Sci&Tech, Medical and Envirnoment

Trai recommendations on blocking lost, stolen mobiles by Dec

Telecom regulator Trai is likely to come out with its final recommendations on blocking lost and stolen mobiles by December to provide relief to people who fear the misuse of stored data and personal information in such events.
we have come across some problems with regard to duplicate International Mobile Equipment Identity (IMEI) numbers in mobile handsets available in the market, which is difficult to track.
An IMEI is a unique serial number that identifies the handset. It is stored in the equipment identity register (EIR) database of the service provider.
The telecom service providers can only block the SIM card. They, however, do not block the mobile phone.

Rose out of poverty to lead way in deciphering genetic code

Har Gobind Khorana, who rose from childhood poverty in pre-partition India to become a biochemist and share a Nobel prize for his role in deciphering the genetic code, has died in Concord, Massachusetts. Khorana, aged 89, was professor emeritus at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
He received the 1968 Nobel prize in physiology or medicine with Robert Holley, of Cornell University, and Marshall Nirenberg, of the National Institutes of Health. They worked independently of one another and received the award for showing how genetic information is translated into proteins, which carry out the functions of a living cell.
Their experiments looked at the nucleic acids found in RNA, a chemical in cells that translates the genetic information contained in DNA. RNA is composed of four chemical bases, adenine, cytosine, uracil and guanine, which are represented by the letters A, C, U and G. The three scientists showed that these chemical bases combine to form three-letter ''words'' that represent amino acids, the components from which proteins are constructed.
Nirenberg discovered the first word, UUU, the code for phenylalanine. Khorana used chemical synthesis to combine the letters into specific defined patterns, such as UCUCUCUCU, from which he deduced that UCU encoded for serine and CUC encoded for leucine.
In 1972, Khorana reported a second breakthrough: the construction of the first artificial gene, using off-the-shelf chemicals. Four years later, he succeeded in getting an artificial gene to function in a bacterial cell.
The ability to synthesise DNA was central to advances in genetic engineering and the development of the biotechnology industry.
Khorana was born in the village of Raipur in the Punjab region of what is now Pakistan.
Khorana became a citizen of the United States in 1966.

India inks climate change adaptation deal with neighbours

Realising that consequences of climate change in Himalayas can no longer be ignored, India along with Bhutan, Nepal and Bangladesh has signed a declaration for wide-ranging collaboration on energy, water, food and biodiversity issues to addresss the threat to their ecosystem.
The four nations reached the pact at the two-day "Climate Summit for a Living Himalayas" against the backdrop of melting glaciers, erratic weather conditions, changing rainfall patterns and increasing temperatures impacting the people and wildlife of the region.
The four nations broadly agreed to combine powers to increase access to 'affordable and reliable' clean energy resources and technology through a regional knowledge sharing mechanism.
This would include diversification of energy supply, improved regional connectivity for electricity and natural gas, as well as efforts to enhance energy efficiency across the Eastern Himalayas
Consensus was also reached on food security and securing livelihoods, with the deal covering adaptive approaches to improving and sustaining food production, promoting systems that help vulnerable communities gain better access to nutritious food, as well as regional knowledge sharing and capacity building

Breast Cancer Genetic Profiling Has Not Achieved Personalized Medicine Yet

Although ten years of genetic profiling has had an enormous impact on the understanding of breast cancer, progress on individualizing therapy has been rather limited
At this moment there are no commercially available molecular tests that can predict benefit from a specific therapeutic agent, despite of many prognostic and predictive signatures having been developed.
Treatment decisions have usually been based on several clinical factors, such as tumor size and its location, estrogen receptor (ER) status, and whether the cancer has spread to lymph nodes or distant sites in the body.
With these approaches, about 60% of all patients with early-stage breast cancer still receive adjuvant chemotherapy, of which only a small proportion, 2-15% of patients, will ultimately derive benefit, while all remain at risk of toxic side-effects.
Using gene signatures to predict which patients may benefit from specific therapies has been less successful, and even though scientists have developed many predictive signatures, some have been based on unreliable data; their usefulness in patients continues to be controversial.
The theoretical knowledge and logistical lessons learned from gene expression profiling studies, however, will prove useful for research aiming to develop the next generation of prognostic and predictive biomarkers.

M-governance gains momentum

Governments worldwide have successfully deployed mobile-based technologies for providing a wide variety of public services, and the Indian States are following suit.
A few years ago, Kerala launched ‘Dr. SMS,' an m-health information system, for providing information on medical facilities available in the locality of the resident. Goa followed
Next came Maharashtra. It adopted a similar traffic management system through mobile alerts.
A laudable initiative launched by the Greater Hyderabad Municipal Corporation in September tries to use technology in an area that requires continuous monitoring. A mobile phone-based Intelligent Garbage Monitoring System enables sanitary supervisors to report the status of cleaning of garbage bins through their GPS-enabled mobile phones.
The map with a GIS interface spans all areas of the city. Managing the number of trips, gathering daily summary of the clearance and, most importantly, reports of the bins that are full but have not been cleared can also be obtained.
When trash is collected, each bin is photographed with a camera phone. The image is loaded on the website, where it is monitored by an administrator in the municipality office. Earlier, the clearing of bins was monitored through information from sanitary supervisors.
Experts say that though mobile applications for public services delivery use light technologies, they require collaboration among all stakeholders.

Energy-efficiency labelling for laptops set to gather pace

The newly introduced Bureau of Energy Efficiency (BEE) labelling regime for laptops is set to gain traction in the coming days, with one more major manufacturer about to adopt it and others getting ready to follow suit, according to the Manufacturers' Association of Information Technology (MAIT).
It is the voluntary phase that is on in the case of laptops and BEE is expected to come up with a schedule for covering laptops, desktops and office-automation products for mandatory compliance
The standard is based on the Energy Star programme of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency and the U.S. Department of Energy.
The programme was meant to help consumers identify and buy energy-efficient products “that offer savings on energy bills without sacrificing performance, features, and comfort.”
Labelling decision for laptops is a very recent one and started only on March 30, 2011.