• The 13th Conference of Parties (COP) of the Convention on the Conservation of Migratory Species of Wild Animals (CMS) (also called as the BONN Convention), an environmental treaty under the aegis of United Nations Environment Programme, is going to be hosted by India during 17th to 22nd February 2020 at Gandhinagar in Gujarat.
• As the host, India shall be designated the President for the next three years.
• The Government of India is Signatory to the Convention on Conservation of Migratory wild Animals (CMS) since 1983.
• The Government of India has been taking necessary actions to protect and conserve migratory marine species.
• Seven species that include Dugong, Whale Shark, Marine Turtle (two species), have been identified for preparation of Conservation and Recovery Action Plan.
• The theme of CMS COP13 in India is, “Migratory species connect the planet and we welcome them home”.
• “The CMS COP 13 logo is inspired by ‘Kolam’, a traditional artform from southern India.
• In the logo of CMS COP-13, Kolam art form is used to depict key migratory species in India like Amur falcon, humpback whale and marine turtles.
• The mascot for CMS COP13, “Gibi - The Great Indian Bustard” is a critically endangered species which has been accorded the highest protection status under the Wildlife Protection Act, 1972.

Flyway

• A flyway is a geographical region within which a single migratory species, a group of migratory species – or a distinct population of a given migratory species – completes all components of its annual cycle (breeding, moulting, staging, non-breeding etc.)

Central Asian Flyway (CAF)

• It covers areas between the Arctic and Indian Oceans, and covers at least 279 populations of 182 migratory water bird species, including 29 globally threatened species.
• The Indian sub-continent is also part of the flyway network.

• India is home to several migratory species of wildlife including snow leopard, Amur falcons, bar headed Geese, black necked cranes, marine turtles, dugongs, humpbacked whales, etc. and has signed non legally binding MOU with CMS on the conservation and management of Siberian Cranes (1998), Marine Turtles (2007), Dugongs (2008) and Raptors (2016).
• Migratory species of wild animals move from one habitat to another during different times of the year, due to various factors such as food, sunlight, temperature, climate, etc. The movement between habitats, can sometimes exceed thousands of kilometers/miles for some migratory birds and mammals.
• A migratory route will typically have nesting sites, breeding sites, availability of preferred food and requires the availability of suitable habitat before and after each migration.

• A team of scientists is preparing to dive deep into the depths of the Indian Ocean — into a “Midnight Zone” where light barely reaches but life still thrives.
• Scientists from the British-led Nekton Mission plan to survey wildlife and gauge the effects of climate change in the unexplored area.
• Working with the Seychelles and Maldives governments, the five-week expedition is targeting seamounts — vast underwater mountains that rise thousands of meters from the sea floor.
• To explore such inhospitable depths, Nekton scientists will board one of the world’s most advanced submersibles, called “Limiting Factor”.

• “Midnight Zone” (Bathypelagic Zone) – It is a zone where light barely reaches but life still thrives.
• The ocean's midnight zone is a region between one and four kilometres deep, where no sunlight at all penetrates the frigid water.
• With no light, there is no growth of plants or phytoplankton - all animals are thus predators or scavengers.

• Recently, a British Airways flight broke the subsonic speed record during its New York-to-London journey, surpassing the previous record by 17 minutes, and completing the trip 80 minutes sooner than estimated.
• The Boeing 747-436 plane was able to achieve a speed of 1,327kph as it was aided by a strong jet stream generated due to Storm Ciara.
• Jet streams are narrow bands of strong winds that flow over thousands of kilometres from west to east.
• Major jet streams are found near the upper levels of the atmosphere, around 9 to 16 km from the earth’s surface, and can reach speeds of over 320 kph.
• Shifting jet stream patterns can have a big impact on the weather.
• Jet streams are stronger in winter in the northern and southern hemispheres, because that's when air temperature differences that drive them tend to be most pronounced.
• The polar-front jet stream forms at about 60 degrees latitude in both hemispheres, while the subtropical jet stream forms at about 30 degrees.
• The major jet streams are the Polar Front, Subtropical, and Tropical jet streams.
• In India, the Tropical jet stream influences the formation and duration of the summer monsoon.

• Recently, the Solar Orbiter, a collaborative mission between the European Space Agency and NASA to study the Sun, took off from Cape Canaveral in Florida.
• The mission, which will take the first pictures of the top and bottom of the sun, was launched on an Atlas V rocket.
• It will chart the Unexplored Polar Regions of the Sun.
• Carrying 4 in-situ instruments (which measure the space environment immediately around the spacecraft like the sense of touch) and 6 remote-sensing imagers (which see the sun from afar), the Solar Orbiter (called SolO) will face the sun at approximately 42 million kilometres from its surface.
• The new spacecraft will use the gravity of Venus and Earth to swing itself out of the ecliptic plane, passing inside the orbit of Mercury, and will be able to get a bird’s eye view of the sun’s poles for the first time.

• In its mission to Mars, NASA is sending a new laser-toting robot as one of seven instruments aboard the Mars 2020 rover.
• It is called SuperCam, the robot is used for studying mineralogy and chemistry from up to about 7 metres away.
• It might help scientists find signs of fossilised microbial life on Mars.
• It fires a pulsed laser beam out of the rover’s mast to vaporise small portions of rock from a distance, providing information that will be essential to the mission’s success.
• SuperCam looks at rock textures and chemicals to find those that formed or changed in water on Mars long ago.
• SuperCam looks at different rock and soil types to find ones that could preserve signs of past microbial life on Mars if any ever existed.
• For the benefit of future explorers, SuperCam identifies which elements in the Martian dust may be harmful to humans.

• Recently, a 12 year old Mumbai Girl becomes youngest to climb Mt Aconcagua.
• At 6962 metres, Mt. Aconcagua is the highest peak outside Asia and the highest peak in South America.
• It is the part of the Andes mountain range, located in Argentina.
• The Andes Mountains were formed as the result of subduction of the oceanic Nazca Plate under the South American continent.
• Aconcagua used to be a volcano, when the oceanic plate dipped at a higher angle under the continent.

• Guru Ravidas Jayanti was celebrated on 9th February.
• He was a North Indian mystic poet of the Bhakti Movement.
• His birth is believed to be in 1377 C.E.
• Guru Ravidas Jayanti is celebrated on Magh Purnima, which is the full moon day in the Hindu calendar month of Magha.
• The Adi Granth of Sikhs and the Panchvani are the 2 of the oldest documented sources of  literary works of Guru Ravidas.
• He is believed to be a disciple of the bhakti saint-poet Ramananda and a contemporary of the bhakti saint-poet Kabir.
• One of his famous disciples was the saint Mirabai.
• His teachings resonated with the people, leading to a religion being born called the Ravidassia religion, or Ravidassia Dharam based on his teachings.
• He taught about the omnipresence of God and said that a human soul is a particle of God.
• He rejected the idea that people considered lower caste cannot meet God.
• He said in his teachings that the only way to meet God was to free the mind from the duality.