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New breeding ground for Black-necked Stork
- The place, a wetland near the Dhabok airport, is said to be the second known breeding ground for the
Black-necked Stork ( Ephippiorhynchus asiaticus ) in Rajasthan after the celebrated wetland, Keoladeo National Park near Bharatpur. - They are very fussy while breeding. If the tree on which the nest is made is cut or damaged the next year, they would rather leave the place for good than experiment with a new tree
- The population of Black-necked Stork, though not listed as endangered by the IUCN, is estimated to be slim with their combined presence in South and South East Asia recording a low 1,000 birds.
- In India, the species is spotted in the west, in the central highlands and the Northern Gangetic plains extending up to the Assam valley. The birds are found in sizeable numbers in Australia.
- Black-necked Storks are traditionally referred to as “Loha Sarang” in Bihar and the Mir Shikars, the traditional bird hunting community there maintained a tradition of insisting on a young man wanting to get married to catch a Black-necked Stork before getting the bride. This practice was stopped in 1920 after one of the aspirants was killed by the bird, which can get violent when challenged.
“Relatively few studies undertaken on positive functions of microbiota”
- The positive functions of microbiota within certain threshold levels in the human gut constituted an important area of research that could lead to a better understanding of the pathogenesis of a host of bacterial, viral and parasitic infections
- Pointing out that the intestinal flora bacteria's functions were protective (pathogen displacement by competing for space and nutrients), structural (barrier fortification and development of immune system) and metabolic (synthesis of vitamins), he cited studies with mice to argue that the absence of intestinal flora raised susceptibility to infections, reduced vascularity, enzyme activity and immunoglobulin levels and thickened muscle wall thickness.
- Another study on community diarrhoea, one problem being that unlike a disease like TB with a single etiology line, diarrhoea had as many as 26 different etiology fault lines and required pathogen tests spanning bacteria, viruses and parasites —found that 29 per cent of infections were caused by mixed pathogens that ranged from vibrio cholera to rotaviruses and giardia parasites.
- One of the study findings was that while in the case of an organism like the shigella there has hardly any difference, the odds of finding a co-infection involving adenovirus and rotavirus were the highest. The study also showed that polymicrobial infection associated with vibrio cholerae and rotavirus was non-random unlike previously thought of
- National Institute of Cholera and Enteric Diseases was now analysing questions such as the role of pathogens in healthy children, the point where the balance between pathogens and microbiota gets disrupted and the immune response to pathogens in a healthy child.
Hedge your bet, plants “talk''
- According to scientists at Britain's Exeter University, a cabbage was “heard'' warning its neighbours of trouble ahead after it had a leaf snipped with scissors.
- By adding the protein luciferase — which makes fireflies glow in the dark — to the DNA, the plants' emissions could be monitored on camera. One cabbage plant had a leaf cut off with scissors and started emitting a gas — methyl jasmonate — thereby ‘telling' its neighbours there may be trouble ahead.
- Two nearby cabbage plants, which had not been touched, received the message they should protect themselves. They did this by producing toxic chemicals on the leaves to fend off predators such as caterpillars
- It's fascinating to realise that there could be a constant chatter going on between different plants, that they can in some way sense chemically what is happening to others, like a hidden language which could be going on all around us. Most people assume that plants lead a rather passive life, but in reality they move and sense and communicate. It's almost like they show a kind of intelligence
