India's heaviest rocket GSLV-Mark III successfully test-fired

* Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) on 18 December 2014 successfully conducted an experimental test-flight of GSLV MK III carrying a crew module, to be used in future manned space missions.

* GSLV MK III, which is the heaviest launch vehicle Isro has ever made, lifted off from the second launch pad of the Satish Dhawan Space Centre at Sriharikota at 9.30am.

* "We have completed the first experimental test-flight of GSLV Mark III. The performance of solid and liquid propulsion stages happened as expected. The crew module has plunged into the sea. The next developmental flight of the launch vehicle will be done in the next two years," Isro chairman K Radhakrishnan said.

* The GSLV's integral cryogenic engine phase was in a passive state and the suborbital test-flight was conducted mainly to test the flight validation of the launch vehicle and its new telemetric systems, apart from the atmospheric reentry pattern and thermal resistance of the module during the Crew Module Atmosphereic Re-entry Experiment (CARE).

* The rocket soared from the launch pad after a 24-hour countdown that commenced on Wednesday morning. The crew module separated from the rocket at an altitude of 126 km and then re-entered into the earth's atmosphere at 80 km. It then followed an uncontrolled trajectory into the Bay of Bengal about 180 km off the Andaman Nicobar Islands.

* GSLV Mark III is being projected as Isro's most advanced launch vehicle capable of injecting heavier satellites like GSAT 19e. The 630.5 tonne rocket has two active solid and liquid propulsion stages, S 200 and L110 respectively in addition to its cryogenic engine C 25 X which in in a passive state.

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Rolene Strauss is Miss World 2014

* Miss South Africa, 22-year-old Rolene Strauss, was crowned Miss World 2014 at the pageant's final in London on 14 December 2014, with an estimated billion viewers watching on television around the globe. 

* Miss Hungary, Edina Kulcsar, was the runner-up and Miss United States, Elizabeth Safrit, came third in the 64th annual competition, contested by women from 121 countries.

* Strauss clasped her hands together in surprise and was presented with the sash by the outgoing Miss World, Megan Young of the Philippines.

* The medical student sat in the winner's throne as the 2013 champion put the glittering crown on her head before a fireworks finale at the ExCeL exhibition centre in east London.

* "South Africa this is for you," Strauss said afterwards. "I think I will brace myself for what's about to happen. It's a huge responsibility."

* Koyal Rana, India's contender to Miss World 2014 couldn't make it to the top 5.

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Australia’s Richard Flanagan wins Man Booker prize 2014

* Australian author Richard Flanagan took away the literary world's most coveted prize for his book 'The Narrow Road to the Deep North' on 15 October 2014.

* Flanagan's book is the story of his father as a prisoner during war in a Japanese prison and was called a literary masterpiece by the jury.

* Flanagan - the Tasmanian-born author is the third Australian to win the coveted prize which, for the first time in its 46-year history, is now expanded to include entries from writers of all nationalities, writing originally in English and published in the UK.

* 'The Narrow Road to the Deep North' is the sixth novel from Flanagan which centres upon the experiences of surgeon Dorrigo Evans in a Japanese POW camp on the now infamous Thailand-Burma railway.

* In addition to his £50,000 prize and trophy, Flanagan also receives a designer bound edition of his book, and a further £2,500 for being shortlisted.

* On winning the Man Booker prize, an author can expect international recognition, not to mention a dramatic increase in book sales.

* Kolkata boy Neel Mukherjee was among the six short listed authors for his book 'The Lives of Others'. The other contestants for the award were US authors Joshua Ferris, Karen Joy Fowler, and British authors Howard Jacobson and Ali Smith.

* This is also the first time in the British prestigious literary award's 46-year history that it was opened to writers of any nationality, writing in English and having their work published in Britain. It had hitherto been confined to writers from Commonwealth countries, Ireland, and Zimbabwe.

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Nobel prize for Economics 2014

The Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences has decided to award The Sveriges Riksbank Prize in Economic Sciences in Memory of Alfred Nobel for 2014 to

Jean Tirole

Toulouse 1 Capitole University, France

“for his analysis of market power and regulation”.

--> Tirole is the third French Laureate awarded the prize in Economic Sciences.

--> Tirole who has used game theory in an attempt to find ways to control the dominance of major companies said he was incredibly surprised when he got the news.

--> 61-year-old Tirole who was awarded the economics prize — the first without an American winner or joint winner since 1999 wins eight million kroner (£700,000) prize.

--> The Academy said, "Tirole is one of the most influential economists of our time. He has made important theoretical research contributions in a number of areas, but most of all he has clarified how to understand and regulate industries with a few powerful firms."

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Nobel Peace Prize for 2014 for Kailash Satyarthi and Malala Yousafzay

The Norwegian Nobel Committee has decided that the Nobel Peace Prize for 2014 is to be awarded to

Kailash Satyarthi and Malala Yousafzay

for their struggle against the suppression of children and young people and for the right of all children to education.

The press release issued by the Norwegian Nobel Committee read as follows:

--> Children must go to school and not be financially exploited.  In the poor countries of the world, 60% of the present population is under 25 years of age.  It is a prerequisite for peaceful global development that the rights of children and young people be respected.  In conflict-ridden areas in particular, the violation of children leads to the continuation of violence from generation to generation.

--> Showing great personal courage, Kailash Satyarthi, maintaining Gandhi’s tradition, has headed various forms of protests and demonstrations, all peaceful, focusing on the grave exploitation of children for financial gain.  He has also contributed to the development of important international conventions on children’s rights.

--> Despite her youth, Malala Yousafzay has already fought for several years for the right of girls to education, and has shown by example that children and young people, too, can contribute to improving their own situations.  This she has done under the most dangerous circumstances.  Through her heroic struggle she has become a leading spokesperson for girls’ rights to education.

--> The Nobel Committee regards it as an important point for a Hindu and a Muslim, an Indian and a Pakistani, to join in a common struggle for education and against extremism.  Many other individuals and institutions in the international community have also contributed.  It has been calculated that there are 168 million child labourers around the world today.  In 2000 the figure was 78 million higher.  The world has come closer to the goal of eliminating child labour.

--> The struggle against suppression and for the rights of children and adolescents contributes to the realization of the “fraternity between nations” that Alfred Nobel mentions in his will as one of the criteria for the Nobel Peace Prize.

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Nobel Prize in Literature for 2014 to Patrick Modiano

Nobel Prize in Literature for 2014 

The Nobel Prize in Literature for 2014 is awarded to the French author

Patrick Modiano

“for the art of memory with which he has evoked the most ungraspable human destinies and uncovered the life-world of the occupation”.

-->  Paris' literary doyen Patrick Modiano has won literature's most coveted price for his unparalleled mastery in portraying loss and legacy.

--> The 69-years-old Modiano, legendary for shunning the limelight is the 11th literature laureate born in France and is known to be a modern master in depicting brooding themes surrounding "memory, identity and guilt".

--> He is known to be an authority on Paris with most of his epic works set in the city.

--> Modiano's struggle with his Jewish heritage is well known. He was born outside Paris to a Sephardic Jewish family with roots dating back to eminent rabbis in Greece. It haunted him for most part of his life having spent the early phase of his writing career bluffing away about his year of birth. He claimed he was born in 1947 in order to distance himself from the shame of the World War II.

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Nobel Prize in Chemistry for 2014

Nobel Prize in Chemistry for 2014 announced 

The Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences has decided to award the Nobel Prize in Chemistry for 2014 to

Eric Betzig

Janelia Farm Research Campus, Howard Hughes Medical Institute, Ashburn, VA, USA,

Stefan W. Hell

Max Planck Institute for Biophysical Chemistry, Göttingen, and German Cancer Research Center, Heidelberg, Germany

and

William E. Moerner

Stanford University, Stanford, CA, USA

“for the development of super-resolved fluorescence microscopy”

--> The Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences announced on Wednesday that for a long time, optical microscopy was held back by a presumed limitation: that it would never obtain a better resolution than half the wavelength of light.

--> Helped by fluorescent molecules, the Nobel laureates in Chemistry 2014 ingeniously circumvented this limitation. Their ground-breaking work has brought optical microscopy into the nano dimension.

--> In what has become known as nanoscopy, scientists visualize the pathways of individual molecules inside living cells. They can see how molecules create synapses between nerve cells in the brain; they can track proteins involved in Parkinson's, Alzheimer's and Huntington's diseases as they aggregate; they follow individual proteins in fertilized eggs as these divide into embryos.

--> It was all but obvious that scientists should ever be able to study living cells in the tiniest molecular detail. In 1873, the microscopist Ernst Abbe stipulated a physical limit for the maximum resolution of traditional optical microscopy: it could never become better than 0.2 micrometres.

--> Americans Betzig and Moerner and German scientist Hell have been awarded the Nobel prize in chemistry 2014 for having bypassed this limit. Due to their achievements the optical microscope can now peer into the nanoworld. Two separate principles are rewarded.

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Nobel Prize for Physics 2014

Nobel Prize for Physics 2014 announced 

The Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences has decided to award the Nobel Prize in Physics for 2014 to

Isamu Akasaki

Meijo University, Nagoya, Japan and Nagoya University, Japan

Hiroshi Amano

Nagoya University, Japan

and

Shuji Nakamura

University of California, Santa Barbara, CA, USA

“for the invention of efficient blue light-emitting diodes which has enabled bright and energy-saving white light sources”

--> The invention of an energy source that lights up our computer and/or mobile phone screens and holds promise to brighten up the quality of life of over 1.5 billion people around the world, has been awarded the Nobel prize for physics 2014.

--> The laureates were rewarded for having invented a new energy-efficient and environment-friendly light source — the blue light-emitting diode (LED).

--> According to the committee, the laureates' inventions revolutionized the field of illumination technology.

--> As about one fourth of world electricity consumption is used for lighting purposes, the LEDs contribute to saving earth's resources. Materials consumption is also diminished as LEDs last up to 100,000 hours, compared to 1,000 for incandescent bulbs and 10,000 hours for fluorescent lights.

--> When Isamu Akasaki, Hiroshi Amano and Shuji Nakamura produced bright blue light beams from their semi-conductors in the early 1990s, they triggered a fundamental transformation of lighting technology.

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Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine 2014

Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine 2014 announced 

The 2014 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine was divided with one half to

John O´Keefe

and the other half jointly to

May-Britt Moser and Edvard I. Moser

"for their discoveries of cells that constitute a positioning system in the brain"

--> Keefe is currently director of the Sainsbury Wellcome Centre in Neural Circuits and Behaviour at University College London.

--> This year's Nobel Laureates have discovered a positioning system, an "inner GPS" in the brain that makes it possible to orient ourselves in space, demonstrating a cellular basis for higher cognitive function. In 1971, John O'Keefe discovered the first component of this positioning system. He found that a type of nerve cell in an area of the brain called the hippocampus that was always activated when a rat was at a certain place in a room. Other nerve cells were activated when the rat was at other places. O'Keefe concluded that these "place cells" formed a map of the room.

--> More than three decades later, in 2005, May-Britt and Edvard Moser discovered another key component of the brain's positioning system. They identified another type of nerve cell, which they called "grid cells", that generate a coordinate system and allow for precise positioning and pathfinding. Their subsequent research showed how place and grid cells make it possible to determine position and to navigate.

--> The discoveries of John O'Keefe, May-Britt Moser and Edvard Moser have solved a problem that has occupied philosophers and scientists for centuries — how does the brain create a map of the space surrounding us and how can we navigate our way through a complex environment?

-->The Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences announced the first of the many Nobel prizes for 2014 on Monday.

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List of Gold Medal winners for India at Asian Games 2014- PDF Download

Friends.. The 17th Asian Games came to an end on 04 October 2014 with spectacular closing ceremony at Incheon, South Korea. India finished their campaign with 57 medals which includes 11 gold, 10 silver and 36 bronze. They ended joint 5th (in terms of total haul) in the medal standings and overall 8th. Now it’s time to rewind the list of Gold Medal winners for India as the Asian Games related questions are going to be a sure part in the upcoming competitive Exams. There were 4 individual gold medal winners for India and the other 7 came via team events. Here is the complete list of gold medal winners for India with details. You can download this as PDF by clicking on the 'print friendly' button below. 

11 Gold Medal winners

1) Jitu Rai

Jitu Rai brought India's first gold medal in Incheon with a win in the men's 50 metres pistol shooting.  The 27-year-old showed steely grit to get the better of a strong field, which included two-time Olympic champion Jin Jongoh of South Korea, to snatch the gold off the final shot in a straight duel with Vietnamese rival Nguyen Hoang Phuong. It was India's first gold medal at Asian Games 2014.

2) Men's Archery team

Indian team containing Sandeep Kumar, Raijat Chauhan and Abhishek Verma won Compound Men's team gold in Archery.  Young archer Abhishek Verma became India's new hero as he combined with Rajat Chauhan and Sandeep Kumar to clinch the gold medal in the compound team at the Gyeyang Asiad Archery Field.s

3) Squash team

Squash team with Saurav Ghosal, Harinder Pal Singh Sandhu, Kush Kumar and Mahesh Manaonkar won Men squash team event. Saurav Ghosal combined with Harinder Pal Singh Sandhu to help India beat Malaysia 2-0 and win the men's team gold medal, the first in squash in the continental games.

4) Yogeshwar Dutt

Yogeshwar Dutt won gold medal winning the men's freestyle 65kg wrestling. He won India's fourth gold medal at Asian Games defeating Zalimkhan Yusupov of Tajikistan.

5) Seema Punia

Seema Punia won gold medal winning women's discus throw. Seema clinched the gold medal with a best throw of 61.03m in the women's discus throw final at the Incheon Asiad Main Stadium.

6) Tennis mixed doubles

Saketh Myneni with Sania Mirza won gold in Tennis mixed doubles. The second-seeded Indian pair overwhelmed the top-seeded Chinese Taipei pair of Hao Ching Chan and Hsien Yin Peng 6-4 6-3 in the summit clash in just 69 minutes.

7) Mary Kom

Mary Kom won gold in women's boxing flyweight 48-51 kg category. She became the first Indian woman boxer to clinch a gold medal in the Asian Games defeating Kazakhstan's Zhaina Shekerbekova in the flyweight final.

8) Hockey (Men's Team)

Indian men won gold in hockey beating Pakistan 4-2 in penalty shootout in the final. It was 1-1 after regulation time. They ended a 16-year wait for gold.

9) 4x400 Relay Team

Indian women won gold medal after winning the 4x400 metres relay race. The team included MR Poovamma, Tintu Luka, Mandeep Kaur and Priyanka Panwar.

10) Kabaddi - women

Indian women kabaddi team won the gold defeating Iran in final. This was India’s second consecutive Gold at Asian Games.

11) Kabaddi - men

Indian men kabaddi team won the gold defeating Iran in final. This was India’s seventh consecutive Gold at Asian Games.

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Mars Orbiter Mission: India becomes first country to enter Mars orbit in maiden attempt

>> Creating history, ISRO's Mars Orbiter Mission (MOM) on Wednesday successfully entered the orbit of the red planet. With this, India has become the first nation in the world to have entered the Mars orbit in the first attempt. ISRO's MOM is also the cheapest such mission till now.

>> Indian Space Research Organisation's Mars Orbiter Mission (MOM) spacecraft started orbiting the red planet at 7.47am, but it was only 12 minutes later —because of a time delay in radio signals travelling the 680 million km -- that scientists at Isro Telemetry, Tracking and Command Network in Bangalore, could erupt in joy as Prime Minister Narendra Modi stood a happy witness.

>> The scientists had waited for more than 300 days as MOM journeyed on through space, but the last 54 minutes were virtually unbearable. For, it was during this period that the orbiter first reoriented itself and then fired its engine and thrusters for about 24 minutes to get into the Mars orbit.

>> Prime Minister Narendra Modi congratulated the Isro scientists over the success. "MOM never disappoints," he told applauding scientists at the Isro Telemetry, Tracking and Command Network in Bangalore. "India is the first country to get this right in the first attempt," he said.

>> With MOM successfully entering the red planet's orbit, ISRO on Wednesday also launched the MOM's official Twitter handle, @MarsOrbiter.

>> With the success of Mars Orbiter Mission (MOM), India has joined the United States, European Space Agency and the former Soviet Union in the elite club of Martian explorers.

>> Interestingly, India's MOM is also the world's cheapest inter-planetary mission costing around Rs 450 crores or 74 million USD, which is a tenth of NASA's Mars mission MAVEN that entered the Martian orbit on September 22.

>> It aims to study Mars' surface and mineral composition, and scan its atmosphere for methane with the help of scientific instruments.

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US Open 2014- Complete list of Winners

The 2014 US Open Tennis Tournament was the 134th edition of the US Open, the fourth and final Grand Slam event of the year. It took place at the USTA Billie Jean King National Tennis Center, and ran from August 25 – September 8 2014. 

In the men's singles competition, Marin Cilic won his maiden grand slam title; however, Serena Williams won her Open era record tying sixth title in the women's singles competition tying Chris Evert, and it was her eighteenth grand slam title tying Evert and Martina Navratilova. Winning the men's doubles, Bob Bryan and Mike Bryan became the most victorious doubles team in Open era history at the tournament.

Here is the complete list of winners with details

Men's Singles

Final between: Marin Cilic (Croatia) vs Kei Nishikori (Japan)

Winner- : Marin Cilic (Croatia) (6–3, 6–3, 6–3)

Women's Singles

Final between: Serena Williams (USA) vs Caroline Wozniacki (Denmark)

Winner: Serena Williams (USA) (6–3, 6–3)

Men's Doubles

Final between:  Bob Bryan(USA) & Mike Bryan(USA)  vs  Marcel Granollers (Spain) & Marc López (Spain)

Winners: Bob Bryan(USA) & Mike Bryan(USA) (6–4, 6–3)

Women's Doubles

Fianl between:

Ekaterina Makarova (Russia) &  Elena Vesnina (Russia) vs  Martina Hingis (Switzerland) &  Flavia Pennetta (Italy)

Winners: Ekaterina Makarova (Russia) &  Elena Vesnina (Russia) (2–6, 6–3, 6–2)

Mixed Doubles

Final between:  Sania Mirza (India) &  Bruno Soares (Brazil) vs Abigail Spears (USA) & Santiago González(Mexico)

Winners:  Sania Mirza (India) &  Bruno Soares (Brazil) (6–1, 2–6, [11–9])

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List of Arjuna Award Winners 2014 with discipline: PDF Download

The Arjuna Awards are given by the Ministry of Youth Affairs and Sports, government of India to recognize outstanding achievement in National sports. Instituted in 1961, the award carries a cash prize of INR 500,000, a bronze statuette of Arjuna and a scroll. The Government has recently revised the scheme for the Arjun Award. As per the revised guidelines, to be eligible for the Award, a sportsperson should not only have had good performance consistently for the previous three years at the international level with excellence for the year for which the Award is recommended, but should also have shown qualities of leadership, sportsmanship and a sense of discipline.

A large number of nominations were received for these awards this year, which were considered by the select  panels of eminent sportspersons and sports administrators; Selection Committees were headed by eminent sportspersons  and consisted of former  Olympians, Arjuna Awardees, Dronacharya Awardees, Dhyan Chand Awardees, Sports Journalists/Experts/Commentators and sports administrators. Selection Committee for Rajiv Gandhi Khel Ratna Award and Arjuna Awards was headed by Shri Kapil Dev.

Here is the list of complete winners and their discipline. You can download this as PDF from print friendly button below.

1. Mr. Abhishek Verma - Archery

2. Ms. Tintu Luka- Athletics

3. Mr. H.N. Girisha- Para-Athletics

4. Mr. V. Diju- Badminton

5. Ms. Geetu Anna Jose- Basketball

6. Mr. Jai Bhagwan- Boxing

7. Mr. R. Ashwin- Cricket

8. Mr. Anirban Lahiri- Golf

9. Ms. Mamta Pujari - Kabaddi

10. Mr. Saji Thomas- Rowing

11. Ms. Heena Sidhu- Shooting

12. Ms. Anaka Alankamony- Squash

13. Mr. Tom Joseph- Volleyball

14. Ms. Renu Bala Chanu- Weightlifting

15. Mr. Sunil Kumar Rana- Wrestling

For Rajiv Gandhi Khel Ratna 2014, no sportsperson has been recommended. The awardees will receive their awards from the President of India at a specially organized function at the Rashtrapati Bhawan on August 29, 2014 (National Sports Day).  

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List of Gold medal winners for India at Commonwealth Games 2014

India finished fifth in the just concluded Commonwealth Games 2014 held at Glasgow, Scotland from 23 July to 3 August 2014. A 216-strong team of Indian athletes bagged 15 gold, 30 silver and 19 bronze for a total haul of 64 medals to finish fifth behind table-toppers England (58, 59, 57), Australia (two - 49, 42, 46), Canada (three - 32, 16, 34) and hosts Scotland (four - 19, 15, 19). India had finished second behind Australia in the 2010 Delhi edition but considering that some disciplines, from which the hosts had won medals, were either dropped or pruned down in Glasgow, it was a creditable performance by the Indians in the Games. Let's have a look at the list of 15 Gold Medal winners for India in the game. We would like to thank our friend Pepe who has provided valuable information for preparing this article. You can download this chart as PDF by clicking on print friendly button at the bottom. 

Sl No	Name	Discipline	Category
1	K Sanjita Chanu	Weightlifting	48 kg category
Note: First gold winner of India in Commonwealth Games 2014. From Manipur
2	Sukhen Dey	Weightlifting	56 kg category
Note: Silver in CWG 2010 in 56 Kg category from West Bengal
3	Satish Sivalingam	Weightlifting	77 kg category
Note: Created a games record with a total lift of 328 kg. From Tamil Nadu
4	Yogeshwar Dutt	Wrestling	65 kg freestyle
Note: Gold in CWG 2010 and Bronze in Olympics 2012 in 60 Kg Free style. From Haryana
5	Sushil Kumar	Wrestling	75kg freestyle
Note: Gold in CWG 2010 and Silver in Olympics 2012 in 66 Kg Free style. From Delhi
6	Amit Kumar	Wrestling	57kg freestyle
Note: 21 years old from Haryana
7	Babita Kumari	Wrestling	55 kg freestyle
Note: Silver in CWG 2010 in 51 Kg free style. From Haryana
8	Vinesh Phogat	Wrestling	48kg freestyle
Note: Youngest Indian wrestler , Just 19 years old, from Haryana
9	Jitu Rai	Shooting	50 m pistol
Note: Born in Nepa. From Lucknow, UP.
10	Abhinav Bindra	Shooting	10m Air Rifle
Note: Silver in CWG 2010 and Gold in Beijing Olympics 2008 from Punjab
11	Rahi Sarnobat	Shooting	25 m Pistol
Note: Gold in CWG 2010.  From Maharastra
12	Apurvi Chandela	Shooting	10 m Air Rifle
Note: Her first international medal. From Rajasthan
13	Vikas Gowda	Athletics	Discus throw
Note: First Indian man to win a field event gold medal at the Commonwealth Games. From Karnataka
14	Parupalli Kashyap	Badminton	Men's Single
Note: First Indian man in 32 years to win badminton gold at the Games. From Hyderabad
15	Dipika Pallikal and Joshana Chinappa	Squash	Women’s doubles
Created history by winning India's first ever gold medal in CWG squash. From Tamil Nadu

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