Daily News

• Scientists at Arthritis Research UK Epidemiology Unit found out in second week of November, 2012 about 14 new genes which cause rheumatoid arthritis. This adds to the already identified 32 genes which cause the disease. The discovery will help the scientists explore new treatments for this condition. Also, this discovery will help the scientists know why women are more susceptible to the disease than men.
• Micro Blogging site Twitter on 15 November 2012 launched a new service for Email Sharing of Tweets also known by one-to-many text messaging service.The new email service is now going to allow users to share their favorite Tweets via email. The Company is giving users the ability to share tweets beyond their list of followers on the social media site.Now,with the help of new service you can retweet any (Twitter messages) to your Twitter followers, but sometimes if you want to share with another group, like your college roommates or your parents or a friend who isn't yet on Twitter, You can simply do it with the help of this brand new service.
• A study led by Scientist and Evolutionary Anthropologist, Dean Falk of Florida State University revealed in the Month of October that the Physicist Albert Einstein's brain had an "extraordinary" prefrontal cortex - unlike those of most people which may have contributed to his remarkable genius.It was on Einstein's death in 1955 that his brain was removed and photographed from multiple angles with the permission of his family and was sectioned into 240 blocks from which histological slides were prepared.The researchers came to conclusion after studying 14 newly discovered photographs of Einstein's brain, which was preserved for study after his death. The research concludes that the brain was indeed highly unusual in many ways as it was compared to 85 "normal" human brains and, in light of current functional imaging studies, interpreted its unusual features.
• The Japanese Lower House of Parliament-the House of Representatives was dissolved on 16 November 2012, and paved the way ahead to general elections scheduled on 16 December 2012.Takahiro Yokomichi, the Speaker of the House of Representatives read out the imperial decree signed by Emperor Akihito to parliament, which proclaimed the dissolution of the government.Campaigns of the election scheduled for 16 December 2012 would start from 4 December 2012 and in case the ruling Noda’s Center-left Party Looses the election, Japan would get its seventh Prime Minister after many years.
• Ami Bera, 47, California-based, Indian-American has become the only 3rd of the community to win Congressional election, making it to US House of Representatives on 6 November, 2012 by defeating Republican Dan Lungren.On 6 November 2012, Bera had neck to neck competition with the opponent Lungren with just 184 votes lead. The lead increased to 3800 votes on 13 November 2012. Later, on 15 November 2012, it was announced by The Sacramento County Registrar of Voters that the lead of Bera had increased by 5696 votes or 2.2 percent. Gradually the lead widened and Bera won the seat to the House of Representatives.
• Australia on 16 November 2012 created the world's largest network of marine reserves, protecting more than 2.3 million square kilometres of ocean environment.The announcement came after years of planning and consultation. The Marine reserve created is going to expand the protection of creatures such as the blue whale, green turtle and the critically endangered populations of grey nurse sharks, and dugongs.The plan extension cover six marine regions and it was first made public in June 2012.Australia is home to some incredible marine environments which include the Perth Canyon in the south-west and the stunning reefs of the Coral Sea and by creating World’s largest Marine Reserve is becoming a world leader on environmental protection.
• Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist and writer Katherine Boo on 14 November 2012won the national book award for nonfiction for Behind the Beautiful Forevers: Life, Death, and Hope in a Mumbai Undercity, which sheds light on the lives of India's poor as well as government corruption.Behind the beautiful forever is a story of an ambitious woman who has set her sights on being slumlord in Annawadi, a large slum close to Sahar International Airport in Mumbai the story also revolves around a boy and the harsh and illuminating after effects of crime or perceived crime. More broadly, the book explores themes of inequality and the perseverance of families striving for something better.
• Savita Halappanavar a woman of Indian Origin and dentist by profession died on 28 October 2012 in Ireland after doctors refused to perform an abortion. The doctors denied the abortion with a claim that Ireland was a Catholic Country.Savita the Indian dentist was suffering from miscarriage when she was 17 weeks pregnant and the Irish law at the University College Hospital Galway denied abortion to her. This led to septicemia (blood poisoning), multiple organ failure leading to her death.According to the Person Act 1861 of Irish Law on abortion and offences, abortion has is considered illegal in the country. This denial on abortion that took life of Savita created a widespread outrage, to make the Irish Government take a clear stand on Irish Laws on Abortion.
• Goldman Sachs, the international financial services giant, promoted 16 Indians as the Managing Directors in the second week of November. Three other Indians were named partners at Goldman Sachs Group.US-based group named 70 executives as the partners and 266 as the MDs and they will be holding positions starting from 1 January 2013. The three Indian partners are named Gaurav Seth, Vivek Bantwal and Amol Naik. The new partners will be based in America.
• The Vice President of India M. Hamid Ansari on 16 November 2012 presented the Moortidevi Award for 2010 to eminent Urdu scholar Gopi Chand Narang for his outstanding work on Urdu Ghazal aur Hindustani Zehan wa Tehzeeb at a function organized by Bhartiya Jnanpith.Gopi Chand Narang revived Urdu language in India through his writings and he is one of the foremost theorist, literary critic and Urdu scholar of our country. His perceptive writings have helped Urdu criticism becoming more contemporary.It is befitting that his long academic life of excellence has been felicitated by conferring the Moortidevi award on him.
• India and Japan signed an Earths Pact on 16 November 2012 that will enable the latter to import the rare Earth minerals from India. These rare minerals are very important for the Tech-savvy industries of Japan. The pact came as a conclusion despite postponement of India-Japan annual summit.As per the signed pact, Japan will be able to import 4000 tonnes rare Earth minerals for a year from India. By signing the pact, Japan has branched out its supply from China for metals which are used in their industries.Japan now hopes that the pact will reduce its dependency on China for these rare minerals. It is important to note here that Japan is in tiff on the issue of Senkaku islands with China.
• Apart from this, India-Japan also signed a social security pact. These two pacts which were destined to come into force on the now-cancelled Indian PM’s trip were reinforced in Japan.
• The Shiv Sena Supremo Balasaheb Keshav Thackeray died on 17 November 2012 at the age of 86. He is survived by his wife Mina and two sons Jaidev Thackeray and Uddhav Thackeray- who serves as the executive President of the Party, Shiv Sena. He died of the cardio-respiratory arrest after suffering a long illness at his residence Matoshree, in Mumbai.
• Balasaheb Keshav Thackeray was an Indian Politician, who founded Shiv Sena a Political Party based in Mumbai, Maharashtra in the year 19 June 1966. Before turning up to politics, he was a cartoonist by profession with an English daily newspaper in Mumbai, named the Free Press Journal. His cartoons were also published in the Times of India. He resigned from the Free Press Journal in 1960 and founded his own political weekly, named Marmik. He also founded Samana, the Marathi language newspaper and the Dophar ka Samna a Hindi newspaper.His house at Bandra, Mumbai is famous with the name Matoshree.Balasaheb was a leading face in the fight named Samyukta Maharashtra movement (United Maharashtra movement); to make Mumbai a place for Maharastrians that was witnessing the influence of South Indians, Gujaratis and Marwaris.
• Tobacco Board on 16 November 2012 launched the first tobacco e-auctioning platform located at Periyapatna in Mysore district in Karnataka.The Tobacco Board plans to introduce e-auctioning in all the 11 auction platforms in Karnataka by the by the end of November 2012.
• The e-auctioning system is going to provide farmers an assured and remunerative price for their crop through a transparent bidding process.Although earlier farmers were getting remunerative prices in the manual auctioning system and receiving assured payments in time, there were certain disadvantages such as cartelisation of trade, discrimination in the allotment of bales, price ceiling, and errors in recording the price and weight. To curb such malpractices and to ensure transparency in the bidding process, it was decided to go for e-auctioning.