1981. Option D, Oceansat-1 of 1999, studied the sea, its colour and winds over it, so it is an ocean rather than a weather satellite. The later dedicated weather satellites in this line are the INSAT-3D series.

The correct answer is A, a half-humanoid robot. Vyommitra, a name built from vyom for sky and mitra for friend, is a half-humanoid robot developed by ISRO to fly on an uncrewed Gaganyaan mission. It has a head, arms and a torso but no legs, and it is meant to sit in the crew seat, monitor cabin parameters, operate switches and report back, so that the systems a human crew will depend on are tested first.

Option B is wrong because the cryogenic engines of the LVM3 have their own designations. Option C is wrong because mission control works from the ISRO Telemetry, Tracking and Command Network and the Mission Control Centre, not from anything called Vyommitra. Option D is wrong because the Indian crew's spacesuit is a separate development and carries no such name. Questions on this topic usually pair Vyommitra with the uncrewed test flights.

The correct answer is B, John McCarthy. The American computer scientist John McCarthy is called the father of artificial intelligence because he coined the term itself in his proposal for the Dartmouth summer research project of 1956, the meeting at which the field was born. He also created LISP in 1958, the language in which most early artificial intelligence work was written, argued for time sharing on computers, and received the Turing Award in 1971. Option A is wrong because Alan Turing is honoured as the father of computer science and of the Turing test, which asks whether a machine can be told apart from a person in conversation, but he did not name the subject. Option C is wrong because Blaise Pascal built the Pascaline, a mechanical adding machine, in the seventeenth century. Option D is wrong because Dartmouth is the college where the 1956 conference was held, not a person. Exam tip: McCarthy named artificial intelligence in 1956 and wrote LISP.

The correct answer is B, Shiv Shakti Point. The spot where the Vikram lander of Chandrayaan 3 touched down on 23 August 2023, in the high latitude region near the lunar south pole, was given this name shortly after the landing. The day of the landing was also declared National Space Day.

Option A, Tiranga Point, is the name given to the place where the Chandrayaan 2 lander came down in 2019, so it is a real lunar name and the sharpest distractor here. Option C, Jawahar Point, is the name of the place where the Moon Impact Probe of Chandrayaan 1 struck the surface on 14 November 2008. Option D, Sarabhai Point, is not a site name, although a lunar crater is named after Vikram Sarabhai. Three of these four names are genuine, which is what makes the question worth a careful reading.

The correct answer is B, Yuri Gagarin. The Soviet cosmonaut Yuri Gagarin orbited the Earth once aboard Vostok 1 on 12 April 1961, becoming the first human being in space. The day is now observed as the International Day of Human Space Flight, and the Russian training centre where Gaganyaan's astronaut-designates trained is named after him.

Option A, Neil Armstrong, was the first human to set foot on the Moon, during Apollo 11 in July 1969, which is a different first. Option C, Valentina Tereshkova, became the first woman in space in June 1963 aboard Vostok 6. Option D, Alan Shepard, was the first American in space, on a suborbital flight in May 1961, a few weeks after Gagarin, and later walked on the Moon with Apollo 14. Papers often mix the first in space with the first on the Moon.

The correct answer is D, a fresh lunar orbiter. Chandrayaan 3 was deliberately built without one, because the orbiter of Chandrayaan 2 was still healthy in lunar orbit and could relay the lander's signals to the Earth. Leaving out a new orbiter saved weight and cost and let the mission concentrate on the landing that had failed in 2019.

Option A is wrong because the mission did carry a propulsion module, which took the lander to lunar orbit and then remained there with a single instrument observing the Earth. Option B is wrong because the lander Vikram was the heart of the mission and made the soft landing on 23 August 2023. Option C is wrong because the six wheeled rover Pragyan rolled out of the lander and carried two spectrometers that confirmed sulphur and several metals in the lunar soil.

The correct answer is C, China. China launched Yang Liwei aboard Shenzhou-5 in October 2003, becoming the third country after the Soviet Union and the United States to send a human into orbit on its own rocket and spacecraft. China has since built its own space station, and its astronauts are called taikonauts.

Option A, Japan, and Option B, France, have sent astronauts to space, but always on Soviet, Russian, American or European missions, not on national crewed spacecraft. Option D, India, has not yet flown a crewed mission of its own; Gaganyaan is intended to be that first flight, and Rakesh Sharma's 1984 flight was on a Soviet spacecraft. The question tests independent capability, not whether a citizen of the country has ever been to space.