Science Day Quiz

SCIENCE DAY QUIZ

IISER MOHALI

PRELIMS
The rules(and most questions) are straight forward. Each correct answer gets you 1
point.
The questions numbered with multiples of 5 are ‘*’ marked. Hence, will be considered
in case of a tie.
Top 6 teams will be selected for the Finals.

1
__________ is an unofficial holiday celebrated among chemists and chemistry
students on October 23, between 6:02 AM and 6:02 PM.

6.02 X

23
10

AVOGADRO NUMBER

2
Jonas Edward Salk was an American medical researcher and virologist. He
discovered and developed the first successful inactivated X. In 1957, when the X was
introduced, ______ was considered the most frightening public health problem of the
post-war United States. Annual epidemics were increasingly devastating. The 1952
epidemic was the worst outbreak in the nation's history. Of nearly 58,000 cases
reported that year, 3,145 people died.
Identify X.

3

Tetrahedron

Cube

Octahedron

Dodecahedron

Icosahedron

In Euclidean Geometry, the _________ solid is a regular, convex polyhedron with
congruent faces with the same number of faces meeting at each vertex.
[not so helpful HINT: Named after a Greek philosopher]

4

Identify the Medal. It is honored for fundamental contributions to Mathematics. It is
handed out once in every four years, to a mathematician under the age of 40.
The inscription reads “ To transcend one’s spirit and to take hold of the world ”. The
person embossed is Archimedes ( No, its not Archimedes medal).

5*
Identify this Indian Physicist. He is known for his contributions to string theory. He also
received the 2012 Fundamental Physics Prize, an endowment worth around 3 million
USD.

6
After an accidental meeting between Jamsetji Tata and Swami Vivekananda on a
ship in 1893 where they discussed Tata's plan of bringing the steel industry to India,
Tata wrote to Vivekananda five years later:

“ I trust, you remember me as a fellow-traveler on your voyage from Japan to
Chicago. I very much recall at this moment your views on the growth of the ascetic
spirit in India... I recall these ideas in connection with my scheme of Research Institute
for India, of which you have doubtless heard or read ”
Which Institute is being talked about here?

7

Performed in 1908, X involved measuring the force on _________ in a glass chamber
sandwiched between two electrodes, one above and one below. With the electrical
field calculated, one could measure the ________’s charge, the charge on a single
electron calculated as 1.592×10-19 C. At the time, the existence of subatomic
particles was not universally accepted.

Identify this famous experiment.

MILLIKAN'S OIL DROP EXPERIMENT

8
The X is an equinoctial sundial, consisting a gigantic triangular gnomon with the
hypotenuse parallel to the Earth's axis. On either side of the gnomon is a quadrant of
a circle, parallel to the plane of the equator. The instrument is intended to measure
the time of day, correct to half a second and declination of the Sun and the other
heavenly bodies.
In the early 18th century, Maharaja Jai Singh II of Jaipur constructed five Xs in total
and they were completed between 1724 and 1735.

10*
A __________ = 6 feet or 1.8288 metres, is a unit of length in the old imperial
system, used especially for measuring the depth of water. It was originally based on
the distance between a man's outstretched arms.

It is also a common verb in the English language.

11
This is a picture of a football. It is made of 20 hexagons and 12 pentagons.
Chemistry Connect.

12
The name X in Greek means "fine, small, thin" and the earliest attested form of the
word is in the Mycenaean Greek.
X is the name of various fractional units of currency used in the Greek-speaking
world from antiquity until today. During Classical and Hellenistic times a X was
always a small value coin, usually the smallest available denomination of the
currency.
The term X was first used by physicist Léon Rosenfeld in 1948, who adopted the
denomination to denote a particle of small mass.

13
A ___________ is an instrument designed to indicate whether a surface is horizontal
(level) or vertical (plumb).
The instrument has a vial, common on most ordinary ________ today, has a slightly
curved glass tube which is incompletely filled with a liquid, usually a colored spirit or
alcohol, leaving a bubble in the tube. At slight inclinations the bubble travels away
from the center position, which is usually marked.
Alcohols such as ethanol are often used rather than water. Alcohols have low viscosity
and surface tension, which allows the bubble to travel the tube quickly and settle
accurately with minimal interference with the glass surface.

14
The area of a cyclic quadrilateral with sides p,q,r,s is given by:
𝐴=

𝑆− 𝑝

𝑆− 𝑞

𝑆− 𝑟

𝑆 − 𝑠 where S =

𝑝+𝑞+𝑟+𝑠
2

Identify the Ancient Indian Mathematician, who derived this result ?
[He is also famous for his insights into division by 0]

15*
Zbtb7 is a gene that may act as a master switch for cancer, and is responsible for the
proliferation of cancer throughout surrounding cells. The gene is unique in that it is
needed for other oncogenes to cause cancer.
Discovery of the gene was first published in the January 2005 issue of Nature. It was
originally called "POK erythroid myeloid ontogenic factor" but was renamed to
Zbtb7.

Why was it renamed ? (HINT: copyright violation)

Original name is an backronym of the Pokémon media franchise. A Nintendo
subsidiary, The Pokémon Company, not wanting the bad press inherent with its
trademark sharing a name with a cancer-causing gene, threatened the authors with
legal action in December 2005

16
There are 10 kinds of people in the world.
People who know binary numbers and _________________
Fill in the blanks. Who are these 10 kinds of people?

 Courtesy(xkcd comics)

PEOPLE WHO DON’T
10 = 2 in Binary number system.

17
The X are seven problems in mathematics that were stated by the Clay Mathematics
Institute in 2000. As of July 2013, six of the problems remain unsolved. A correct
solution to any of the problems results in a US $1,000,000 prize being awarded by
the institute.
The Poincaré conjecture was solved by Grigori Perelman, but he declined the award
in 2010.
State X.

18

The following verb was adopted by Macmillan Dictionary, in the aftermath of
something that happened in 2006.
[HINT: Astronomy]

19

The X experiment, performed in 1797–98 by British scientist X, was the first
experiment to measure the force of gravity between masses in the laboratory, and
the first to yield accurate values for the gravitational constant(G). Because of the
unit conventions then in use, the gravitational constant does not appear explicitly in
X’s work. Instead, the result was originally expressed as the specific gravity of the
Earth, or equivalently the mass of the Earth, and were the first accurate values for
these geophysical constants.

20*

What is this list ? [The timeline should help]

CHEMICAL WEAPONS USED IN FIRST WORLD WAR

Infinite Rebound I
Quotes

Differential
Infinite Rebound II

Finals

King of the Hill

INFINITE REBOUND I
There are 6 questions (General Science). Each carry 10 points ( No negatives).
Each successive question goes to the team numbered next to the team that answered.
If no team answers, we go back to the same team for the next question (privilege for
a max. of 2 questions).

1
Modern X mainly uses vermilion, which is an orange-red pigment. Vermilion is the
purified and powdered form of cinnabar, which is the chief form in which mercury
sulfide naturally occurs.

As with other compounds of mercury, X is toxic and must be handled carefully.
Sometimes, red lead (lead tetroxide) is added to X.
In early 2008, allegations of high lead content led the U.S. Food and Drug
Administration to recall batches of X from several manufacturers.

Unlike US, the use of X is a part of India’s Cultural identity.

2
Although named after Dutch astronomer X, the law was first accurately described by
the scientist Ibn Sahl at Baghdad court, when in 984 he used the law to derive lens
shapes that focus light with no geometric aberrations in the manuscript “On Burning
Mirrors and Lenses” .

3

What is this list ? There are 32 in total.

BLOOD GROUP SYSTEMS
In the "ABO" system, all blood belongs to one of four major groups: A+/-, B+/-,
AB+/-, or O+/-.
But there are more than two hundred minor blood groups that can complicate blood
transfusions. These are known as rare blood types. Whereas common blood types are
expressed in a letter or two, with maybe a plus or a minus, a smaller number of
people express their blood type in an extensive series of letters in addition to their
'AB-' type designation.

4
X, also known as acetylsalicylic acid with IUPAC name 2-acetoxybenzoic acid is a
salicylate drug, often used as an analgesic to relieve minor aches and pains, as an
antipyretic to reduce fever, and as an anti-inflammatory medication.

The active ingredient of X was first discovered from the bark of the willow tree in
1763 by Edward Stone of Wadham College, Oxford University. He had discovered
salicylic acid. X was first synthesized by Felix Hoffmann, a chemist with the German
company Bayer in 1897.

5

Equation of what? It’s a closed curve. (Famous logo of comics character)
• Courtesy (wolfram)

6

X (1816-1892) was a German inventor and industrialist. X’s name has been adopted
as the SI unit of electrical conductance(with symbol S). He was also the founder of the
electrical and telecommunications company X.

1
X (5 July 1996 – 14 February 2003) was a female domestic sheep, and the first
mammal to be cloned from an adult somatic cell, using the process of nuclear transfer.
She was cloned by Ian Wilmut, Keith Campbell and colleagues at the Roslin Institute,
part of the University of Edinburgh, and the biotechnology company PPL
Therapeutics near Edinburgh in Scotland, the United Kingdom. She was born on 5
July 1996 and died from a progressive lung disease 5 months before her seventh
birthday.
She has been called "the world's most famous sheep" by sources including BBC News
and Scientific American.

2
The X effect is a term referring to the apparently mysterious 'anecdotal' failure of
technical equipment in the presence of certain people. The term was coined using the
name of the Austrian theoretical physicist X.

Lacking an aptitude or interest in experimental work, many theorists have earned a
reputation for accidentally breaking experimental equipment. X was exceptional in
this regard, it was said that he was such a good theorist that any experiments would
self-destruct simply because he was in the vicinity. For fear of the X effect, the
experimental physicist Otto Stern banned him from his laboratory in Hamburg
despite their friendship.
Who ?

PAULI EFFECT
Wolfgang Pauli. Yes, the guy with the famous exclusion principle.

3
In Biology
In vivo- is experimentation using a whole, living organism.
In vitro- is experimentation in glass, with partial or dead organism.
In situ- means to examine the phenomenon exactly in place where it occurs
What does In silico mean?

PERFORMED ON COMPUTER OR VIA COMPUTER
SIMULATION

A forest of synthetic pyramidal dendrites grown in silico

SATELLITE NAVIGATION SYSTEM
NAVSTAR Global Positioning System: USA
GLONASS: Russia
BeiDou Navigation Satellite system: China
Galileo Navigation Satellite system: Europe

5
Which phenomena is being observed?

6

X (16 April 1838 – 26 May 1922) was a Belgian chemist, industrialist and
philanthropist.
In 1861, he developed the ammonia-soda process for the manufacturing of soda ash
(anhydrous sodium carbonate) from brine (as a source of sodium chloride) and
limestone (as a source of calcium carbonate). Its called the X process.

Above, is also the famous photograph of the fifth X conference in physics, attended
by many notable physicist like Einstein, Neils Bohr, Heisenberg etc.
Identify X.

“QUOTES”
You will be shown famous science quotes, make appropriate guesses.
This is more of a filler round. But, the points count.
For every correct answer, you credit 5 points. Write down the answer in the sheet
provided. Questions open to all.

1
“

Anybody who has been seriously engaged in scientific work of
any kind realizes that over the entrance to the gates of the temple
of science are written the words: ‘Ye must have faith’ ”

2
“ If I have seen further it is by standing on the shoulders of
Giants.”

3
“A mathematician is a blind man in a dark room looking for a
black cat which isn't there.”

4
“Science never solves a problem without creating ten more.”
HINT: Famous novelist and playwright, most notable work: Pygmalion.

1
“

Anybody who has been seriously engaged in scientific work of
any kind realizes that over the entrance to the gates of the temple
of science are written the words: 'Ye must have faith ”

DIFFERENTIAL
Each question carries 2N+5 points (N is the number of teams that did not
answer/answered wrong).
Write the answers in the sheets provided. Questions open to all.

1
Some have dubbed Dutch engineer Vic Hayes as the "father of X" due to his
involvement in negotiating the initial standards within the IEEE while chairing the
workgroup.

The Australian radio-astronomer John O'Sullivan developed a key patent used in X
as a by-product in a CSIRO research project, "a failed experiment to detect
exploding mini black holes the size of an atomic particle". In 1992 and 1996,
Australian organization CSIRO (the Australian Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial
Research Organization ) obtained patents for a method later used in X to "unsmear"
the signal.
X is now a commonplace thing.

2
At the University of Cambridge in England, a ‘X' is a student who gains first-class
honours in the third year of the University's undergraduate degree in mathematics.
The highest-scoring student is the Senior X, the second highest is the Second X, and so
on.
The rankings are communicated to each student privately. Therefore the names of
only some 20th-century Senior Xs (such as Crispin Nash-Williams, Christopher Budd,
Frank P. Ramsey, Donald Coxeter, Kevin Buzzard, Jayant Narlikar, Jacob Bronowski
and Ben J. Green) have become publicly known.

The name is also associated with a very famous garments(jeans) brand.

3
Charles Lutwidge Dodgson(27 January 1832 – 14 January 1898), is better known by
his pen name X, is a famous writer.
According to one popular story, Queen Victoria herself enjoyed his work Y so much
that she suggested he dedicate his next book to her, and was accordingly presented
with his next work, a scholarly mathematical volume entitled An Elementary Treatise
on Determinants. Of course, she was shocked.
Identify the author X and his famous work Y.

LEWIS CARROLL, ALICE IN WONDERLAND

4
Kalam observed a painting that was hung in the reception lobby of NASA, depicting
a battle scene in which rockets are being launched against oncoming troops. Kalam
took a closer look and realized that the painting was of a battle between X’s army
and colonial British troops on Indian soil.
X was the first to create Military grade rockets. Though the Chinese were the first to
invent rockets, X’s rockets were amazing with the use of iron casings, which allowed
the attainment of greater chamber pressures and accordingly, greater range. Some
of these rockets could fly 1000 yards.

Who is X? (He is also touted as the rocket man of India)

5
Clara Ma, won the NASA Essay contest in 2012.
What was this contest about (that made her famous)?

6

Three quarks for Muster Mark!
Sure he hasn't got much of a bark
And sure any he has it's all beside the mark.
But O, Wreneagle Almighty, wouldn't un be a sky of a lark
To see that old buzzard whooping about for uns shirt in the dark
And he hunting round for uns speckled trousers around by Palmerstown Park?
Hohohoho, moulty Mark!
You're the rummest old rooster ever flopped out of a Noah's ark
And you think you're cock of the wark.
Fowls, up! Tristy's the spry young spark
That'll tread her and wed her and bed her and red her
Without ever winking the tail of a feather
And that's how that chap's going to make his money and mark!
And that's how that chap's going to make his money and mark!

Above is a poem by James Joyce in his classic work Finnegans Wake.
Which important term in physics was adopted from this? [The rhyme scheme should help]

SPACE AGENCIES
POCKOCMOC: Russian Federal Space Agency
CSA: Canadian Space Agency
JAXA: Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency
CNSA: China National Space Administration
ESA: European Space Agency

8
Alkaloid theobromine is sometimes used as a drug to treat high blood pressure. Its
effects are similar to caffeine but on a smaller scale. However, it can be poisonous to
dogs as they metabolize this compound very slowly. What commonly enjoyed food
contains theobromine and thus should not be given to dogs?

9
On whose tombstone is it written,

“ He lies here, somewhere”

10
The New Delhi counter closed at 11:45 PM (14 July 2013) and the revenue collected
was Rs 68,837 as the country bid adieu to the harbinger of good and bad news for
generations of Indians.

The last ______ was sent to Rahul Gandhi.
What event are we talking about here?

KING OF THE HILL
This is the last obstacle you face.
The round has a rapid-fire format. There are six ballots, pick one.
You can answer a maximum of 6 questions in 50 seconds. Each question carries 5
marks.

Top

Strange

Up

Rapidfire
Charm

Down

Bottom

1
What are up, down, charm, strange, top and bottom?

2
Wilhelm Conrad Roentgen won this for the first time in 1901.What?

3
Who gave the structure of Benzene?

4
The type of cell division that produces eggs and sperms is called meiosis.
True or False?

5
What mathematical day is celebrated every year on March 14 (3/14)?

6
Spelunking is the study of ?

What are up, down, charm, strange, top and bottom?
Ans: Types of Quarks
Wilhelm Conrad Roentgen won this for the first time in 1901.What?
Ans: Nobel Prize
Who gave the structure of Benzene?
Ans: August Kekule

The type of cell division that produces eggs and sperms is called meiosis.
Ans: True
What mathematical day is celebrated every year on March 14 (3/14)?
Ans: Pi Day
Spelunking is the study of ?
Ans: Caves

1
What is the name of the star closest to the earth?

2
Fear of spiders is known as ‘acrophobia’.
True or False.

3
Which element is used in making the filament of an electric bulb?

4
Name the science fiction writer, who wrote the three laws of robotics.

5
What famous islands west of Ecuador were extensively studied by Charles Darwin?

6
Paleontology is the study of?

What is the name of the star closest to the earth?
Ans: Sun
Fear of spiders is known as ‘acrophobia’.
Ans: False (Arachnophobia)
Which element is used in making the filament of an electric bulb?
Ans: Tungsten

Name the science fiction writer, who wrote the three laws of robotics.
Ans: Isaac Asimov
What famous islands west of Ecuador were extensively studied by Charles Darwin?

Ans: Galapagos
Paleontology is the study of?
Ans: Prehistoric Life

1
In statistics, the middle value of an ordered set of values is called what?

2
Ornithology is the study of?

3
Mercury is the hottest planet in the solar system.
True or False.

4
Pure water has a pH level of around ____.

5
Name the Largest desert in the world.

6
A change of the DNA in an organism that results in a new trait is known as a
_______.

In statistics, the middle value of an ordered set of values is called what?
Ans: Median
Ornithology is the study of?
Ans: Birds
Mercury is the hottest planet in the solar system.
Ans: False (Venus)

Pure water has a pH level of around ____.
Ans: 7
Name the Largest desert in the world.

Ans: Antarctica
A change of the DNA in an organism that results in a new trait is known as a _______.
Ans: Mutation

1
Newton’s law states that action and reaction forces act on different bodies.
True or False.

2
Scattering of light by particles in a colloid or fine suspension is called __________
effect.

5
Who wrote the famous book ‘A brief history of time’?

6
Which is larger, the set of real numbers or the set of natural numbers?

Newton’s law states that action and reaction forces act on different bodies.
Ans: True
Scattering of light by particles in a colloid or fine suspension is called __________
effect.
Ans: Tyndall Effect
Entomology is the study of?
Ans: Insects
Expand CFC.
Ans: Chlorofluorocarbon
Who wrote the famous book ‘A brief history of time’?
Ans: Stephen Hawking
Which is larger, the set of real numbers or the set of natural numbers?
Ans: Real numbers

1
Rickets is caused by the deficiency of Vitamin __.

2
Special relativity states that speed of light is constant in all mediums.
True or False.

3
Boson is named after which Indian scientist?

4
Ernest Rutherford was awarded a Nobel prize in which field?

6
What is the latest Android OS ?

Rickets is caused by the deficiency of Vitamin __.
Ans: D
Special relativity states that speed of light is constant in all mediums.
Ans: False (Constant in all inertial frames)
Boson is named after which Indian scientist?
Ans: S.N.Bose

Ernest Rutherford was awarded a Nobel prize in _________.
Ans: Chemistry
Mycology is the study of?

Ans: Fungi
What is the latest Android OS ?
Ans: KitKat

2
Turing Prize is awarded in which field?

3
Elements with same atomic number and different mass numbers are called Isotopes.
True or False.

4
Light Sabers are weapons used in which movie series?

5
Which chemical is produced via the Haber’s process?

6
Which Indian woman was popularly known as the Human Computer?

Oncology is the study of?
Ans: Cancer
Turing Prize is awarded in which field?
Ans: Computer Science
Elements with same atomic number and different mass numbers are called Isotopes.
Ans: True

Light Sabers are weapons used in which movie series?
Ans: Star Wars
Which chemical is produced via the Haber’s process?

Ans: Ammonia
Which Indian woman was popularly known as the Human Computer?
Ans: Shakuntala Devi

CREDITS
Quiz Team: Ashish, Bharat, Prabhu, Panda and Srikanth (IISER Mohali Quiz Club)
We thank IISER M Faculty, Students and all Participants.
Other people who contributed : Harsh, Devwrat, Manas, Arul, Sumit.
We also thank Jimmy Wales, co-founder Wikipedia.

DEVWRAT DUBE
(Convener)
IISER MOHALI QUIZ CLUB – A Brighter Lamp

09646643326
MS11015@IISERMOHALI.AC.IN

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