Current Affairs Quiz - August, 2019

Notes:
The World Humanitarian Day (WHD) is held every year on 19 August to pay tribute to aid workers who risk their lives in humanitarian service, and to rally support for people affected by crises around the world. The 2019 WHD campaign – #WomenHumanitarians –honour the work of women in crises throughout the world. This year’s focus salutes the efforts of women humanitarian workers across the world who rally to people in need and are often the first to respond and the last to leave.

Notes:
Dr. K Thangaraj, Chief Scientist at the city based Centre for Cellular and Molecular Biology (CCMB) has bagged the prestigious J C Bose Fellowship for his outstanding scientific contributions in the field of population and medical genomics. The J C Bose fellowship is awarded to active scientists in recognition of their outstanding performance by the Science and Engineering Research Board, Department of Science & Technology. Dr Thangaraj is a population geneticist. Some of his major works includes finding out the origin of Indian population– how humans migrated from Africa during different episodes and populated different parts of India. These studies led to further work on understanding how these populations interbred. He also showed how in the last 2000 years Indians started practicing endogamy resulting in many population specific genetic disorders.

Notes:
Dr. Jagannath Mishra (82), the 3-times former chief minister of Bihar, has passed away in Delhi on August 19, 2019. He was known for sharp political acumen and bold decision-making, which he demonstrated during the peak of his career. Mishra was the last Congress chief minister of Bihar between December 1989 and March 1990. He also served as a Union minister in the P V Narasimha Rao cabinet. He was one of the most powerful leaders of the state in pre-Mandal politics who brought the infamous ‘Press Bill’ to curtail the freedom of the press. Currently, he was a member of Bhartiya Jan Congress (Rashtriya).

Notes:
Environmental NGO Greenpeace has recently released an analysis of a National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) Ozone Monitoring Instrument (OMI) satellite data. as per country-wise world rankings, India is the world’s largest emitter of Sulphur Dioxide (SO2) as it has the maximum hotspots. It contributes more than 15% of all anthropogenic SO2 hotspots in the world. The major SO2 emission hotspots in India are Singrauli in Madhya Pradesh, Neyveli and Chennai in Tamil Nadu, Talcher and Jharsuguda in Odisha, Korba in Chhattisgarh, Kutch in Gujarat, Ramagundam in Telangana and Chandrapur and Koradi in Maharashtra. According to report, the vast majority of plants in India lack Flue-Gas Desulfurization (FGD) technology to reduce their air pollution. Individually, the Norilsk smelter complex in Russia is the largest SO2 emission hotspot in the world, followed by Kriel in Mpumalanga province in South Africa and Zagroz in Iran. Singrauli in Madhya Pradesh is at 5th position.

Notes:
To mark the 75th birth anniversary of former Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi, the Punjab government has rolled out a mega health insurance scheme named ‘Mahatma Gandhi Sarbat Sehat Bima Yojana’. It will cover 76% of the state’s population. The scheme has clubbed with the Centre’s health insurance scheme titled ‘Pradhan Mantri Jan Arogya Yojana (PMJAY) for the poor. As per latest Socio Economic and Caste Census (SECC), Ayushman Bharat would have covered only 14.86 lakh families while the Punjab scheme in its new form, will benefit a total of 46 lakh families. Like the original PMJAY, the Punjab government will provide cashless health insurance cover of Rs 5 lakh per year. The Centre and the state government will bear the cost of the annual premium for 14.86 lakh families in the ratio of 60:40. For the remaining beneficiaries, the Punjab government will bear the entire expense.The Punjab scheme with 1,396 treatment packages will be implemented through over 450 empanelled hospitals, including 200 government hospitals.

Notes:
Rajiv Gauba, a 1982 batch IAS officer of Jharkhand cadre, has been appointed as the new Cabinet Secretary for two years. His tenure will be effective from August 30, 2019 & will succeed Pradeep Kumar Sinha. Gauba is currently posted as Union Home Affairs secretary. The Cabinet Secretary is the top-most executive official and senior-most civil servant of the Government of India (GoI). He works under the direct charge of the Prime minister.

Notes:
NITI Aayog has recently released report on the Composite Water Management Index 2.0 (CWMI 2.0) for reference year 2017-18 . Gujarat has been ranked first in the CWMI 2.0, followed by Andhra Pradesh, Madhya Pradesh, Goa, Karnataka and Tamil Nadu. In North Eastern and Himalayan States, Himachal Pradesh has been adjudged No. 1 in 2017-18 followed by Uttarakhand, Tripura and Assam. The Union Territories have first time submitted their data and Puducherry has been declared as the top ranker. In terms of incremental change in index (over 2016-17 level), Haryana holds No. 1 position in general States and Uttarakhand ranks at first position amongst North Eastern and Himalayan States. On an average, 80% of the states assessed on the Index over the last 3 years have improved their water management scores, with an average improvement of +5.2 points.

Notes:
The Jabalpur-based Tropical Forest Research Institute (TFRI) has launched a mobile phone application containing details about insects and pests and their management. The app “INSECT PESTS” is a tool that provides information on insect and pests found in various forest areas and their management in tropical forests of central India. The app contains information in three categories– insect and pests of forest nurseries, of plantations, of natural forest–and their management. The app also has various features to identify pests, their host plants, infestation period, the nature of damage, their brief life history and also the measures to control them. The TFRI works under the Indian Council of Forestry Research and Education (ICFRE) of the Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate Change.

Notes:
The researchers at the IIT-Hyderabad have derived collagen from discarded skin of eel (a snake like fish) by treating it with acetic acid, common salt and pepsin. It then combined the collagen with alginate hydrogel and used a 3D printing process to obtain scaffolds. They shown that tissue scaffolds built using such collagen allow growth and proliferation of stem cells. Thus, eel-skin derived collagen is a promising biomaterial for tissue engineering applications. The research was funded by the Central government’s Department of Science and Technology-Science and Engineering Research Board (DST-SERB) through the National Postdoctoral Fellowship Scheme (N-PDF). The practical applications of this research can lead to utilizing eel fish skin-derived collagen as a promising alternative to animal derived collagen, which are expensive and are associated with pathological diseases. Collagen is a protein found especially in the joints of humans and animals.

Notes:
The 4th edition of the Internet of Things (IoT) India Congress 2019 held in Bengaluru, Karnataka. The theme of Edition is ‘Mainstreaming the Internet of Things’. It is the India’s largest confluence of digital technology. The 2-day session focused on 10 tracks viz. Energy, Healthcare, Defence, Standards and Regulatory, Retail, Digital Communication, Skills and Development, Agriculture, Manufacturing and Smart Cities.