Science and Technology Mixed Practice — MCQs with Answers (Set 15)

The Fund is built from R&D cess collections, plus tax-deductible donations since the Finance Act, 1999.

TDB’s loans carry a simple interest rate of 5% per annum, well below typical commercial lending rates.

TDB funds the leap from a working lab process to a commercial-scale operation, for indigenous or adapted technology.

An external satellite signal is vulnerable to jamming or spoofing; White Rabbit runs over India’s own cables instead.

The initiative is framed under ‘One Nation, One Time,’ for a uniform, secure time standard across India.

Prof. Ganesan Karthikeyan, a cardiologist formerly at AIIMS Delhi, is THSTI’s current Executive Director. Dr. Rajesh Gokhale is DBT Secretary and BRIC’s Director General, a different real post; Dr. M.K. Bhan was THSTI’s founding visionary.

BRIC absorbed THSTI and 13 other DBT institutes in November 2023. BIRAC is a real, separate DBT body that funds biotech startups and industry, including through its RDI Fund, but it did not absorb THSTI.

SYNCHN’s 2025 edition reached 19 binding strategic agreements, up from 13 Letters of Intent in 2024. Its third edition, SYNCHN 2026, was held on 15 July 2026.

The Medical Research Centre’s CHIS facility is a first for India. The Centre also has an early-phase clinical trial unit and a CAR-T cell research unit, but not a manufacturing plant.

THSTI was established in 2009, envisioned by then-DBT Secretary M.K. Bhan to speed up the transition of lab research into real-world products. It celebrated its 17th Foundation Day on 15 July 2026.

His 1937 paper ‘Neutrons, Degeneracy and White Dwarfs’ built his reputation in statistical thermodynamics and astrophysics.

Kothari worked with Rutherford, Kapitza, and Fowler at Cambridge; Einstein was not part of that circle.

Sethna set up a thorium-extraction plant at Alwaye, Kerala, separating rare earths from monazite sand, and later oversaw a uranium mill at Jaduguda, Jharkhand.

Sethna received the Padma Vibhushan in 1975. He had earlier received the Padma Shri (1959) and the Padma Bhushan (1966).

Sethna, as AEC Chairman, gave Smiling Buddha its institutional and administrative leadership. Raja Ramanna led the direct scientific team at BARC that built the device — two different, complementary roles behind the same test.

Sethna became AEC Chairman in 1972, succeeding Vikram Sarabhai. Raja Ramanna succeeded Sethna himself in 1983.

In 1959, Sethna led the Plutonium Plant at Trombay as Project Engineer — the first such plant designed and built entirely by Indian engineers.

Siddiqi’s 1960s work was in microbial and bacterial genetics. From the 1970s, he pivoted to animal neurogenetics, using the fruit fly Drosophila — a genuine change in research field.

Siddiqi’s 1961 work with Alan Garen on nonsense-suppressor mutations contributed to discovering stop codons, the genetic-code signals that end protein-building.

Homi Bhabha invited Siddiqi to set up TIFR’s molecular biology unit in Bombay, in 1962.

From the 1970s, Siddiqi studied the fruit fly, Drosophila melanogaster, identifying mutants with broken genes for smell, taste, and nerve signalling.

VSSC is in Thiruvananthapuram, the Satish Dhawan Space Centre is at Sriharikota, and URSC is in Bengaluru.

The Department of Space (DOS) was created in 1972. ISRO has functioned under it ever since, and DOS reports directly to the Prime Minister.

ISRO traces its origins to 1962, when INCOSPAR (the Indian National Committee for Space Research) was set up. It was reconstituted as ISRO on 15 August 1969.

Degrees were conferred on 260 students, across the Integrated M.Sc., Integrated M.Sc.-Ph.D., M.Sc., and Ph.D. programmes.