1. Sex Reassignment Surgery

Context: Tamil Nadu has banned sex reassignment surgeries in children

About:

• Sex Reassignment Surgery (SRS), also known as Gender Reassignment Surgery (GRS) and several other names, is a surgical procedure (or procedures) by which a person’s physical appearance and function of their existing sexual characteristics are altered to resemble that socially associated with their identified gender.
• It is part of a treatment for gender dysphoria in transgender people.

2. Peacock Parachute Spider or Gooty Tarantula

Context: Researchers have sighted Peacock Parachute Spider (Gooty Tarantula) for the first time beyond its known habitat in the Eastern Ghats.

About:

• The species specie is endemic to India.
• It’s known habitat is in Eastern Ghats, in degraded forests near Nandyal in Andhra Pradesh.
• Now researchers have sighted it for the first time beyond Eastern Ghats in the Pakkamalai Reserve Forests near Gingee in Villupuram district, Tamil Nadu.
• Scientific Name: Poecilotheria metallica
• Common Name: Peacock Parachute Spider; Gooty Tarantula.
• The spider belongs to the genus Poecilotheria.
• IUCN Status: Critically endangered.

3. C-Sat-Fi Technology

Context: The Government has reiterated its commitment in providing Wi-Fi in all the villages through GramNet with high speed connectivity using C-Sat-Fi Technology.

About:

• C-Sat-Fi is based on the optimal utilization of wireless and satellite communication to extend connectivity to the unserved areas including the remote islands and difficult terrains.
• Besides offering the ease of deployment, the solution is ideally suited to addressing disasters and emergencies when no other means of communication are available.
• This cost-effective solution does not require expensive Satellite Phones and can work on any WiFi-enabled phone.

4. Smooth-Coated Otter

Context: CITES votes to ban trade in endangered otters

About:

• The Smooth-coated Otter is distributed throughout South Asia And South-East Asia.
• Its distribution is continuous from Indonesia, through south-east Asia, and westwards from southern China to India and Pakistan, with an isolated sub population in Iraq.
• Members at the CITES CoP 18 Conference have voted to move the smooth-coated otter (Lutrogale perspicillata) from CITES Appendix II to CITES Appendix I “because it is considered to be facing a high risk of extinction and is detrimentally affected by international trade, as well as habitat loss and degradation and persecution associated with conflict with people (and fisheries)”.
• IUCN Status: Vulnerable
• The otters are protected in India under Schedule II of The Wildlife (Protection) Act, 1972.