Top 5 Current Affairs: 18 August 2017

Vishal Sikka Resigns as MD and CEO of Infosys

Vishal Sikka has resigned as Managing Director and CEO of Infosys and his resignation was accepted with immediate effect by the board. Sikka will remain with Infosys as executive vice-chairman. The position is a newly created position at Infosys.
In addition, Infosys, second largest software exporter of India, has appointed chief operating officer UB Pravin Rao as interim managing director and CEO.

Indian Army to get 6 Apache attack helicopters

Defence Acquisition Council (DAC) has approved the proposal of procuring 6 Apache attack helicopters for Indian Army. This 6 helicopter will be procured at an expense of Rs 4168 crore. Besides, the DAC also approved a proposal to procure two gas turbine engines for Admiral Grigorovich class naval ships at a cost of Rs 490 crore.

Union Government signs GEF Grant Agreement with World Bank

Union Government and World Bank’s Global Environment Facility (GEF) have signed a Grant Agreement worth USD 24.64 million for Ecosystem Service Improvement Project. The project would be entirely financed by the World Bank out of its GEF Trust Fund. The total duration of the project is five years. The project’s main objective is to strengthen the institutional capacity of the Departments of Forestry and Community Organisations and to enhance forest ecosystem services and improve the livelihoods of forest dependent communities in Central Indian Highlands.

Asteroid Florence to pass safely by Earth on September 1: NASA

NASA has said that a large near-Earth asteroid will safely pass by our planet Earth on 1 September 2017. The asteroid named Florence will pass at a distance of seven million kilometres or about 18 Earth-Moon distances. NASA says that asteroid Florence is among the largest near-Earth asteroids that are several miles in size.

New artificial womb may help save premature babies

A research report published in The American Journal of Obstetrics and Gynecology says that the researchers have developed an artificial womb that has been successfully used to incubate healthy baby lambs for a week. Researchers hope the technology will one day be able to do the same for extremely premature babies.

The published report on the research says that preterm lambs were successfully maintained in a healthy, infection-free condition with significant growth, for a period of one week using ex- vivo uterine environment (EVE) therapy.