It may be surprising to learn that even giraffes, parrots, and oak trees are included in the list of threatened species, as well as cacti and seaweed.
Seaweed is one of the planet’s great survivors, and relatives of some modern-day seaweed can be traced back some 1.6 billion years. Seaweed plays a vital role in marine ecosystems, providing habitats and food for marine lifeforms, while large varieties – such as kelp – act as underwater nurseries for fish.
However, mechanical dredging, rising sea temperatures and the building of coastal infrastructure are contributing to the decline of the species.
The world’s trees are threatened by various sources, including logging, deforestation for industry and agriculture, firewood for heating and cooking, and climate-related threats such as wildfires.
Unsplash/Shane Stagner. Kelp, a type of seaweed, can be fed to animals and could help to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.
It has been estimated that 31 per cent of the world’s 430 types of oak are threatened with extinction, according to the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) Red List of threatened species. And 41 per cent are of “conservation concern”, mainly due to deforestation for agriculture and fuel for cooking.
Giraffes are targeted for their meat, and suffer from the degradation of their habitat due to unsustainable wood harvesting, and increased demand for agricultural land; it’s estimated there are only around 600 West African giraffes left in the wild.
A grand statue of Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose, will be unveiled on 8th of September 2022 near India Gate in New Delhi in a jet black granite stone measuring 28 ft. under the Canopy near India Gate, which had King George’s statue originally.
Ever since the plan to install King George V statue by the British was scrapped owing to controversy, the canopy remained vacant. There was a move to install Mahatma Gandhi statue during the late 1980s but opposition from some circles that the Republic Day parade carrying arms and ammunition go against the Mahatma’s message of peace reigned on the government to reject the plan.
India Gate canopy in the 1940s had King George V statue but was removed later.
Finally, the canopy will have the grand statue of Netaji being unveiled on Sept 8, 2022, heralding a befitting tribute to the Indian National Army hero, who fought for Indian freedom based in Japan and Singapore. The statue has been carved from a monolithic block of granite weighing 280 MT after spending 26,000 man hours of intense artistic endeavor and the final statue weighing 65 MT will greet the visitors to India gate in New Delhi now.
The statue is completely hand sculpted using traditional techniques and modern tools under a team of sculptors led by Arun Yogiraj.
The statue of Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose will be unveiled by the Prime Minister in the same place where a hologram statue of Netaji was unveiled earlier this year on Parakram Diwas (January 23) by him to mark the 125th birth anniversary of Netaji.
Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose inspecting Indian National Army
The 28 feet tall towering statue of Netaji is one of the tallest, realistic, monolithic, handmade sculptures in India. A 100 feet long truck with 140 wheels was specially designed for this monolithic granite stone to travel the 1665-km distance from Khammam in Telangana to New Delhi.
Details of Netaji statue unveiling ceremony:
The unveiling event at the canopy will begin with traditional Manipuri Shankh Vadayam and Kerala’s traditional Panch Vadayam and Chanda. The unveiling of the statue of Netaji would be accompanied to the tune of Kadam Kadam Badhaye jaa, the traditional INA song.
To demonstrate the spirit of Ek Bharat – Shrestra Bharat & Unity in Diversity a cultural festival by 500 dancers drawn from all parts of the country, would be showcased on the Kartvya Path.
The glimpse of the same would be shown to the Prime Minster on the step Amphitheatre near India Gate by around 30 artists who will perform tribal folk art forms such as Sambalpuri, Panthi, Kalbelia, Kargam and dummy horse with live music by Nashik Dhol Pathik Tasha and Drums.
Mangalgaan penned by Pandit Shrikrishna Ratanjankarji on the auspicious occasion of 1st Independence Day of India in 1947 is being presented by Pandit Suhas Vashi along with a team of singers and musicians. Ashish Keskar will be the music director for the presentation.
The festival at renamed Kartvya Path (old Raj Path) would commence at 08.45 PM on 8th September, 2022 after the main function and will continue on 9th, 10, & 11th September, 2022 from 7.00 PM to 9.00 PM.
A special 10 minute Drone Show on Netaji’s life would be projected at India Gate at 08.00 PM on 9th, 10th & 11th September, 2022. Both the cultural festival and the drone show would be open to public with free entry.
A Portugal woman has revealed recently that her twin children has DNA of both sex partners with whom she had sex on the same day.
Now one year and four months old, these twins were tested for their DNA and the doctors were surprised to see that both of them had the DNA of both fathers.
The woman, who preferred not to be identified, said after having sex with them on the same day, she became pregnant with the twins. The woman hails from the town of Mineiros in the state of Goias in Portugal.
What’s heteroparental superfecundation?
The case has become what the medical doctors said was the rarest of the rare 20th case of ‘heteroparental superfecundation’ ever recorded in the world.
Representational picture of twins / https://www.womenshealth.gov/
It means a pregnancy that produces twins with two different fathers. Dr Tulio Jorge Franco, who has been studying the unusual pregnancy since the beginning said, “two eggs from the same mother are fertilized by different men. The babies share the mother’s genetic material, but they grow in different placentas”.
According to Jason Kasraie, the chair of the Association of Clinical Embryologists, a woman can release two eggs at the same time. Since sperm can survive for a few days in the female reproductive tract, loitering in the corner of the womb and the fallopian tube, it would be possible to have sex with one father-to-be in advance of the egg being released, and another just after ovulation.” Or it could be possibel when the woman releases two eggs a few days apart but in the same reproductive cycle.
It was realized only when one boy’s DNA did not fully match with the father, one of the two men who fathered the twins. The woman recollected: “I remembered that I had had sex with another man and called him to take the test, which was positive… I was surprised by the results. I didn’t know this could happen and the babies are very similar.”
However, the birth certificate of both of them is in the name of one father and “he takes care of both of them, helps me a lot and gives them all the necessary support that they need,” she told media.
Doctor confirms
Dr Tulio Jorge Franco recently confirmed the details in a talk with the Portuguese news outlet G1. “Two eggs from the same mother are fertilized by different men. The babies share the mother’s genetic material, but they grow in different placentas,” he explained.
He further added that it is an extremely rare case that happens once in a million. “I never imagined that I would see such a case in my life,” he noted.
Department of Biotechnology (DBT) and its PSU, Biotechnology Industry Research Assistance Council (BIRAC) has announced approval from DCGI for emergency use authorization first of its kind intranasal COVID-19 Vaccine to Bharat Biotech (BBIL).
Supported by DBT and BIRAC under the aegis of Mission COVID Suraksha, the mission was launched by DBT and implemented by BIRAC to reinforce and accelerate COVID-19 vaccine development efforts. Scientific leadership at various levels of vaccine development was provided by DBT laboratories and BIRAC. This is the fourth success story for the Covid-19 vaccine under mission Covid Suraksha.
BBV154 is an intranasal replication-deficient chimpanzee adenovirus SARS-CoV-2 vectored vaccine. It consists of a replication deficient ChAd vector expressing the stabilized Spike SARS-CoV-2 (Wuhan variant).
DBT’s Autonomous Institute, National Institute of Immunology (NII), New Delhi utilized their “Human Immune Monitoring and T-cell Immunoassay Platform” to examine the vaccine-induced SARS-CoV-2-specific systemic and mucosal cellular immune responses the trial participants.
Interactive Research School for Health Affairs (IRSHA), Pune completed the Plaque Reduction Neutralization Assay (PRNT) to quantify the neutralizing antibody for the virus from three trial sites.
Covid Suraksha
Dr Rajesh S Gokhale, Secretary, DBT, and Chairperson, BIRAC speaking on the subject said that “The Department through Mission COVID Suraksha, is committed to the development of safe and efficacious COVID-19 vaccines.
BBV154 COVID Vaccine is the first intranasal vaccine approved by DCGI for primary immunization against COVID-19 in the 18+ age group for restricted use in emergency situation being developed in the country under Mission COVID Suraksha and adds to India’s COVID-19 vaccine series.
“This is an excellent example of Aatmanirbharta initiative of the Government of India. I congratulate our scientists for partnering with Bharat Biotech and providing scientific leadership throughout the development of first intranasal COVID-19 vaccine,” said Gokhale.
Karnataka Food and Civil Supplies Minister Umesh Vishwanath Katti aged 61 passed away due to cardiac arrest in Bengaluru on Tuesday night.
The State declared one day mourning.
Prime Minister, Narendra Modi has expressed deep grief on the demise of Karnataka Minister, Umesh Katti.
The Prime Minister tweeted;
“Shri Umesh Katti Ji was an experienced leader who made rich contributions to Karnataka’s development. Pained by his demise. My thoughts are with his family and supporters in this tragic hour. Om Shanti.”
President Droupadi Murmu will virtually launch the TB Mukt Bharat Abhiyaan on Friday to reinvigorate the mission of TB elimination from the country by 2025.
Following the government’s initiative to end Tuberculosis or TB in the country five years ahead of Sustainable Development Goals (SDG) target of 2030 by the United Nations, the Abhiyaan will be launched in presence of Mansukh Mandaviya, Union Minister of Health and Family Welfare and other officials.
The virtual event will be attended by representatives from State and district health administration, corporates, industries, civil society and NGOs as the country reiterates the commitment towards TB elimination by 2025.
The TB Mukt Bharat Abhiyaan has been envisioned to bring together all community stakeholders to support those on TB treatment and accelerate the country’s progress towards TB elimination.
The President will also launch the Ni-kshay Mitra initiative which forms a vital component of the Abhiyaan. The Ni-kshay Mitra portal provides a platform for donors to provide various forms of support to those undergoing TB treatment. The three pronged support includes nutritional, additional diagnostic, and vocational support.
The launch event aims to highlight the need for a societal approach that brings together people from all backgrounds to achieve the ambitious target of eliminating TB from the country by 2025, ahead of the SDG targets set by the UN.
SDG target to eliminate TB
Tuberculosis is an infectious bacterial disease caused by Mycobacterium tuberculosis, which most commonly affects the lungs. In June 2022, WHO’s Director-General Dr Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus held a dialogue with WHO’s Civil Society Task Force on Tuberculosis (CSTF-TB) sought to support the rapid adoption of WHO guidelines at country level.
It has called upon nations to increase access to the best evidence-based interventions for people and communities affected by TB, including prevention, detection and treatment of people with TB and related comorbidities, with the involvement of civil society and affected communities.
Thousands of never-before-seen young stars spotted in a stellar nursery called 30 Doradus, captured by NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope, called Tarantula Nebula owing to its appearance in dusty filaments.
The nebula has long been a favorite for astronomers studying star formation and the Webb has been revealing beautiful distant background galaxies, as well as the detailed structure and composition of the nebula’s gas and dust ever since it’s started capturing the deep space.
At only 161,000 light-years away in the Large Magellanic Cloud galaxy, the Tarantula Nebula is the largest and brightest star-forming region in the Local Group, the galaxies nearest our Milky Way. It is home to the hottest, most massive stars known. Astronomers focused three of Webb’s high-resolution infrared instruments on the Tarantula. Under the lens of Webb’s Near-Infrared Camera (NIRCam), the region resembles a burrowing tarantula’s home, lined with its silk.
The nebula’s cavity centered in the image above has been hollowed out by blistering radiation from a cluster of massive young stars, which sparkle pale blue in the image. Only the densest surrounding areas of the nebula resist erosion by these stars’ powerful stellar winds, forming pillars that appear to point back toward the cluster. These pillars contain forming protostars, which will eventually emerge from their dusty cocoons and take their turn shaping the nebula.
Caption: Nestled in the center of the Tarantula Nebula in the Large Magellanic Cloud is the largest star yet discovered, astronomers have produced the sharpest image ever of this star. Photo:Observatory/NOIRLab/NSF/AURA Acknowledgment
Webb’s Near-Infrared Spectrograph (NIRSpec) caught one very young star doing precisely emerging out of the dust. Astronomers previously thought this star might be a bit older and already in the process of clearing out a bubble around itself. However, NIRSpec showed that the star was only just beginning to emerge from its pillar and still maintained an insulating cloud of dust around itself. Without Webb’s high-resolution spectra at infrared wavelengths, this episode of star formation-in-action could not have been revealed.
The region takes on a different appearance when viewed in the longer infrared wavelengths detected by Webb’s Mid-infrared Instrument (MIRI). The hot stars fade, and the cooler gas and dust glow. Within the stellar nursery clouds, points of light indicate embedded protostars, still gaining mass.
While shorter wavelengths of light are absorbed or scattered by dust grains in the nebula, and therefore never reach Webb to be detected, longer mid-infrared wavelengths penetrate that dust, ultimately revealing a previously unseen cosmic environment.
Caption: NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope
One of the reasons the Tarantula Nebula is interesting to astronomers is that the nebula has a similar type of chemical composition as the gigantic star-forming regions observed at the universe’s “cosmic noon,” when the cosmos was only a few billion years old and star formation was at its peak. Star-forming regions in our Milky Way galaxy are not producing stars at the same furious rate as the Tarantula Nebula, and have a different chemical composition.
Caption: In this mosaic image displays the Tarantula Nebula star, including tens of thousands of never-before-seen young stars that were previously shrouded in cosmic dust. The most active region appears to sparkle with massive young stars, appearing pale blue./Photo:NASA
This makes the Tarantula the closest (i.e., easiest to see in detail) example of what was happening in the universe as it reached its brilliant high noon. Webb will provide astronomers the opportunity to compare and contrast observations of star formation in the Tarantula Nebula with the telescope’s deep observations of distant galaxies from the actual era of cosmic noon.
Boosting physical activity levels and curbing sitting time are highly likely to lower breast cancer risk, finds research designed to strengthen proof of causation and published online in the British Journal of Sports Medicine.
The findings were generally consistent across all types and stages of the disease, reveals the Mendelian randomisation study, prompting the researchers to recommend a stronger focus on exercise as a way of warding off breast cancer.
Mendelian randomisation is a technique that uses genetic variants as proxies for a particular risk factor—in this case lifelong physical activity levels/sedentary behaviour—to obtain genetic evidence in support of a causal relationship.
Exercise/Photo:en.wikipedia.org
Observational studies show that physical inactivity and sedentary behaviour are linked to higher breast cancer risk, but proving they cause breast cancer is another matter.
The researchers therefore used Mendelian randomisation to assess whether lifelong physical activity and sitting time might be causally related to breast cancer risk in general, and specifically to different types of tumour.
They included data from 130,957 women of European ancestry: 69, 838 of them had tumours that had spread locally (invasive); 6667 had tumours that hadn’t yet done so (in situ); and a comparison group of 54,452 women who didn’t have breast cancer.
Exercise-Yoga/Photo:en.wikipedia.org
The researchers then drew on previously published studies that had used the vast repository of UK Biobank data on potential genetic explanations for overall predisposition to physical activity, vigorous physical activity, or sitting time—as measured by wrist-worn activity trackers—to genetically predict how physically active or inactive their own study participants were.
Next, the researchers estimated overall breast cancer risk, according to whether the women had or hadn’t gone through the menopause; and by cancer type,stage (size and extent of tumour spread), and grade (degree of tumour cell abnormality).
Analysis of the data showed that a higher overall level of genetically predicted physical activity was associated with a 41% lower risk of invasive breast cancer, and this was largely irrespective of menopausal status, tumour type, stage, or grade.
Similarly, genetically predicted vigorous physical activity on 3 or more days of the week was associated with a 38% lower risk of breast cancer, compared with no self-reported vigorous activity. These findings were consistent across most of the case groups.
cancer cells/photo:en.wikipedia.org
Finally, a greater level of genetically predicted sitting time was associated with a 104% higher risk of triple negative breast cancer. These findings were consistent across hormone-negative tumour types.
The findings were unchanged after factoring in the production by a single gene of two or more apparently unrelated effects (pleiotropy), such as smoking and overweight, for example.
There are plausible biological explanations for their findings, say the researchers, who point to a reasonable body of evidence indicating numerous causal pathways between physical activity and breast cancer risk, such as overweight/obesity, disordered metabolism, sex hormones, and inflammation.
“Mechanisms linking sedentary time and cancer are likely to at least partially overlap with those underpinning the physical activity relationship,” suggest the researchers.
Their findings provide “strong evidence” that more overall physical activity and less sitting time are likely to reduce breast cancer risk, they say.
And they conclude: “Increasing physical activity and reducing sedentary time are already recommended for cancer prevention. Our study adds further evidence that such behavioural changes are likely to lower the incidence of future breast cancer rates.
“A stronger cancer-control focus on physical activity and sedentary time as modifiable cancer risk factors is warranted, given the heavy burden of disease attributed to the most common cancer in women.”
Emotional eating, or eating as a coping mechanism for negative, positive, or stress-driven emotions, is associated with unhealthy dietary patterns and weight gain. A research article featured in the Journal of Nutrition Education and Behavior, published by Elsevier, discusses adolescent vulnerability to emotional eating and how various feeding practices used by parents, such as restriction, food as reward, and child involvement, influence eating behavior.
“Emotional eating was previously found to be more learned than inherited. This study examined not only the interaction between parents when feeding their children, but also what children learned from watching their parents eat,” said lead author Joanna Klosowska, MSc, Department of Public Health and Primary Care, Ghent University, Ghent, Belgium.
Eating/Photo:en.wikipedia.org
Over the four years between 2013 −2017, covering the time from late childhood to middle adolescence, changes occurred in some parental practices. Parents reported higher monitoring and healthy modeling feeding practices, while the reported levels of food restriction and the healthy environment remained unchanged. During the same time period, adolescents reported a considerable increase in emotional eating from below the average in 2013 to above the average in 2017, according to the norms for the Dutch population. Additionally, the maladaptive way in which they regulated their emotions was also associated with emotional eating.
Dining/Photo:en.wikipedia.org
Food as a reward and monitoring food increased emotional eating especially in instances where the adolescent employed maladaptive strategies in regulating their emotions. Child involvement in meals had an opposite effect since it was associated with higher levels of emotion regulation and lower levels of emotional eating. Interestingly, a parent’s restrained eating behavior was linked to less emotional eating in adolescents.
“This study suggests that parents continue to play an important role in their child’s eating behavior into their teen years,” said Klosowska. “Additional research is needed to understand the impact restrained eating demonstrated by a parent impacts the emotional eating of a child.”
Exposure to air pollution in the first six months of life impacts a child’s inner world of gut bacteria, or microbiome, in ways that could increase risk of allergies, obesity and diabetes, and even influence brain development, suggests new CU Boulder research.
“This study adds to the growing body of literature showing that air pollution exposure, even during infancy, may alter the gut microbiome, with important implications for growth and development,” said senior author Tanya Alderete, assistant professor of Integrative Physiology at CU Boulder.
At birth, an infant hosts little resident bacteria. Over the first two to three years of life, exposure to mother’s milk, solid food, antibiotics and other environmental influences shape which microorganisms take hold. Those microbes, and the metabolites, or byproducts, they produce when they break down food or chemicals in the gut, influence a host of bodily systems that shape appetite, insulin sensitivity, immunity, mood and cognition. While many are beneficial, some microbiome compositions have been associated with Chrohn’s disease, asthma, type 2 diabetes, and other chronic illnesses.
Air pollution/photo:en.wikipedia.org
“The microbiome plays a role in nearly every physiological process in the body, and the environment that develops in those first few years of life sticks with you,” said first author Maximilian Bailey, who graduated in May with a master’s in Integrative Physiology and is now a medical student at Stanford University.
Boosting inflammation
For the study, the researchers obtained fecal samples from 103 healthy, primarily breast-fed Latino infants enrolled in the Southern California Mother’s Milk Study and used genetic sequencing to analyze them.
Using their street addresses and data from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s Air Quality System, which records hourly data from monitoring systems, they estimated exposure to PM2.5 and PM10 (fine inhalable particles from things like factories, wildfires and construction sites) and Nitrogen Dioxide (NO2), a gas largely emitted from cars.
“Overall, we saw that ambient air pollution exposure was associated with a more inflammatory gut-microbial profile, which may contribute to a whole host of future adverse health outcomes,” said Alderete.
For instance, infants with the highest exposure to PM2.5 had 60% less Phascolarctobacterium, a beneficial bacterium known to decrease inflammation, support gastrointestinal health and aid in neurodevelopment. Those with the highest exposure to PM10 had 85% more of the microorganism Dialister, which is associated with inflammation.
infant-small child/photo:en.wikipedia.org
Infants are particularly vulnerable to the health hazards of air pollution because they breathe faster and their gut microbiome is just taking shape.
“This makes early life a critical window where exposure to air pollution may have disproportionately deleterious health effects,” they write.
Meantime, Alderete advises everyone to take these steps to reduce their exposure to both indoor and outdoor pollutants:
Avoid walking outdoors in high-traffic zones
Consider a low-cost air-filtration system, particularly for rooms children spend a lot of time in
If you are cooking, open the windows
And for new moms, breastfeed for as long as possible
“Breast milk is a fantastic way to develop a healthy microbiome and may help offset some of the adverse effects from environmental exposures,” Alderete said.
Suresh Raina, the first Indian batter to score a century in all three international formats, has announced his retirement from “all formats of cricket,” including IPL and other domestic matches. Raina, 35, had already retired from international cricket since 2020.
“I would like to announce my retirement from all formats of cricket,” Raina posted on Twitter on Tuesday.
However, Raina may in play tournaments like the Road Safety Series, for which he has already been confirmed, besides several T20 leagues abroad. “I want to continue playing cricket for two or three years,” he told Dainik Jagran. “I have informed BCCI secretary Jay Shah and vice-president Rajiv Shukla about my decision…. I will play in the Road Safety Series. T20 franchises from South Africa, Sri Lanka and UAE have contacted me but I am yet to take any decision.”
Suresh Raina calls it quits from all cricket matches
Raina, who kept away from the first-class cricket since 2018, played in the IPL last October for the Chennai Super Kings, whom he represented for 11 seasons between 2008 and 2021. He won four titles in CSK in 2010, 2011, 2018 and 2021 and is their top-scorer with 4,687 runs from 176 matches. However, he was released by CSK in Feb 2022 auction.
Raina has so far scored 6,871 runs in 109 first-class matches, 8,078 runs in 302 list A matches, 8,654 runs in 336 T20 matches.
He started playing for Uttar Pradesh in 2002 and made his international debut in 2005. In his career, Raina played 226 ODIs, 78 T20Is and 18 Tests for India, and was a member of the squad that won the ODI World Cup in 2011.
Rishi Sunak, who was defeated in the party leadership contest is not likely to be given any Cabinet berth, breaking from the tradition whereby most unsuccessful leadership contenders have been offered posts, reports said.
The newly elected Conservative leader Liz Truss will take the oath as the next UK Prime Minister on Tuesday. Liz Truss will be the third woman Prime Minister of the United Kingdom after Margaret Thatcher and Theresa May.
Rishi Sunak
Liz Truss defeated rival Rishi Sunak with 81,326 votes to 60,399 among party members. The announcements of the key ministerial portfolios are expected to be announced today by evening.
For the first time in Britain’s history, there will not be a white man in one of the four great offices of state, reports said
According to the British daily newspaper Guardian, James Cleverly may be appointed as foreign secretary, Suella Braverman as home secretary and Kwasi Kwarteng as chancellor.
The expected appointments were welcomed by Boris Johnson’s former race adviser, Samuel Kasumu, who resigned last year after a controversial report by the Commission on Race and Ethnic Disparities, Guardian reported.
Bangladesh Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina, who is on a four-day visit, said India remains a friend of Bangladesh ever and remembered India’s contribution during the liberation struggle.
Hasina was received by Prime Minister Narendra Modi at the Rashtrapati Bhavan where the duo shook hands and posed for the photograph.
She was accorded a ceremonial welcome at Rashtrapati Bhavan in New Delhi on Tuesday. After her welcome, Hasina said, “India is our friend. Whenever I come to India, it is a matter of happiness for me, especially because we always remember India’s contribution during our liberation struggle. We have a friendly relationship, we are cooperating with each other.”
The leaders of the two countries are expected to hold extensive talks, after which the two sides are likely to unveil measures to boost cooperation in the areas of defence, trade and river-water sharing.
PM receives the Prime Minister of Bangladesh, Ms. Sheikh Hasina in a ceremonial welcome, at Rashtrapati Bhavan, in New Delhi on September 06, 2022.
On Thursday, Hasina is scheduled to visit Khwaja Moinuddin Chishti Dargah in Ajmer, Rajasthan.
Hasina’s delegation includes Foreign Minister A.K. Abdul Momen, Commerce Minister Tipu Munshi, Railway Minister Mohd Nurul Islam Suzanne, Liberation War Minister AKM Mozammel Haque and Economic Affairs Adviser to the Prime Minister Masiur AKM Rahman.
She had last visited New Delhi in October 2019. In March 2021, Prime Minister Modi visited Bangladesh to attend events organised to mark the birth centenary of Sheikh Mujibur Rahman and 50 years of Bangladesh’s liberation struggle.
India and Bangladesh finalised the text of the agreement on the interim sharing of waters of the Kushiyara river last month and the Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) is likely to be signed on Tuesday.
Homegrown micro-blogging platform Koo on Tuesday refuted earlier reports that it had laid off 40 employees and clarified that only 15 employees, or 5 per cent of its workforce has been fired.
In a fresh statement to media, the Twitter rival said that 15 positions “have been made redundant or removed due to performance issues. This is completely aligned with the industry standards of hiring and retrenchment. At the same time, Koo continues to hire talent in its monetisation, product and engineering teams.”
The company spokesperson also said Aprameya Radhakrishna, Co-founder and CEO, Koo, was recently in London for an industry event for Indian entrepreneurs and not to raise funds. She “did not meet any funders or high net worth individuals (HNIs) in London and did not engage in any fundraising activity,” said the company.
Koo has so far raised $44.1 million to date. Launched in March 2020, Koo is currently available in 10 languages — Hindi, Marathi, Gujarati, Punjabi, Kannada, Tamil, Telugu, Assamese, Bengali and English.
According to the platform, it has over 45 million downloads and is actively leveraged by 7,000 high-profile people from across the spectrum.
Koo is backed by Tiger Global and early stage investors like Accel, Kalaari Capital, Blume Ventures and Dream incubator. In February this year, Koo raised $10 million. Its investors include Capsier Venture Partner, Ravi Modi Family Trust, Ashneer Grover, FBC Venture Partners, Adventz Finance among others.
Young Australians can now access a free DNA saliva test to learn whether they face increased risk of some cancers and heart disease, which can be prevented or treated early if detected, in a world-first DNA screening study.
The nationally collaborative project, led by Monash University and supported by researchers and clinicians across Australia, will screen at least 10,000 people aged 18-40 for genes that increase risk of certain types of cancers and heart disease that often go undetected.
Those found to be at high risk after DNA testing – about one in 75 or 1.3 per cent – will have their situation explained by experts and be offered genetic counselling and prevention measures, such as regular scans and check-ups.
cancer/photo:en.wikipedia.org
Until now, genetic testing for the DNA changes that increase disease risk has only been available on a small scale for those with a known family history or prior disease diagnosis. Population testing, open to everyone, has the potential to drastically improve access and maximize the preventive benefits of DNA testing.
Monash University’s Associate Professor Paul Lacaze said the project enabled a more efficient and equitable approach to genetic testing, identifying far more people at high risk than current testing methods.
“We hope to identify those at risk while they are young and healthy, not after the fact, and empower them to make more informed decisions about their health,” he said. “For some people, this could save their lives through early detection and prevention of cancer and heart disease. This will also save considerable health system costs in Australia through prevention.
“Providing genetic testing based on family history alone is not enough. Up to 90 per cent of those at high risk in the general population are not identified by current family history-based testing. Most people don’t find out about their genetic risk until it’s too late, like after an incurable cancer or heart attack is diagnosed. We want to change that.”
DNA Screen will identify people with DNA variants in the BRCA1 and BRCA2 genes that lead to an increased risk of hereditary breast and ovarian cancer in women. These genes are also linked to breast and prostate cancer in men, although not as strongly. Men and women who carry DNA variants in the BRCA1 and BRCA2 genes can also pass them onto their children.
The DNA Screen test will also focus on Lynch Syndrome – another condition that increases risk for colorectal, endometrial, and other gastrointestinal cancers. Both cancer-related conditions have effective, proven interventions available to reduce risk if identified early.
This includes attending annual check-ups and screens from age 30, and the option of risk-reducing surgery for some people. Early detection and prevention are often life-saving for cancer.
The DNA test also encompasses heart disease risk, focusing on familial hypercholesterolemia (FH) or ‘genetic high cholesterol’, which results in high risk of heart disease from a young age. Despite effective medications such as statins being available to reduce risk, an estimated 95 per cent of FH carriers are currently undiagnosed.
Associate Professor Lacaze, from the Monash University School of Public Health and Preventive Medicine, is leading a team of national collaborators who were awarded a $2.97 million Medical Research Future Fund (MRFF) grant for the project. The project is supported by the Precision Medicine laboratory at Monash University and the state-of-the-art Biobanking Victoriafacility.
The eventual goal is to develop a new population-based DNA screening program that could be offered through the Australian public healthcare system, available to everyone but targeted on certain medically-actionable conditions where early detection is key.
“We expect to identify about 1 in 75 people at high risk of these diseases. Those found to be high risk won’t necessarily get the disease, but pinpointing risk before symptoms appear enables prevention through regular check-ups, medication, or risk-reducing surgery. It could save their life.
DNA Screen, which is recruiting young people via social media, is expected to save lives and could lead to a wide scale preventive DNA testing program for cancer and heart disease risk, where early detection and prevention can be life-saving.
DNA Screen is the world’s first preventive DNA screening study designed specifically to assess population DNA screening through a national healthcare system. The test is free and involves placing a saliva sample into a small tube received by mail, and sending it back in a postage paid envelope. People can sign up online at dnascreen.monash.edu
Tokyo Institute of Technology researchers have invented a new method that predicts smell based on the odor impression instead of predicting the smell from molecular features.
As the sense of smell is one of the basic senses of animal species, it is critical to finding food, realizing attraction, and sensing danger. Humans detect smells, or odorants, with olfactory receptors expressed in olfactory nerve cells.
These olfactory impressions of odorants on nerve cells are associated with their molecular features and physicochemical properties. This makes it possible to tailor odors to create an intended odor impression. Current methods only predict olfactory impressions from the physicochemical features of odorants. But, that method cannot predict the sensing data, which is indispensable for creating smells.
To tackle this issue, scientists from Tokyo Institute of Technology (Tokyo Tech) have employed the innovative strategy of solving the inverse problem. Instead of predicting the smell from molecular data, this method predicts molecular features based on the odor impression.
Using standard mass spectrum data and machine learning (ML) models, the Tokyo Tech team has found a new method. “We used a machine-learning-based odor predictive model that we had previously developed to obtain the odor impression. Then we predicted the mass spectrum from odor impression inversely based on the previously developed forward model,” explains Professor Takamichi Nakamoto, the leader of the research effort by Tokyo Tech. The findings have been published in PLoS One.
Aroma/Photo:en.wikipedia.org
This simple method allows for the quick preparation of the predicted spectra of odor mixtures and can also predict the required mixing ratio, an important part of the recipe for new odor preparation.
“For example, we show which molecules give the mass spectrum of apple flavor with enhanced ‘fruit’ and ‘sweet’ impressions. Our analysis method shows that combinations of either 59 or 60 molecules give the same mass spectrum as the one obtained from the specified odor impression. With this information, and the correct mixing ratio needed for a certain impression, we could theoretically prepare the desired scent,” highlights Prof. Nakamoto.
This novel method can provide highly accurate predictions of the physicochemical properties of odor mixtures, as well as the mixing ratios required to prepare them, thereby opening the door to endless tailor-made fragrances, said the team.
It looks like the future of odor mixtures smells good!
Diabetes is an ailment that cannot curbed entirely but controlled. The patients of diabetes often experience spiking blood sugar levels due to insufficient insulin generated in the body.
While type-1 diabetes is visible since childhood, diabetes type-2 affects the middle aged people and mostly those in their 50s or 60s. In India too, it’s the most common disease affecting millions of people.
While doctors recommend a low-carbohydrate diet besides regular exercise and weight management to improve insulin sensitivity, some experiments have proved that onions can help reduce the diabetes.
The findings presented at the 97th annual meeting of the Endocrine Society in 2015 show that the extract of an onion can lower blood sugar levels. It was found more effective when given with the common diabetes drug metformin.
“Onion is cheap and available and has been used as a nutritional supplement,” said lead investigator Anthony Ojieh of Delta State University in Nigeria. “It has the potential for use in treating patients with diabetes.”
Ojieh and his colleagues gave metformin and varying doses of onion extract—200, 400 and 600 milligrams per kilograms of body weight daily to see if it would enhance the drug’s effect. Onion extract reportedly lowered the total cholesterol level in diabetic rats, with the two larger doses again having the greatest effects.
Also they found that the onion extract led to an increase in average weight among nondiabetic rats but not diabetic rats. Further, onion extract lowered cholesterol levels.
“Onion is not high in calories. However, it seems to increase the metabolic rate and, with that, to increase the appetite, leading to an increase in feeding,” Ojieh said.
However, for diabetes management, there is no one-size-fits-all approach. Diet is a key and doctors suggest:
Consume daily lots of fruits and vegetables
Avoid carbs and sugar
Eat lean proteins such as chicken and fish
Take nuts and cereals frequently
Legumes and whole grains should be part of your daily diet.
[Disclaimer: Suggestions are for general information and should not be construed as professional medical advice. Please consult your doctor before making any changes to your diet.]
Researchers have discovered that some immunotherapy treatments used to treat cancer can cause fertility damage.
It means these treatments could affect the future fertility and hormonal health of female cancer survivors, prompting experts to call for more research and preventative measures, such as freezing eggs.
Led by the Biomedicine Discovery Institute at Monash University and the Peter MacCallum Cancer Centre, the pre-clinical trial showed that immune checkpoint inhibitors, a common type of immunotherapy drug, resulted in permanent damage to mouse ovaries and the eggs stored inside.
cancer/photo:en.wikipedia.org
Traditional cancer therapies, such as chemotherapy and radiotherapy, are already linked to permanent, negative side effects on the ovaries. This can lead to infertility and premature menopause in young girls and women.
Researchers found that checkpoint inhibitor immunotherapy reduced the number and quality of their eggs, interfered with ovulation, and disrupted the fertility cycle.
Until now the potential fertility side effects of immunotherapy, an emerging and increasingly common cancer treatment that stimulates the immune system, have been unknown.
The study found that a type of immunotherapy called immune checkpoint inhibitors, which ‘release the brakes’ on the immune system to enhance a patient’s ability to fight cancer, could impair immediate and future fertility.
Its authors said studies in female patients were now needed to investigate the findings. In the meantime, fertility preservation through egg or embryo freezing should be considered for women using these immunotherapies.
“Initially these treatments were thought to be less damaging (than chemo and radiotherapy) in the context of off-target effects to the body in general,” Ms Alesi said. “However, it is now clear that inflammatory side effects in other organ systems are quite common with these drugs.
“Our study highlights that caution should be exercised by clinicians and their patients, for whom fertility may be a concern. Studies in women receiving these drugs must now be prioritised.”
Peter MacCallum Cancer Centre Specialist Medical Oncologist Professor in breast cancer and a senior author on the study Sherene Loi said further research into how these drugs impact the ovarian function and fertility of women receiving these drugs must be prioritised and should be included in future clinical trials involving women of reproductive age.
“Our study further highlights that fertility discussions are critical for all age appropriate women who are recommended to receive chemotherapy as well as immunotherapy,” Professor Loi said.
“Appropriate interventions that can preserve fertility and ovarian function can be implemented to facilitate pregnancies in the future, post completion of treatment. These interventions need to be implemented in a timely manner, so as not to delay anti-cancer treatment.
“Immunotherapy is now becoming a standard of care for many women with curable early stage breast cancer, due to impressive results in reducing breast cancer recurrences, but further research into the long-term effects of immunotherapy is needed.”
Apart from drugs that block ovaries from producing hormones during chemotherapy, and strategies to prevent premature menopause in younger women, Ms Alesi said egg and embryo freezing was the only fertility preservation measure available.
She said it was important to remember that embryo freezing was expensive, invasive and did not prevent ovarian damage. This meant that premature menopause could still be a risk for these women.
“Therefore, we are now prioritising investigation of targeted ovarian preservation strategies that aim to prevent the damage to the ovary from occurring in the first place, without interfering with the drugs’ ability to fight the cancer” she said.
Babies and children under three years old are less likely to develop croup if their mothers took fish oil and vitamin D supplements during pregnancy, according to new results from a clinical trial.
Croup is a viral chest infection that affects young children. It causes a characteristic ‘barking’ cough, a hoarse voice and difficulty breathing. Croup is common and usually mild, but some children will need hospital treatment and breathing support.
The study was presented by Dr Nicklas Brustad, a clinician and postdoctoral researcher working on the Copenhagen Prospective Studies on Asthma in Childhood (COPSAC) at Copenhagen University Hospital, Denmark.
He told the Congress: “There is currently no vaccine against the pathogen that causes this disease. Therefore, other preventive strategies are needed, and measures initiated during pregnancy might be important since croup occurs in babies and young children. For such purpose, there is evidence that both vitamin D and fish oil could have an influence on the immune system.”
croup-chest infection/photo:en.wikipedia.org
The study included 736 pregnant women being cared for by COPSAC from 2010. The women were divided up into four groups. One group were given a high-dose vitamin D supplement (2800 international units per day) and fish oil containing long-chain n-3-polyunsaturated fatty acids (2.4 grams), the second group were given high-dose vitamin D and olive oil, the third group were given standard-dose vitamin D (400 international units per day) and fish oil, and the final group were given standard-dose vitamin D and olive oil. All the women took the supplements daily from their 24th week of pregnancy until one week after their babies were born. Neither the women nor the researchers knew which supplements they were taking until the end of the study.
Researchers monitored the children until they were three years old and any who were suspected of suffering from croup were diagnosed by a doctor or via their medical records. There was a total of 97 cases of croup amongst the children.
Overall, children whose mothers took the fish oil had an 11% risk of croup, compared to 17% in the children whose mothers took olive oil (a 38% decrease). Children whose mothers took high-dose vitamin D had an 11% risk of croup, compared to an 18% risk in those whose mothers took the standard-dose vitamin D (a 40% decrease).
Dr Brustad said: “Our findings suggest that vitamin D and fish oil could be beneficial against childhood croup in sufficiently high doses. These are relatively cheap supplements meaning that this could be a very cost-effective approach to improving young children’s health.
Vitamin D and fish oil can stimulate the immune system to help babies and young children clear infections more effectively.”
The research team working at COPSAC have already investigated other potential benefits of vitamin D and fish oil during pregnancy, including its effects on bone development, the central nervous system, body composition and asthma. They will continue to follow the children in the study and plan to investigate why some children are more prone to infections in childhood than others.
Professor Rory Morty from the University of Heidelberg is chair of European Respiratory Society’s lung and airway developmental biology group and was not involved in the research. He said: “We know that lung health in babies and young children can be influenced during pregnancy. For example, babies whose mothers smoke tend to have worse lung health. We are increasingly seeing that elements of a mother’s diet can also help or hinder a baby’s lung development.
“This research suggests that taking vitamin D and fish oil supplements during pregnancy could have benefits for babies and young children. We would like to see further research in this area to support these findings as this could lead to new recommendations for supplementation during pregnancy. Pregnant women should always speak to their doctor before taking supplements.”
Artificial intelligence (AI) can be used to detect COVID-19 infection in people’s voices by means of a mobile phone app, according to research to be presented on Monday at the European Respiratory Society International Congress in Barcelona, Spain [1].
The AI model used in this research is more accurate than lateral flow/rapid antigen tests and is cheap, quick and easy to use, which means it can be used in low-income countries where PCR tests are expensive and/or difficult to distribute.
Ms Wafaa Aljbawi, a researcher at the Institute of Data Science, Maastricht University, The Netherlands, told the congress that the AI model was accurate 89% of the time, whereas the accuracy of lateral flow tests varied widely depending on the brand. Also, lateral flow tests were considerably less accurate at detecting COVID infection in people who showed no symptoms.
COVID-19 infection usually affects the upper respiratory track and vocal cords, leading to changes in a person’s voice.
Covid/commons.wikimedia.org
“These promising results suggest that simple voice recordings and fine-tuned AI algorithms can potentially achieve high precision in determining which patients have COVID-19 infection,” she said.Moreover, they enable remote, virtual testing and have a turnaround time of less than a minute. They could be used, for example, at the entry points for large gatherings, enabling rapid screening of the population.”
The app is installed on the user’s mobile phone, the participants report some basic information about demographics, medical history and smoking status, and then are asked to record some respiratory sounds. These include coughing three times, breathing deeply through their mouth three to five times, and reading a short sentence on the screen three times.
The researchers used a voice analysis technique called Mel-spectrogram analysis, which identifies different voice features such as loudness, power and variation over time.
“In this way we can decompose the many properties of the participants’ voices,” said Ms Aljbawi. “In order to distinguish the voice of COVID-19 patients from those who did not have the disease, we built different artificial intelligence models and evaluated which one worked best at classifying the COVID-19 cases.”
Its overall accuracy was 89%, its ability to correctly detect positive cases (the true positive rate or “sensitivity”) was 89%, and its ability to correctly identify negative cases (the true negative rate or “specificity”) was 83%.
“These results show a significant improvement in the accuracy of diagnosing COVID-19 compared to state-of-the-art tests such as the lateral flow test,” said Ms Aljbawi.
The patients were “high engagers”, who had been using the app weekly over months or even years to record their symptoms and other health information, record medication, set reminders, and have access to up-to-date health and lifestyle information. Doctors can assess the data via a clinician dashboard, enabling them to provide oversight, co-management and remote monitoring.
