News in Short

• The study byCornell University’s Department of Entomology, describes the creation and successful release of gene-edited diamondback moths into an open field setting
• Diamondback moths (Plutella xylostella) is one of the main pests for crops in the brassica family which includes cauliflower, cabbage, broccoli, and canola.
• Certain populations of diamondback moths have shown very stubborn resistance to synthetic insecticides in many settings around the world.
• The idea behind this approach is for genetically-engineered male moths to make their way into the wide world and mate with wild females. They’ll pass on the self-limiting genes, which prevent the female caterpillars from developing normally.

• A study has revealed that all humans have a bit of Neanderthal in their DNA, including Africans who had been thought to have no genetic link to our extinct human relative.
• Study showed that there were many waves of dispersal out of Africa, some of which led to admixture between modern humans and Neanderthals that we see in the genomes of all living individuals today.
• The team also found that previous estimates suggesting that East Asians might have approximately 20% more Neanderthal ancestry compared to Europeans, were wrong and humans on different continents had Neanderthal ancestry similar to each other.

• Scientists have identified the remains of 15 to 20 different species of sharks deep in the cave in Kentucky’s Mammoth Cave National Park.
• The sharks lived about 330 million years ago in what is known as the Late Mississippian geologic time period, when much of North America was covered by oceans.
• When they died, their remains were encased in sediment that eventually became the limestone where the cave formed.

• Indian-origin technology executive Arvind Krishna has been named as the Chief Executive Officer of American IT giant International Business Machines (IBM).
• Krishna had joined IBM in 1990 and has an undergraduate degree from the Indian Institute of Technology, Kanpur, and a PhD in electrical engineering from the University of Illinois.
• Krishna is currently IBM Senior Vice President for Cloud and Cognitive Software and will succeed Virginia Rometty.

• The first case of the new strain of a coronavirus(nCoV) in the country has been reported from Thrissur, Kerala.
• A high level review meeting chaired by cabinet secretary Rajiv Gauba decided that all those who have come from China after January 15, 2020 will be tested as the virus has an incubation period.
• Apart from China, 15 other countries have reported a total of 68 confirmed cases so far.