In a key advance for safely navigating future human exploration of the solar system, NASA said it is set to send its next-generation atomic clock to space in late 2017.
This clock will be smaller, lighter and magnitudes more precise than any atomic clock flown in space before, NASA said.

Engineers at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California have completed integration of the instrument, the Deep Space Atomic Clock, with the spacecraft that will take it into orbit later in 2017, the US space agency said in a statement on Tuesday.

Timekeeping plays a critical role in spacecraft navigation and will be especially important for future deep space missions. 

Most spacecraft are tracked using "two-way" methods — the ground-based antenna 'pings' the spacecraft and waits for the signal to return. 

By measuring how long the signal takes to travel, the distance to the spacecraft can be calculated. 

A navigation team then processes this information to determine the spacecraft's flight path and also determine if any course corrections are required. 

The next-generation atomic clock developed by NASA enables "one-way" tracking, where the spacecraft does not need to send the signal back to Earth. 

The tracking measurements could be taken onboard and processed with a spacecraft-based navigation system to determine the path and whether any manoeuvre are needed to stay on course. 

This will be a key advance for safely navigating future human exploration of the solar system by providing astronauts with their position and velocity when they need it, according to NASA.

It will lighten the load on the antennas in NASA's Deep Space Network, allowing more spacecraft to be tracked with a single antenna.

The Deep Space Atomic Clock would also improve the precision and quantity of the radio data used by scientists for determining a planet's gravity field and probing its atmosphere, NASA said.

Private sector lender Axis Bank on Wednesday said its MD & CEO Shikha Sharma is not resigning.

"..The news appearing in section of social media stating the impending resignation of the MD & CEO of the Bank, which please note is false, speculative and is being circulated with the mala fide intention of misleading the investors and the general public," Axis Bank said in a clarification to the BSE.

Axis Bank has been under pressure over a sharp fall in third quarter profits along with Income Tax Department raids on some of its branches post-demonetisation.

There is also a buzz about the bank's merger with Kotak Mahindra Bank.

Axis Bank had reported 73 per cent decline in net profit to Rs.580 crore for the October-December quarter on account of rise in bad loans.

Shares of Axis Bank were trading 2.07 per cent higher at Rs.498.10 on BSE.

Private sector lender Axis Bank on Wednesday said its MD & CEO Shikha Sharma is not resigning.

"..The news appearing in section of social media stating the impending resignation of the MD & CEO of the Bank, which please note is false, speculative and is being circulated with the mala fide intention of misleading the investors and the general public," Axis Bank said in a clarification to the BSE.

Axis Bank has been under pressure over a sharp fall in third quarter profits along with Income Tax Department raids on some of its branches post-demonetisation.

There is also a buzz about the bank's merger with Kotak Mahindra Bank.

Axis Bank had reported 73 per cent decline in net profit to Rs.580 crore for the October-December quarter on account of rise in bad loans.

Shares of Axis Bank were trading 2.07 per cent higher at Rs.498.10 on BSE.

Sri Lankan President Maithripala Sirisena left on Wednesday on an official visit to Russia, the President's office said.

President Sirisena is the first Sri Lankan leader to visit Russia since 1974, when then Prime Minister Sirimavo Bandaranaike visited Moscow, Xinhua news agency reported.

The visit takes place as both countries celebrate the 60th anniversary of the establishment of diplomatic relations this year, the Foreign Ministry said earlier.

During the visit, President Sirisena is scheduled to hold a bilateral meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin on Thursday.

The official discussions are expected to review progress made in the longstanding bilateral relationship, including the way forward to further promote trade and investment between the two countries. 

Several bilateral agreements in the areas of fisheries, tourism, cultural and education cooperation, including cooperation in the science and technology sector, are scheduled to be signed.

In order to actively promote trade and business linkages between the two countries, a Sri Lanka-Russia Business Forum will be held in Moscow, and Sri Lanka will be represented by a delegation of the Sri Lanka Russia Business Council.

Minister of Foreign Affairs Mangala Samaraweera and five other cabinet ministers are accompanying the President on the trip. 

Sri Lankan President Maithripala Sirisena left on Wednesday on an official visit to Russia, the President's office said.

President Sirisena is the first Sri Lankan leader to visit Russia since 1974, when then Prime Minister Sirimavo Bandaranaike visited Moscow, Xinhua news agency reported.

The visit takes place as both countries celebrate the 60th anniversary of the establishment of diplomatic relations this year, the Foreign Ministry said earlier.

During the visit, President Sirisena is scheduled to hold a bilateral meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin on Thursday.

The official discussions are expected to review progress made in the longstanding bilateral relationship, including the way forward to further promote trade and investment between the two countries. 

Several bilateral agreements in the areas of fisheries, tourism, cultural and education cooperation, including cooperation in the science and technology sector, are scheduled to be signed.

In order to actively promote trade and business linkages between the two countries, a Sri Lanka-Russia Business Forum will be held in Moscow, and Sri Lanka will be represented by a delegation of the Sri Lanka Russia Business Council.

Minister of Foreign Affairs Mangala Samaraweera and five other cabinet ministers are accompanying the President on the trip. 

Punjab's newly-elected Chief Minister Amarinder Singh will hold a series of meetings with the government's top brass here on Wednesday.

Amarinder, who is on his first visit to the national capital after taking over as the chief minister, will meet Prime Minister Narendra Modi at his Parliament House office in the afternoon and President Pranab Mukherjee at Rashtrapati Bhawan in the evening.

He will also meet Union Finance Minister Arun Jaitley at his residence in the afternoon.

Though these meetings are stated to be courtesy calls, he is likely to seek help and cooperation of the Central government in grant of more funds to Punjab to initiate further development in the state.

During his meetings with the Prime Minister and the Finance Minister, he is also likely to put forth some of the demands of the state.

Punjab's newly-elected Chief Minister Amarinder Singh will hold a series of meetings with the government's top brass here on Wednesday.

Amarinder, who is on his first visit to the national capital after taking over as the chief minister, will meet Prime Minister Narendra Modi at his Parliament House office in the afternoon and President Pranab Mukherjee at Rashtrapati Bhawan in the evening.

He will also meet Union Finance Minister Arun Jaitley at his residence in the afternoon.

Though these meetings are stated to be courtesy calls, he is likely to seek help and cooperation of the Central government in grant of more funds to Punjab to initiate further development in the state.

During his meetings with the Prime Minister and the Finance Minister, he is also likely to put forth some of the demands of the state.

The Rupee declined by 27 paise to 65.57 per Dollar in early trade on Wednesday amid gains in the US currency in global markets.

Forex dealers said the Dollar strengthened against major global currencies hitting the Rupee sentiment.

Early losses in stock markets and demand for the US currency from importers also weighed on the Rupee, they added.

On Tuesday, the Rupee had gained 6 paise to close at a nearly 17-month high of 65.30 in a fairly volatile trading.

Meanwhile, the benchmark BSE Sensex fell by 221.71 points, or 0.75 per cent, to 29,263.74 in early trade today.

The Indian Institute of Technology, Kharagpur, is the first academic institution to get a supercomputing facility under the National Supercomputing Mission (NSM).

This will provide large computational support to users to carry out both research and teaching activities that involve state-of-the-art High Performance Computing (HPC) and usher in a new age in research and innovation in the country, an IIT-Kharagpur spokesperson said.

IIT-KGP Director Prof P P Chakrabarti said "The Peta-Flop new system with both CPU and CPU-GPU based servers along with the already existing HPC equipment will provide about 1.5 Peta-Flop capacity support to several areas where the researchers of IIT-KGP are actively involved."

The Institute is setting up a new Centre for Computational and Data Sciences (CCDS) around such a supercomputing platform to build, manage and operate the HPC facility, he said.

Referring to the research areas where the facility will be of use, Prof Chakrabarti said "Faculty members and their research groups at IIT-KGP are already engaged in research in several areas of national importance requiring large computational (both hardware and software) support.

"The facility will cover cutting-edge research scope in different inter-disciplinary areas like bio molecular simulations, drug design and bio-informatics, climate change and digital earth, geo-scientific exploration, infrastructure design and sustainable cities," he said.

"Other than research, CCDS will also focus on education and capacity building," Prof Chakrabarti said adding, IIT-KGP had been chosen as a nodal centre for HPC-related educational activities by NSM.

The objective of NSM is to achieve a self-reliant supercomputing platform in the country and to develop and expand the scope of using HPC systems to solve complex problems of national importance in different fields of science and technology, he said.

The initiative is supported by the Centre for Development of Advanced Computing (C-DAC) and the Indian Institute of Science (IISc) and the mission envisages building supercomputing capacity and capability in the country with an estimated budget of Rs 4,500 crore over a period of seven years, he said.

Amid profit booking and weak global markets, Indian bourses were trading with declines in the second hour of trade on Wednesday. At 10.55 am, the Nifty at the NSE was trading 80 points down at 9,042 while the Sensex at the BSE was trading 242 points lower at 29,243.

In the broader markets, BSE Midcap index slumped 1.1 per cent but Smallcap index lost 0.7 per cent. All the BSE sectoral indices were trading in negative zone with Metal index leading the declines, down 1.8 per cent.

On Tuesday, the Nifty50 had closed five points down at 9,122 and the Sensex had closed 33 points lower at 29,485.

Top gainers in the Sensex-30 pack: Axis Bank (up 1.5 per cent) and Cipla (up 0.1 per cent).

Top losers in the Sensex-30 pack: Bharti Airtel (down 2.8 per cent), Tata Motors (down 1.8 per cent), M&M (down 1.7 per cent), ICICI Bank (down 1.6 per cent) and Tata Steel (down 1.4 per cent).

In the Asian markets, Japan’s Nikkei 225 Index plummeted by 2 per cent, Singapore’s Straits Times Index lost 1.2 per cent, Hong Kong’s Hang Seng index slumped 1.5, Korea’s KOSPI slipped 0.6 per cent and China’s Shanghai Composite Index shed 0.8 per cent.

Back home, the Rupee was trading 24 paise down at 65.54 against the US Dollar.

 Nearly 600 million children, one in four worldwide, will live in areas with extremely limited water resources by 2040, according to a UN report.

The report was released late Tuesday by the UN International Children's Emergency Fund (Unicef), Efe news reported on Wednesday.

Unicef warned of the threat to children's lives due to the lack of safe water and of how climate change is exacerbating the problem.

"Water is elemental; without it, nothing can grow. But around the world, millions of children lack access to safe water — endangering their lives, undermining their health, and jeopardising their future," Unicef Executive Director Anthony Lake said.

"This crisis will only grow unless we take collective action now," he insisted.

The report warns that population growth as well as increased consumption and demand are putting more and more stress on water availability, while right now such stress is already "extremely high" in 36 countries.

The situation occurs when demand for water far exceeds the renewable supply available, the report said.

It also highlighted various factors affecting the quality and availability of water such as warmer temperatures, rising sea levels, melting ice and increasing droughts.

To date, 663 million people are lacking adequate access to water sources and more than 800 children under the age of five die every day from diarrhoea linked to contaminated water and inadequate sanitation and hygiene.

According to Unicef, the lack of an adequate supply exposes children to deadly diseases forcing children in many places to spend hours every day to collect water, preventing them from going to school.

The report furthermore includes recommendations for different sectors and urges governments to plan for possible changes in water availability and demand over the coming years.

According to Unicef, the priority must be to safeguard access to water for the most vulnerable children. 

Singer-actress Jennifer Lopez feels her split from singer Marc Anthony has been "good for the whole family".

Lopez ended her marriage to Anthony in 2014 and feels it has allowed the former couple to be closer to their nine-year-old twins Max and Emme, reports dailymail.co.uk.

"At first I was like, 'We're good with the kids and everything, but if we start working together, are we gonna start going at each other again?' And it's been awesome. Honestly, I think it's even helped our relationship," Lopez said on TV show Live! With Kelly

"We're just in a really great place, and the kids get to spend time with the two of us more together and see us working together. It's just good for the whole family," she added.

Finance Minister Arun Jaitley on Wednesday said that the government was hoping to implement the Goods and Services Tax (GST) by July 1, after the enabling Bills get Parliament nod in the current budget session.

"GST is the biggest reform in India. Hopefully, GST will be implemented by July 1. GST Bills will hopefully be cleared in Parliament," Jaitley said here at the 23rd Conference of Auditors General of Commonwealth Nations hosted by the Comptroller and Auditor General (CAG) of India.

Finance Minister Arun Jaitley on Wednesday said that the government was hoping to implement the Goods and Services Tax (GST) by July 1, after the enabling Bills get Parliament nod in the current budget session.

"GST is the biggest reform in India. Hopefully, GST will be implemented by July 1. GST Bills will hopefully be cleared in Parliament," Jaitley said here at the 23rd Conference of Auditors General of Commonwealth Nations hosted by the Comptroller and Auditor General (CAG) of India.

Former South Korean President Park Geun-hye spend more than 21 hours at the Prosecutor's Office here, where she was questioned over her role in the "Female Rasputin" corruption scandal, a media report said on Wednesday.

Park, who appeared for the first time before investigators after losing her presidential immunity on March 10, was questioned for 14 hours and spent seven more reviewing her statement, Efe news reported.

She looked exhausted as she left the Seoul Central District Prosecutors' Office for her home in Gangnam district. She did not speak to the media gathered there.

During the process, she denied all charges, including bribery and abuse of power, but further details on her statements have not been given yet.

Outside the headquarters of the Prosecutor's Office and also around her residence huge crowd of followers gathered to cheer her.

Park has been South Korea's first head of state who was dismissed since the country returned to democratic elections in 1987, a fact that her supporters regard as stemming from a plot from the left and the media.

The Constitutional Court approved her impeachment on March 10 due to her involvement in the "Rasputin" corruption scandal in which the main accused Choi Soon-sil, is her long-time friend.

The decision by the country's highest judicial body has forced the cabinet of incumbent President Hwang Kyo-ahn to convene early presidential elections on May 9.

A total of 30 people have been charged so far in the scandal which involves 53 companies, including conglomerates such as LG, Hyundai and Samsung., whose de facto president Lee Jae-yong is being held and tried.

Samsung's de facto president Lee Jae-yong is being held and tried for allegedly approving bribes to foundations allegedly created and controlled by Choi.
 

Former South Korean President Park Geun-hye spend more than 21 hours at the Prosecutor's Office here, where she was questioned over her role in the "Female Rasputin" corruption scandal, a media report said on Wednesday.

Park, who appeared for the first time before investigators after losing her presidential immunity on March 10, was questioned for 14 hours and spent seven more reviewing her statement, Efe news reported.

She looked exhausted as she left the Seoul Central District Prosecutors' Office for her home in Gangnam district. She did not speak to the media gathered there.

During the process, she denied all charges, including bribery and abuse of power, but further details on her statements have not been given yet.

Outside the headquarters of the Prosecutor's Office and also around her residence huge crowd of followers gathered to cheer her.

Park has been South Korea's first head of state who was dismissed since the country returned to democratic elections in 1987, a fact that her supporters regard as stemming from a plot from the left and the media.

The Constitutional Court approved her impeachment on March 10 due to her involvement in the "Rasputin" corruption scandal in which the main accused Choi Soon-sil, is her long-time friend.

The decision by the country's highest judicial body has forced the cabinet of incumbent President Hwang Kyo-ahn to convene early presidential elections on May 9.

A total of 30 people have been charged so far in the scandal which involves 53 companies, including conglomerates such as LG, Hyundai and Samsung., whose de facto president Lee Jae-yong is being held and tried.

Samsung's de facto president Lee Jae-yong is being held and tried for allegedly approving bribes to foundations allegedly created and controlled by Choi.
 

Justifying his efforts to speed up implementation of the campaign promises including replacing healthcare, US President Donald Trump on Wednesday told his party colleagues that people voted for change and "serious action." 

"On November 8, the American people voted for historic change and they also voted for serious action by delivering the House, the Senate, and the White House. The American people gave us clear instructions. It's time to get busy, get to work, and to get the job done," Trump said in his address to the National Republican Congressional Committee.

"That legislative effort begins with Thursday's crucial vote. And it really is a crucial vote for the Republican Party and for the people of our country to finally repeal and replace the disaster known as Obamacare. That's what it is, a disaster," Trump said as he touted several efforts he has launched so far including his defense budget.

"A new national pride is stirring our souls. A new optimism is sweeping our land. A new era of American greatness is just beginning," he said in his remarks.

Trump said that because of the new business climate jobs are coming back to the US.

"Because of the new business climate that we're creating jobs are already starting to pour back in. Companies like Sprint, Intel, Exxon Mobil, where a great man, Rex Tillerson is doing an incredible job. He ran that company for many years… Wal Mart, Ford, Fiat-Chrysler, General Motors have all announced that they re keeping or adding tens of thousands of jobs right here in America. Big difference," he said.

Noting that the people earlier used to hear the companies are leaving, he said that they're all coming back and if they don't, he will tax the hell out of their profits. "Why didn't somebody start doing that 25 years ago?" he asked.

Trump said he is following through on his promise to secure, protect, and defend the borders of the United States.

"Yes, we will build a great border wall at our southern border. These security actions will save billions of dollars, millions of jobs, and thousands of lives," he said.

"We're also taking decisive action to improve our vetting procedures," he said, alleging that the courts are not helping him.

"I have to be honest with you. It's ridiculous. Somebody said I should not criticize judges. OK. I'll criticize judges to keep criminals and terrorists the hell out of our country," Trump said.