Set by Divij Ghose and Ipshita Paul

2. Torquest -16
Elims

3. Acknowledgments
This quiz is brought to you by the BCQC-COEP Quiz
Club.
Quiz set by Divij Ghose and Ipshita
Special thanks to Aman Shaikh, Mustafa Abbas,
Vrushabh Gudade, and Somaditya Kar for contributions
Huge shoutout to our admin team for the day Karan
Agarwal and Omkar Borate

4. Rules
21 Questions.
11-15 are two part questions, each part is worth a point.
Quizmaster is not God. We don’t need that
hypothesis.(Brownie points if you get the reference)
Quizmaster’s decision is final and binding tho.
Please switch off all electronic devices. Anyone caught
cheating or using a cell phone will be immediately
disqualified.

5. Q. 1
It is claimed that James Thomson, brother of Lord
Kelvin, who is known for his work on Water Wheels,
Pumps and Turbines introduced the term X in English
Scientific Literature. X is derived from a Latin word
which can mean "to twist or turn" and is also the
etymological root of words like distort & torture. X is
also a term used by historians to denote twisted metal
necklaces worn anciently. ID X

7. Q. 2
After the successful launch of SWAYAM, COEP's
Satellite initiative now plans to build and launch a solar
sail aircraft. Apart from the Japanese IKAROS, the only
other such spacecraft to be successfully deployed is
one developed by The Planetary Society, which is
currently headed by Bill Nye. Identify this spacecraft,
which derives its name from the fact that it uses
photons for propulsion.

9. Q. 3
Ramesh Raskar is a COEP alumni who has been working
in MIT Media Lab since 2007. He was in the news
recently for winning the prestigious Lemelson-MIT
prize. He developed a radical imaging system, a camera
which records at a trillion frames per second, using
laser pulses which last for 10−15 seconds. It is said to be
so detailed that it shows light itself in motion. What is
the name of this technology?

11. Q. 4
A ______ resistor is an electrical component made up
of two conductive surfaces separated by a dielectric
material, twisted 180° and connected. Once the ______
resistor is connected up in this way it effectively has
only one side and one continuous surface. It provides a
resistor that has no residual self-inductance, meaning
that it can resist the flow of electricity without causing
magnetic interference at the same time. FITB.(Image
follows)

13. Q. 5
FITB in this 1971 song called "Bitch" by The Rolling Stones –
"Yeah when you call my name
I salivate like a ______ ___
Yeah when you lay me out
My heart is beating louder than a big bass drum“
As a set, the blanks would include around 40 elements
including Bierka, Nalyot,Golovan,Arap and others

14. *Q. 6
This region, known as Tombaugh Regio, was in the news in
2015 owing to an event that was 9 years in the making. A
recent study published in the science journal Nature suggests
that its distinctive shape is to a large degree created by highly
volatile nitrogen ice that unavoidably accumulates in the basin
and forms a permanent reservoir of ice. The massive glacier
making up much of the region will change shape with time,
enlarging and shrinking.
Where would you find the Tombaugh Regio? And what
distinctive shape are we talking about?

15. Q. 7
Although Murphy's Law is a major theme in this movie,
something called the Kessler Syndrome is what sets the
plot in motion. Kessler predicted that by 2000, the
density of <deleted> would be so high that it would
lead to a domino effect like scenario of collisions,
rendering the use of <deleted> unfeasible for many
generations. This prediction ,however, proved to be
false, due to certain preventive measures.
Which movie?

16. Q. 8
________ Day is an international professional day
recognized in many technology companies. It is
celebrated on the 256th day of each year. The number
256 was chosen because it is the number of distinct
values that can be represented with an eight-bit byte.
256 is also the highest power of two that is less than
365, the number of days in a common year.
Mother Russia has made this a holiday by decree. FITB.

17. *Q. 9
X is a an airbreathing jet engine in which combustion
takes place in supersonic airflow. X engines have no
rotating parts, don't have to carry oxygen and operate
very efficiently at high speeds, which means they can
potentially make space travel much cheaper.ID X, a
technology which ISRO tested recently, thus making
India one of only 5 nations to possess this technology.

18. Q. 10
__________ is a genus of dinosaurs. Its fossilized bones
were discovered by the Geological Survey of India in
the Narmada Valley, hence the name of the species is
______ Narmadensis. It was named so because of an
unusual yet impressive crest on its head, which
resembles a <deleted>.
You may know this name from another reference. FITB.

19. Q. 11a
The 'A' line is the altitude that produces an
atmospheric pressure so low that water boils at normal
temperature of human body. It represents the altitude
beyond which humans can absolutely not survive in an
unpressurised suit i.e. pressure suits are required above
this altitude. Above earth, this altitude is about 18-19
KM.ID A

20. Q.11b
The 'B' line lies at an altitude of 100 kilometers (62 mi)
above the Earth's sea level, and commonly represents
the boundary between the Earth's atmosphere and
outer space. Around this altitude, the atmosphere
becomes too thin to support aeronautical flight,
because a vehicle at this altitude would have to travel
faster than orbital velocity to derive sufficient
aerodynamic lift to support itself. That is, this is the line
where aerodynamics stops and astronautics begins.
ID B

21. Q. 12a
This inorganic blue pigment, named after its constituent
elements, was accidentally produced by Prof. Mas
Subramaniam and his team when they were studying
electrical properties of Manganese Oxide in 2009. It was in
the news because of its vibrant, near perfect blue colour,
durability, safety and heat reflecting properties, making it a
"cool" colour. Commercial production of this pigment
started in 2016. Which pigment?

22. Q.12b
This is a substance made of vertically aligned nano tube
arrays of carbon, and is the blackest substance known,
absorbing upto 99.965% of radiation in the visible
spectrum. Initially developed for military and solar
energy purposes, this substance caused outrage among
artists because exclusive rights to use this colour were
given to Anish Kapoor. What is the name of this
substance?

23. Q. 13a
X was a brand of canned meat which became popular
during WW2, and is still ubiquitous in the US and the
territories it controlled in the Pacific. However, a Monty
Python sketch portrayed X as tasting horrible,
ubiquitous and inescapable, characteristics which led to
its name being borrowed for irrelevant, unsolicited
electronic messages, typically sent to a large number of
people. ID X.

24. Q. 13b
Y is email that has been subscribed to and is
therefore solicited, like news alerts, periodic
messages from e-merchants or social networking
sites, etc. The name is used to convey the fact
that "Y is much better than X, but not as good as
personal e-mail". ID Y

25. Tombstones of famous
scientists who contributed to
the field of thermodynamics.
ID

26. Q. 14a

27. Q. 14b

28. Q. 15a
Google Doodle celebrating whose birthday?

29. Q. 15b
_____ Logic is a form of many-valued logic in which the
truth values of variables may be any real number
between 0 and 1, considered to be _____, instead of
the "crisp" values of just 1 and 0. Introduced with the
1965 proposal of _____ set theory by Lotfi Zadeh, it
now finds applications in control theory (high speed
trains, helicopters, washing machines & vacuum
cleaners, etc.) and artificial intelligence. FITB

30. Q. 16
When Microsoft was porting several million lines of
code from 32-bit to 64-bit Windows, one particular
third party software which had been part of Windows
since Windows 95 developed a nasty bug which
rendered its "collision detector" defunct. Since the
code was completely uncommented and Microsoft
didn't have the resources to debug it, it was
discontinued in further versions. Which app?

31. Q. 17
In astronomy, an asterism is any pattern
of stars recognized in the Earth's night sky. It may be
part of an official constellation or it may be composed
of stars from more than one constellation. The Belgian
radio channel Studio Brussels and the MIRA Public
Observatory identified one such asterism in January,
but due to a misinterpretation, the news that there is a
new constellation soon went viral.
Who was the asterism dedicated to?

33. Q. 18
Created by Paul Bucheit, this web based service was initially
codenamed Caribou, borrowing the name of a mysterious
corporate project occasionally alluded to in Dilbert. Since it
was launched on 1st April, and considering the parent
company's history with pranks and the implausibility of
such a service at that time, it was considered by many to be
an April Fool's Day hoax. Which service, which is now the
dominant service in its field?

34. *Q. 19
There is a story about an Indian temple in Kashi Vishwanath which
contains a large room with three time-worn posts in it surrounded
by 64 golden disks. Brahmin priests, acting out the command of
an ancient prophecy, have been moving these disks, in accordance
with the immutable rules of the Brahma, since that
time. According to the legend, when the last move will be
completed, the world will end. If the legend were true, and if the
priests were able to move disks at a rate of one per second, using
the smallest number of moves, it would take them 264−1 seconds
or roughly 585 billion years or to finish, or about 127 times the
current age of the sun.
This is said to be the inspiration behind which mathematical
game?

35. *Q. 20
In 1854, the Broad Street area of Soho district in
London was hit by an epidemic. John Snow (yes, a real
person), a physician investigating the outbreak made an
important discovery, which went against the then
dominant "miasma theory". He persuaded local
authorities to remove the handle of a handpump, and
within days the outbreak died out. What was his
discovery?

37. Q. 21
Google, especially the Chrome team is known for their
witty error messages.
In Google Chrome, “He’s Dead, Jim!” is an error
message that lets you know that the tab has crashed.
Which character is this a reference/tribute to?