23 Feb 2021: PIB Summary & Analysis

February 23rd, 2021, PIB:- Download PDF Here

TABLE OF CONTENTS

1. Intensified Mission Indradhanush (IMI) 3.0
2. National Urban Digital Mission (NUDM)
3. Cadmium (Cd) doped Silver Antimony Telluride

1. Intensified Mission Indradhanush (IMI) 3.0

Context:

States/UTs roll out Intensified Mission Indradhanush (IMI) 3.0.

About Intensified Mission Indradhanush (IMI):

• IMI 3.0. is a campaign aimed to reach those children and pregnant women who have been missed out or been left out of the Routine Immunisation Programme.
• The mission is under the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare (MoHFW).

Learn more about Intensified Mission Indradhanush in the link.

2. National Urban Digital Mission (NUDM)

Context:

The National Urban Digital Mission (NUDM) has been launched by the Ministry of Housing and Urban Affairs (MoHUA) along with the Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology.

About NUDM:

• The central government has launched the NUDM to create a digital infrastructure for cities in the country.
• According to the MoHUA, this will institutionalise a citizen-centric and ecosystem-driven approach to urban governance and service delivery in cities by 2022, and across all cities and towns by 2024.
• NUDM will create a shared digital infrastructure that can consolidate and cross-leverage the various digital initiatives of the Ministry of Housing and Urban Affairs, enabling cities and towns across India to benefit from holistic and diverse forms of support, in keeping with their needs and local challenges.

Additional Information:

The government also launched India Urban Data Exchange (IUDX) and the SmartCode Platform.

India Urban Data Exchange (IUDX):

• IUDX serves as a seamless interface for data providers and data users, including ULBs, to share, request, and access datasets related to cities, urban governance, and urban service delivery.
• IUDX is an open-source software platform which facilitates the secure, authenticated, and managed exchange of data amongst various data platforms, 3^rd party authenticated and authorised applications, and other sources.
• Significance:
  • IUDX is designed to address the problem of data silos, both within and across cities.
  • Cities generate large volumes of data, which are recorded by a wide range of entities, both within government and across industry, academia, and civil society.
  • The combination of these datasets can enable rapid innovation, as well as a better understanding of and planning for urban needs and challenges.
  • IUDX creates a secure and reliable channel for data producers or owners to share their data, with complete control over what is shared and with whom, in order to enable sharing while addressing security and privacy protections by design.
• IUDX has been developed in partnership between the Smart Cities Mission and the Indian Institute of Science (IISc), Bengaluru.

SmartCode Platform:

• SmartCode is a platform that enables all ecosystem stakeholders to contribute to a repository of open-source code for various solutions and applications for urban governance.
• It is designed to address the challenges that ULBs face in the development and deployment of digital applications to address urban challenges, by enabling cities to take advantage of existing codes and customising them to suit local needs, rather than having to develop new solutions from scratch.
• As a repository of open-source software, the source code available on the platform will be free to use without any licensing or subscription fees, thus limiting costs to those involved with customising the code and developing a locally-relevant solution.

3. Cadmium (Cd) doped Silver Antimony Telluride

Context:

New material converts waste heat to electricity for small home appliances & vehicles.

What’s in the news?

• Scientists have found a new Lead (Pb) free material which can efficiently convert waste heat to power our small home equipment and automobiles.

Background:

• Thermoelectric energy conversion allows generation of electrical voltage when one end of a material is heated while keeping the other side cold.
• Finding an efficient material to realize this scientific principle has been a daunting task for scientists.
• It entails fitting in three seemingly different properties into a single material – high electrical conductivity of metals, high thermoelectric sensitivity of semiconductors, and low thermal conductivity of glasses.
• Most efficient thermoelectric materials developed by scientists so far use Lead as a major constituent element, restricting their use for mass-market applications.

The Study:

• Scientists from Jawaharlal Nehru Centre for Advanced Scientific Research (JNCASR), Bengaluru, an autonomous institution of the Department of Science & Technology (DST), Government of India have now identified a lead-free material called Cadmium (Cd) doped Silver Antimony Telluride (AgSbTe2) which can efficiently allow recovery of electricity from ‘waste heat’ marking a paradigm shift in the thermoelectric puzzle.
• This work is supported by Swarna-Jayanti fellowship and project fund from Science and Engineering Research Board (SERB) and Department of Science & Technology (DST), India, along with support from New Chemistry Unit (NCU) & International Centre for Materials Science (ICMS), JNCASR, Bangalore.

Read previous PIB here.

February 23rd, 2021, PIB:- Download PDF Here