About Friedreich ataxia (FA):

• It is a rare, inherited disorder that causes progressive damage to the nervous system.
• The damage affects your spinal cord and the nerves that control muscle movement in your arms and legs.
• Cause:
  • It is caused when a gene called FXN becomes mutated.
  • The FXN gene codes for a protein called frataxin. Frataxin is essential for mitochondria, which are our cells’ powerhouses.
  • The chemical ATP, which is the cell’s energy currency, is made mostly in the mitochondria.
  • Nerve, spinal cord, brain, and heart muscle cells use a lot of energy.
  • When their frataxin levels become abnormally low, the mitochondria produce ATP less effectively and also accumulate toxic by-products.
  • This renders the cell dysfunctional, leading to the symptoms of FA.
  • Individuals who inherit two defective copies of the FXN gene, one from each parent, will develop the disease.
  • A person who inherits only one abnormal copy of the gene is called a carrier.
  • Most of the affected individuals come from consanguineous marriages. That is, marriages between relatives, such as uncles and nieces, or between cousins.
• Treatment:
  • There is currently no cure for FA.
  • Treatment focuses on easing symptoms and maintaining comfort and function for as long as possible.

About Mount Elbrus:

• Located in Southern Russia, Mount Elbrus is the highest peak of the Caucasus Mountains.
• Mount Elbrus is the world’s 10^th most prominent peak as well as the highest mountain peak in both the European continent and Russia.
• It is one of the Seven Summits of the world, which are the tallest mountains on each of the seven continents.
• Mount Elbrus is an inactive volcano that consists of two principal summits, both of which are dormant volcanic domes. It is also Eurasia’s highest stratovolcano.
• Formation:
  • It is believed that the Caucasus Mountains were formed due to the northward collision of the Arabian Plate with the Eurasian Plate.
• Major Glaciers: Bolshoi Azaou and Irik Glacier.
• Many Russian rivers like the Baksan, Malka, and Kuban rivers originate from these glaciers.

About Mahadayi River:

• The Mahadayi River, also known as the Mandovi or Mhadei River, is a rain-fed river shared between Karnataka and Goa.
• Course:
  • It originates from the Bhimgad Forest in the Western Ghats, located in the Belagavi district of Karnataka.
  • It flows westward to join the Arabian Sea at Panaji, Goa.
• Panaji, the state capital, and the town of Old Goa are situated on the left bank of the Mandovi River.
  • Near the town of Old Goa, there are three large freshwater islands, Divar, Chorao, and Vashee, in the Mandovi River. The island of Chorao houses Salim Ali Bird Sanctuary.
• It has several tributaries, namely Rogaro, Kushavati, Nanorem, Nanuz, Valvota, and Mapusa.
• The river is central to a decades-long dispute between Karnataka and Goa, primarily over Karnataka’s plans to divert water from the Kalasa and Bhandura tributaries to the Malaprabha basin for drinking water needs.
• The Mahadayi Water Disputes Tribunal (MWDT) in 2018 allocated 13.42 tmc (380 Mcum) of water to Karnataka, including permissions for limited diversion from the Kalasa (1.72 tmc) and Bhandura (2.18 tmc) streams.

About New Development Bank (NDB):

• The New Development Bank (NDB), formerly known as the BRICS Development Bank, is a multilateral development bank established by Brazil, Russia, India, China, and South Africa (BRICS).
• Objective: NDB aims to mobilize resources for infrastructure and sustainable development projects in BRICS countries and other emerging economies and developing countries.
• The agreement for establishing the NDB was signed during the BRICS Summit held in Fortaleza, Brazil, on July 15, 2014.
• The bank became operational in 2015 and is headquartered in Shanghai, China, with a regional office in Johannesburg and additional offices later opened in São Paulo and Moscow.
• Membership in NDB is open to any member of the United Nations.
• NDB’s key areas of operation include clean energy and energy efficiency; transport infrastructure; water and sanitation; environmental protection; social infrastructure; and digital infrastructure.
• Capital: Its founding capital was set at USD 100 billion, with initial subscribed capital of USD 50 billion divided equally among the five founding members.
• Governance Structure:
  • The bank is governed by a Board of Governors made up of the finance ministers of the five BRICS countries, and a Board of Directors.
  • Both the presidency and vice-presidency of the NDB are rotated among BRICS founding members.
  • Unlike in the case of the World Bank or Asian Development Bank (ADB), each member in the NDB has an equal voting power.

About Earthquake Swarm:

• Occurrence: It occurs when multiple seismic events of comparable intensity strike a small area in relatively quick succession.
• Intensity: It involves a series of many (sometimes thousands) low-intensity earthquakes without a discernible main shock that can occur over weeks in active geothermal areas.
• When seismic energy piles up inside the Earth and is released in small amounts from certain points, such a series of earthquakes can occur.

What Causes Swarm Sequences?

• Fluid movement:
  • In volcanic environments, this can be fluid released from deeper magma or circulating within active geothermal areas (in volcanic areas such as the Taupō Volcanic Zone).
  • The earthquakes triggered by fluids occur as fault slip on the cracks and faults through which the water is moving.
• Active volcanism:
  • Magma movement can also act as the ‘driving mechanism’ for swarms, creating the earthquakes as magma-filled cracks push their way through the Earth’s crust.
  • In such a case the earthquakes commonly occur near the crack tip (ahead of the magma where the crack is starting to open), or off to the side of the crack.
• Slow-slip events:
  • A slow-slip event is essentially an earthquake in slow-motion, and typically involves centimetres to tens of centimetres of movement along a fault, over weeks to years.
  • It is seen at the Hikurangi subduction zone, usually at least one or two per year.

About Hara Mangrove Forest:

• Location: The Hara forests are a vital ecological treasure of the Persian Gulf, spanning the Strait of Hormuz.
• These mangrove forests consist mainly of grey mangrove trees (Avicennia marina).
• They have a special filtration system in their roots that allows them to thrive in saline conditions.
• The forests are designated as a UNESCO Biosphere Reserve.
• Ecological Role:
  • The same roots also protect the coast against erosion and are voluminous carbon sinks, sequestering significantly more carbon than terrestrial forests.
  • They serve as an important nursery for marine life as they shelter shrimp, crabs, and numerous fish species that sustain the region’s fisheries.
  • The Hara forests’ canopy is also a major migratory hub for birds like the great stone-curlew and various herons.
  • The mangroves are the backbone of the sustainable tourism programmes of Qeshm, an Iranian island in the Persian Gulf, and draw visitors to their labyrinthine waterways.

About Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope:

• It is NASA’s flagship orbital observatory.
• It is designed to settle essential questions in the areas of dark energy, exoplanets, and infrared astrophysics.
  • Scientists by using this telescope will focus on three main topic areas: dark energy, exoplanets, and dark matter.
• It will provide one of the deepest-ever views into the heart of our Milky Way galaxy.
• It will orbit around a special place in space called the second Sun-Earth Lagrange point, or L2. 
• Objectives: It will monitor hundreds of millions of stars in search of tell-tale flickers that betray the presence of planets, distant stars, small icy objects that haunt the outskirts of our solar system and isolated black holes.
• It will have two instruments:
  • Wide Field Instrument:
    • It is a 300-megapixel infrared camera.
    • It will have a field of view that is 100 times greater than the Hubble infrared instrument, capturing more of the sky with less observing time.
    • It will measure light from a billion galaxies over the course of the mission lifetime.
    • It will perform a microlensing survey of the inner Milky Way to find ~2,600 exoplanets.
  • Coronagraph Instrument:
    • It is a technology demonstration which will perform high contrast imaging and spectroscopy of individual nearby exoplanets.
    • Its Galactic Bulge Time-Domain Survey will focus on the Milky Way.

About SAFTA:

• It is the free trade arrangement of the South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation (SAARC).
• Background: The agreement came into force in 2006, succeeding the 1993 SAARC Preferential Trading Arrangement.
• SAFTA signatory countries: Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Bhutan, India, Maldives, Nepal, Pakistan and Sri Lanka.
• SAFTA recognizes the need for special and differential treatment for LDCs in its preamble.
• Objective: The Objectives of this Agreement are to promote and enhance mutual trade and economic cooperation among Contracting States by, inter-alia:
  • Eliminating barriers to trade in, and facilitating the cross-border movement of goods between the territories of the Contracting States;
  • Promoting conditions of fair competition in the free trade area, and ensuring equitable benefits to all Contracting States, taking into account their respective levels and pattern of economic development;
  • Creating effective mechanism for the implementation and application of this Agreement, for its joint administration and for the resolution of disputes.
  • Establishing a framework for further regional cooperation to expand and enhance the mutual benefits of this Agreement.

About National Consumer Dispute Redressal Commission:

• It is a quasi-judicial commission set up in 1988 under the Consumer Protection Act of 1986.
• Mandate: To provide inexpensive, speedy, and summary redressal of consumer disputes.
• The Commission is headed by a sitting or a retired Judge of the Supreme Court of India or a sitting or a retired Chief Justice of High Court.
• Jurisdiction: It shall have jurisdiction to entertain a complaint valued more than two crore and also have appellate and revisional jurisdiction from the orders of State Commissions or the District fora as the case may be.
• The provisions of this act cover ‘goods’ as well as ‘services’.
• Appeal: Any person aggrieved by an order of NCDRC, may prefer an appeal against such an order to SC within a period of 30 days.
• Its head office is located in New Delhi.
• A complaint may be filed by the following:
  • A consumer
  • Any voluntary consumer association registered under the Companies Act 1956
  • The Central Government or any State Government
  • One or more consumers where there are numerous consumers.