Last Six months Current affairs 2012-13 for sbi po exam

10. Prithvi-II missile test, a Success : The strategic Forces Command, which is in charge of

nuclear weapons, successfully fired the surface to surface Prithvi-II missile from Chandipur

in Odisha’s Balasore district on 25th August 2012, confirming yet again that the armed

forces are

capable of launching nuclear missiles independently.

11. China Military test fires 14,000km range missile : The china central television(CCTV)

reported that the china’s military had successfully tested the new 14,000 rang Dong feng-

41 Intercontinental Ballistic Missile (ICBM). It have the capacity to carry 10 nuclear war

heads.

12. Blue moon on 31st August 2012 : When a full moon appears in the night sky for the

second time in a calendar month ,it is called a ‘blue oon’.The next blue moon will occur on

July 31,2015.

13. In US, India’s First C-17 transport aircraft takes shape : Now the Indian Air Force is

planned to introduce a C-17 Globemaster III heavy lift military planes in place of old Cargo

planes for the next year June. So India made deal with Boeing for $410 crores in the last

year.C-17 has the capacity to fill oil in the air.

14. China developing new class of guided missile destroyer’ : The Chinese Navy is

developing a brand new class of guided-missile destroyer, a “new type” of naval warship

with upgraded air-defence missiles, anti-ship and anti-submarine missiles.The new

destroyers are equipped with two 32-unit vertical launch systems capable of launching HQ-

9B air-defence missiles, anti-ship and anti-submarine missiles.The new destroyer is

comparable to the “Aegis” equipped destroyers of the US Navy which use powerful

computers and radars to track and guide weapons to destroy enemy targets

15. Gliese 163C: New Earth-Like Planet Might Sustain Life : Dubbed Gliese 163C, the

planet is about seven times the mass of Earth and orbits a red dwarf, or a small, relatively

cool star. Gliese 163C is 49 light years away. It’s thought to be composed of mostly rock

and water and gets 40 percent more light from its parent star than Earth gets from the

sun, making it hotter with a surface temperature of 60 degrees Celsius.

16. Air India’s first Dreamliner landing at IGI Airport : After a four-year delay and

subsequent acrimony, the first of Air India’s advanced Boeing B-787 Dreamliner landing at

the Indira Gandhi International Airport on 08th September 2012.It is capable of flying over

15,000 km non-stop. For AI, the plane has been configured to have 256 seats — 18 fullflat

business class seats and 238 in economy.Air India, which ordered 27 Dreamliners six

years ago, will get two more in the next few weeks. A total of eight will arrive by March

2013.

17. PSLV-C21 delivers two satellites into their intended Orbits : The Indian Space

Research Organization(ISRO) successfully put into orbit two foreign satellites( French SPOT

6(712kgs) and Japanese micro Satellite(15kgs)) marking Indian space agency’s 100th

mission since the launch of the first satellite,Aryabhata,in 1975 by Russian rocket.

18. ISRO to launch SARAL satellite on 12 Dec 2012 : Indo-French satellite “SARAL” would

be launched onboard PSLV-C20 from the spaceport of Sriharikota on 12 December 2012

Indian Space Research Organisation Chairman K Radhakrishnan said at the Bangalore

Space Expo 2012 on 12th September 2012.

19. U.S.-Russian space crew lands safely in Kazakhstan : A Russian Soyuz capsule

landed on the Kazakh steppe on 17th September 2012, delivering a trio of astronauts from

a four-month stint on the International Space Station.

20. India tests Agni-IV n-missile : India successfully tested its nuclear-capable surface-tosurface

Agni-IV missile from a military base in Odisha on 19th September 2012.The new

generation missile, which has the capability to hit targets at about 4,000 km.

21. India test-fires N-capable Agni-III missile successfully : India on 21st September

2012 successfully test-fired its nuclear-capable Agni-III surface-to-air missile with a strike

range of over 3000 km and capable of carrying a warhead of 1.5 tonnes from the Wheeler

Island off the Odisha coast.

22. China launches its first aircraft carrier : China launched its first aircraft carrier on 25th

September 2012. The 60,000 tonne carrier, a former Soviet ship brought from Ukraine and

later refurbished locally is named ‘Liaoning’, after a Chinese province liberated from

Japanese occupation in 1945, in what can be seen as another symbolic warning to Tokyo.

The 300m long Liaoning carrier has the capacity to bring 3

23. NASA says Curiosity rover finds evidence of water on Mars : NASA scientist say the

Curiosity rover has found evidence of a “vigorous” thousand-year water flow on the surface

of Mars.

24. India’s heaviest satellite, GSAT-10 launched from Kourou launch pad in French

Guiana : India’s advanced communication satellite GSAT-10 was successfully launched on

board Ariane-5 rocket from Europe’s spaceport in French Guiana on 29th September

2012.This is the India’s heaviest satellite of 3,400kg weight.

25. Scientists discover bacteria that can produce 24-carat gold : Scientists have

discovered a bacteria that has the ability to withstand incredible amounts of toxicity and

can be the key to creating 24-carat gold.Researchers from the Michigan State University

have found that the metal-tolerant bacteria ‘Cupriavidus metallidurans’ can grow on

massive concentrations of gold chloride or liquid gold, a toxic chemical compound found in

nature.

26. India sucessfully test-fires Prithvi-II ballistic missile : On 4th October 2012 India

sucessfully test-fired surface-to-surface Prithvi-II ballistic missile from the Integrated Test

Range (ITR) in Chandipur of Balasore district off Odisha coast.

27. India successfully test-fires nuclear-capable Dhanush missile : A day after the

launch of Prithvi-II, India successfully test-fired nuclear-capable Dhanush ballistic missile

for its full range of 350 km from a naval ship off Odisha on 5th October 2012.

28. Australia launches world’s fastest radio telescope : In the remote Australian outback,

scientists have launched the world’s fastest radio telescope which will exponentially

increase astronomers’ ability to survey the universe, mapping black holes and shedding

new light on the origins of galaxies.The Australian Square Kilometre Array Pathfinder

(ASKAP), located near the region of Murchison about 650 kilometres north of Perth, was

officially opened 5th October 2012 by Science Minister Chris Evans.

29. Indian navy successfully test-fires BrahMos supersonic cruise missile : The Indian

Navy on 7th October 2012 successfully test-fired the 290-km range BrahMos supersonic

cruise missile, capable of carrying a conventional warhead of 300 kg, from a warship off

the Goa coast.

30. The Barcode Turns 60 Years Old : October 7, 2012 marks the 60th anniversary of the

registration of the first bar code patent. The original patent for what we know today as the

modern barcode was granted on October 7, 1952 to Norman Joseph Woodland and

Bernard Silver, its inventors.

31. New planet discovered in Earth’s backyard : Astronomers have found a new planet

called exoplanet in Alpha Centauri , the closest yet outside our solar system and just an

astronomical stone’s throw away at four light years.Alpha Centauri is a three-star system

consisting of two stars similar to our sun and a faint red star called Proxima Centauriand

another one is the Alpha Centauri B.The Exoplanet orbits Alpha Centauri B.

32. Indian diamond fetches 16.9 million euros at auction : A 76-carat flawless diamond

from India’s famous Golconda mines broke world record by fetching a whooping 16.9

million euros (Rs 1,18,16,98,700) at an auction in Geneva on 14 November 2012.

33. Scientists Created a Paper-thin material that can stop bullets : A team of

mechanical engineering and materials scientists from Rice University and MIT has created

special nanomaterials that were able to stop bullets in the lab. The type of material, called

a structured polymer compositecan actually self-assemble into alternating glassy and

rubbery layers.

34. Solar System’s largest planet discovered : A team of astrophysicists had discovered

an enormous gaseous planet that is 13 times more massive than Jupiter, earning the name

“Super-Jupiter “ and is the largest planet in our own solar system.

35. India successfully test fires supersonic interceptor missile : India successfully testfired

an indigenously developed supersonic interceptor missile, capable of destroying a

hostile ballistic missile, from a test range off the Odisha coast on 23 November 2012.

36. Drug that can halt cancer spread : Scientists was developed a new drug called

Aflibercept, for stop the cancer cells from multiplying.

37. Pakistan tests nuclear-capable ballistic missile : Pakistan successfully test-fired a

nuclear-capable ballistic missile called Hatf-V(Ghauri) on 28 November 2012 that can hit

targets up to 1,300 km (807 miles) away.

38. Astronomers Discovered Giant black hole in tiny galaxy : Astronomers claim to

have discovered the most massive black hole ever known in a small galaxy about 250

million light-years from Earth, holding a mass equivalent to 17 billion Suns.The supermassive

black hole is located inside the galaxy NGC 1277 in the constellation Perseus.It

makes up about 14 per cent of its host galaxy’s mass, compared with the 0.1 per cent a

normal black hole would represent, scientists said, adding that it has a mass equivalent to

17 billion Suns

39. Canadian Scientists Created Artificial Brain : Software engineers as well as

neuroscientists at University of Waterloo, Canada claimed that they have developed a

closest model of the functioning human brain, known as Spaun which is advanced enough

for passing the basic IQ tests. This is the virtual brain which functions on the

supercomputer and comprises of a digital eye, which can be used for visual input. It also

has the robotic arm which can be used for drawing the response.

40. Voyager 1 Drifts Into Unknown Region of Space : NASA’s Voyager 1 spacecraft has

discovered a new layer of the solar system that scientists hadn’t known was there,

researchers announced on 4 December 2012. Voyager 1, in particular, has entered a new

region of the heliosphere that scientists are calling a “magnetic highway,” which allows

charged particles from inside the heliosphere to flow outward, and particles from the

galaxy outside to come in.

41. New Anti-HIV Gel for HIV Transmission : Researchers led by Dereuddre-Bosquet from

the European Combined Highly Active Anti-Retroviral Microbicides (CHAARM) Consortium

describe the gel’s key ingredient, which are small peptides engineered to present a decoy

to bind up the virus and prevent it from entering and infecting the body cells. Because this

is a gel it can be topically applied and could represent a powerful preventative agent

against sexual transmission of HIV. Bosquet and colleagues engineered peptides named

‘miniCD4s’ because they mimic the CD4 receptor used by HIV to gain entry into immune

cells of the body.

42. NASA to Send New Rover to Mars in 2020 : NASA was announced plans to send a

new robotic explorer to the the Red Planet, Mars in 2020.

43. 7 Planets Discovered In The Milky Way : New York Scientists have been discovered

Seven planets in the Milky Way outside our solar system that could potentially harbour life

and researchers from an ambitious project to catalogue all habitable worlds claim.

44. Russia Delivered MiG-29 Fighter Jets to India : Russia on 10 December 2012

delivered the first three upgraded MiG-29UPG fighter jets to India under a USD 900

million contract to modernise the ageing fleet of MiG-29 aircraft with the IAF.

45. Tata Group Developed new “Artillery Gun” : On 11 December In a step towards

developing the indigenous private sector defence industry, the Tata group has created a

new Artillery Gun. The 155mm 52 calibre gun developed by the Tata group is likely to have

a strike range of 52 kms, which would probably be the longest in the Indian inventory.

46. India Successfully Test Fired Agni-I Ballistic Missile : India on 12 December 2012

successfully test-fired its indigenously developed nuclear capable Agni-I ballistic missile

with a strike range of 700 km from a test range off Odisha coast. Weighing 12 tonnes, the

15-metre-long Agni-I, which is capable of carrying payloads up to 1000 kg and destroy

the targets at a distance of 700 km.

47. North Korea Launched Unha-3 Rocket : On 12 December North Korea launched a

long-range rocket Unha-3 despite international opposition and growing tensions in the

region successfully delivering a scientific satellite Kwangmyongsong-3 into orbit.Unha-3 is

the second version of satellite Kwangmyongsong-3 which is successfully lifted off from the

Sohae Space Center by carrier rocket.The US and its allies view the launch as a disguised

test of ballistic missile technology.

48. NASA’s Twin Probes Crashed Successfully onto Lunar Mountain : Ebb and Flow, the

gravity mapping satellites of NASA ended the successful mission to Moon by crashing on

the rim of crater. Lunar surface on which Ebb and Flow crashed will be given a name after

Sally Ride, the first woman of America in the space who died earlier in 2012.

49. Rocket with 3 Astronauts Takes off for ISS : A Soyuz spacecraft carrying three

astronauts took off atop a towering Russian rocket on 19 December 2012, headed for the

International Space Station.It launched from Russia’s manned-space facility in the frigid

steppes of Kazakhstan. American Tom Marshburn, Russian Roman Romanenko and

Canadian Chris Hadfield are travelled in capsule.

50. Prithvi-II Flight- Tested Successfully : The Strategic Forces Command (SFC)

successfully flight-tested nuclear weapons-capable Prithvi-II missile from Chandipur, off

the Odisha coast on 20 December 2012. The surface-to-surface ballistic missile, was fired

from a road mobile launcher and tested for its full range of 350 km.The single-stage, liquid

propelled missile can carry a payload of 500 kg.

51. Astra Missile Successfully Test-fired : India on December 2012 test launched its

indigenously developed beyond visual range (BVR) air-to-air interceptor missile Astra at

the interim test range(ITR) at Chandipur in Odisha.Astra which has the capability to

intercept and destroy enemy aircraft at a supersonic speed can be fitted into any fighter

aircraft. Considered as one of the best of its kind in the world, the 3.8 metre long missile

which weighs about 160 kg can carry explosive loaded conventional warheads up to 15 kg.

52. Scientists Discovered Mini Nile River on Saturn’s Moon Titan : Nasa scientists had

spotted the longest extraterrestrial river system ever – on Saturn’s moon Titan – and it

appears to be a miniature version of Earth’s Nile river.

53. Higgs Boson ‘ Tops Journal Science’s 2012 List : The discovery of the Higgs Boson, an

invisible particle that explains the mystery of mass, leads a list of the top 10 scientific

advances of 2012 released by the US journal Science on 22 December .

54. America Launched Reusable Rockets : US California based SpaceX’s industry

successfully launched ‘Grasshopper’ reusable rockets.The rocket took a giant leap for

commercial space flight and when it rose 131 feet and landed safely back on Earth.

Grasshopper rocket rose to a height of 131 feet around ten storeys and hovered before

landing safely on its launch pad using closed loop thrust vector and throttle control. :

55. Hot Spots For World’s more Powerful Earthquakes Revealed : The locations of

where the world’s largest earthquakes are most likely to take place had pinpointed with

greater accuracy than ever before, by researchers from the University of Sydney.The

coasts of Southern Chile and Peru, Indonesia’s Sumatra Island, and several regions along

the eastern Eurasian coastline, are some of the regions prone to great earthquakes.

56. US approved First new Tuberculosis Drug : On 1 January The US Food and Drug

administration approved a Johnson & Johnson tuberculosis drug in 40 years .This is the

first new medicine to fight the deadly infection in more than four decades.The disease is

rare in the US, but kills about 1.4 millionpeople a year worldwide.

57. Spiral galaxy IC 2233 : Astronomers had captured one of the flattest galaxies known in

the universe, sitting like a silver needle in the haystack of space. The NASA/ESA Hubble

Space Telescope produced a beautiful image of the spiral galaxy IC 2233, one of the

flattest galaxies. The IC 2233 is located about 40 million light-years away from Earth. This

galaxy was earlier discovered by British astronomer Isaac Roberts in 1894.

58. “Immune system ‘booster’ may hit cancer” : Japanese research where stem cells

were used to clone and produce large numbers of a specialized type of white blood cell.

These cells, known as cytotoxic T lymphocytes (CTLs), are produced by the immune

system and are able to recognize specific markers on the surface of various tumour cells,

causing them to launch an attack to kill the tumour cells.The researchers are succeeded in

using stem cells to “mass-produce” CTLs in laboratory conditions.

59. Chinese Biologists Discovered Antibiotic In Panda Blood : Chinese biologists have

discovered that the blood of the endangered giant panda includes a compound called ”

Cathelicidin-AM ” which acts as a natural antibiotic. The nature of the blood compound

makes it an attractive treatment for so-called superbugs, those strains of disease that

have become immune or resistant to traditional antibiotics.

60. India to make world’s largest solar telescope : India is likely to begin construction of

the world’s largest solar telescope on the foothills of the Himalayas in Ladakh to

understand the fundamental processes taking place on the Sun by year-end.A 2-metre

class, state-of-the-art National Large Solar Telescope (NLST), built by Bangalore-based

Indian Institute of Astrophysics (IIA), will permit Indian scientists to carry out cutting edge

research aimed to study Sun’s atmosphere.

61. Internet emits 830 mt of carbon dioxide annually : According to Researchers from

the Centre for Energy-Efficient Telecommunications (CEET) and Bell Labs, Internet and

other components of information communication and technology (ICT) industry annually

produces more than 830 million tonnes of carbon dioxide (CO2), the main greenhouse gas,

and is expected to double by 2020

62. ‘Lakshya’ Missile Successfully Tested : India’s indigenously developed, ‘Lakshya’ was

sucessfully tested on 7 January .It was launched from the Integrated Test Range – ITR, at

Odisha .25 meters in length, 100 km away from the target to the missile .

63. 17 billion’ Earth-sized planets in Milky Way : The Milky Way contains at least 17

billion planets the size of Earth.Astronomers using NASA’s Kepler spacecraft found that

about 17 percent of stars in our galaxy have a planet about the size of Earth in a close

orbit.The Milky Way is known to host about 100 billion stars, meaning that about one of

every six has an Earth-sized planet around it.

64. Brahmos cruise missile test fired in successfully : Supersonic cruise missile BrahMos

scored once again in its 34th launch on 09 January 2013 off Visakhapatnam in the Bay of

Bengal, hitting a decommissioned vessel with accuracy.As it took off vertically from a naval

warship, reached an altitude of 14 km, levelled out and started cruising at three times the

speed of sound, it performed “a double manoeuvre in S-form” and hit the decommissioned

ship, about 290 km away.

65. Astronomers Found ” NGC 6872 ” Largest known Spiral Galaxy : A team of

astronomers from the United States, Chile and Brazil has crowned it the largest-known

spiral galaxy, a spectacular behemoth five times bigger than our own Milky Way, based on

archival data from NASA’s Galaxy Evolution Explorer (GALEX) mission.The title-holder is

now NGC 6872, a barred spiral found 212 million light-years away in the southern

constellation Pavo. The distance between NGC 6872′s two huge spiral arms is 522,000

light-years, compared to about 100,000 light-years for the Milky Way.

66. Indian Scientists Discovered Molecule for Cancer Treatment : A team of Indian

researchers, led by Dr Sathees C Raghavan of the Indian Institute of Science at Bangalore,

have identified a molecule which they claim will revolutionise the cure for cancer.The

molecule has been named after “Sathees as SCR7” and a detailed account of it has been

carried in the international scientific journal “Cell”".Scientists world over believe that the

double strand break (DSB) of DNA is one of the most lethal form of DNA damage, resulting

in drastic consequences such as genome instability, and cancer.

67. “Largest Space structure in the Universe:Large Quasar Group : An international

team lead by astronomer Roger Clowes of the University of Central Lancashire in England

discovered the largest known structure in the universe, a clump of active galactic cores

that stretches 4 billion light-years from end to end.This is the largest Space structure in

the Universe.This structure is known as a “Large Quasar Group(LQG)”.

68. Indian Scientists Discovered Molecule for Cancer Treatment : A team of Indian

researchers, led by Dr Sathees C Raghavan of the Indian Institute of Science at Bangalore,

have identified a molecule which they claim will revolutionise the cure for cancer.The

molecule has been named after “Sathees as SCR7” and a detailed account of it has been

carried in the international scientific journal “Cell”".Scientists world over believe that the

double strand break (DSB) of DNA is one of the most lethal form of DNA damage, resulting

in drastic consequences such as genome instability, and cancer.