Showing posts with label DNA. Show all posts
Showing posts with label DNA. Show all posts

Wednesday, May 1, 2013

No more the good guy

E. coli is now declared a human hazard as scientists are observing a discomfiting link to bowel & colon cancer. The world must act.

Beware! E. coli is a dire human threat now. Research done by medical scientists in Britain has revealed that the primary cause of one of the most common cancers is the E. coli virus.

As a matter of fact, Escherichia coli (commonly known as E. coli) happens to be the most studied organism in the world. It is a very complex group of gut bacteria that’s found in all warm-blooded animals including humans. The general theory and empirical evidence till date postulated that the bacterium was mostly harmless. This bacterium has even been deemed in some past studies as being essential for the survival of human beings and cattle as it helps to digest food. But recently, medical tests have revealed that E. coli might be the main cause of bowel/colorectal cancer (a disease which claims 600,000 plus lives a year, as per WHO’s International Agency for Research on Cancer). Tests have indicated that E. coli bacteria are more prevalent among bowel cancer patients than otherwise. A germ being the root cause of cancer may seem uncommon. However, it is not totally out-of-place, as it has been proved beyond doubt that there are living viruses that cause cervical cancer and bacteria that lead to stomach cancer.

E. coli reportedly has genes that are poisonous and lead to DNA damage that is common in cancer. However, it is not a sureshot cause of food poisoning and can remain dormant in the bowels with no ill effects. But the recurrence is high in patients. This is reflected in a study published in Journal Science. A sample size of 21 taken from bowel cancer patients revealed that two thirds of them were carriers of this bug; whereas among healthy individuals, that rate is just one-fifth. Experiments on these lines are carried out extensively on mice. They also show that bowel cancers are much more frequent when the bacteria with a particularly DNA damaging pks gene is present in the body.

It is also suspected by researchers that E. coli is a carrier of colon cancer, and its involvement is deeper than previously thought. Professor Jonathan Rhodes of Liverpool University is studying this with keen interest, and opines from his own analysis, “The bottomline message is that there seems to be a strong association between a type of E. coli and the development of colon cancer. And given that this type of E. coli is specifically able to damage DNA and inflict the sort of damage you get in a cancer, it is very likely that it has a causative role, at least in some patients.”

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Source : IIPM Editorial, 2013.
An Initiative of IIPM, Malay Chaudhuri
 
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Monday, March 25, 2013

B&E This Fortnight

INTERNATIONAL
ECONOMY & BUSINESS STRATEGY

GOOGLE 2.0

In what is considered to be a strategic shift in its boardroom, Larry Page, Co-founder & President of Google Inc., is set to assume charge of the Mountain View giant as CEO, starting April 1, 2011. Eric Schmidt, who had been playing the business-brain of the company since 1999, will continue as Executive Chairman and will focus primarily on strategic deals & partnerships, broader customer & business relationships and government outreach. This critical decision comes right after the announcement of its financial results for the quarter ending December 2010, in which the company reported GAAP net income of $2.54 billion, a rise of 28.93% when compared to the same period the previous year. Revenues stood at $8.44 billion, representing a y-o-y increase of 26%. This change in management seems to signal that even the management has now realised that in order to keep pace with the manner in which Google is venturing into newer arenas, it has to get newer and younger thoughts into its boardroom. Apart from the search engine business, the Silicon Valley based giant is betting big on the Android OS, YouTube and a secret project which will be a direct competitor to Facebook. A mutated DNA will pose some big challenges. Can Page work out an integrated plan to make the $195 billion giant bigger?

Third time ‘unlucky’!
How does it feel like losing a CEO whose very look confirms that he was responsible for a 264% rise in value of your stockholding in just the past two years? This story is of Steven P. Jobs, who has taken yet another break from Apple – his second since 2008. Though many experts claim that he will be back in few months, and that COO Tim Cook’s appointment as acting CEO is only a temporary affair, this time, the fears of Jobs’ end as CEO, have intensified. The last time when he took a break, Jobs was back in time for the iPad launch. However, this time around, shareholders and analysts alike are more apprehensive about his return. Apple has no blockbuster launches lined up for 2011, except a modified second version of the iPad (the iPad 2). In fact, the tech giant only plans to make minor modifications to its existing line of products. When news of Jobs’ leave became public, Apple’s stock crashed by 8% on NASDAQ, when trading opened the day following the announcement on January 17, 2011. Will Jobs be back? Will Apple’s market value fall in his absence? Will Apple a company that was once “too big to fail” become one “too big to save”? Questions that only Jobs can answer and time can prove.


Source : IIPM Editorial, 2012.
An Initiative of IIPM, Malay Chaudhuri
and Arindam Chaudhuri (Renowned Management Guru and Economist).

For More IIPM Info, Visit below mentioned IIPM articles

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Friday, January 25, 2013

Cinema on 18mm

Here’s a new avenue for individuals to unleash their creativity: Cell phone cinema!

Many people may argue that mobile phone radiation is harmful to one’s health. Some say it can damage one’s DNA; some put up videos on YouTube showing how it can cook an egg and even make popcorns! Worst of all, phones with cameras are often used by the disoriented and perverted minds to come up with scandalous MMS videos. However, Asian Academy of Film & Television (AAFT) has given mobile phone users a new direction, toward the art of movie making. So, as it goes ahead promoting this radiation-emitting monster, no one, as yet, is complaining. This year, on 21st January, 2009, it organised the 2nd International Film Festival of Cell Phone Cinema, which aims at providing a platform for creative individuals to create masterpieces by making use of this rapidly growing technology. Here, the competition was in the field of fiction/music videos, reality/electronic news gathering, and still images, wherein the participants are expected to use mobile phones only in order to take photographs, and videos are not to exceed the time limit of three minutes. The competition witnessed 500 entries from over 20 countries.

They were judged by a jury, which comprised a mix of Indian and international personalities such as Karl Bardosh, Master Professor, Tisch School of Arts, NYU and the pioneer of these awards; Kurt Inderbitzin, Hollywood Film producer/director; Rahul Rawail, film director; Pankaj Prashar, film director; and Arun Anand, still photographer. The winners for the video films were All Elements of Hand – Ek Kavita by Sachin Sreshta and Mukti Krishnan as well as Rainwaters by Sachit Sadanandan; which won US $1,000 and US $500 respectively. While the first is a film that shows what a human can achieve with his or her hands, including surreal achievements like holding sunlight in one’s palm, the second is a film about rain water harvesting. The best award for a still photograph with a prize of US $500 went to Dead Carrier can Die too by Kamal Mahrishi that showed a discarded van from a morgue. The winning films will be screened at New York University – Tisch School of the Arts Theatre.

Akshay Marwah, the festival director, quotes film director Pankaj Prashar to enumerate the criteria for choosing the winners, “the main idea was not replacing a film camera by a film camera, but to see that a mobile phone can capture moments that film cameras can’t, and that is one of the most important criteria and of course technicalities and quality would follow.” Mr. Rawail, one of the jury members, said, “Whatever the technology, it is ultimately the content which should hold the attention of the viewer, and therefore those who create, must realise that their responsibility has increased”.


Source : IIPM Editorial, 2012.
An Initiative of IIPM, Malay Chaudhuri
and Arindam Chaudhuri (Renowned Management Guru and Economist).

For More IIPM Info, Visit below mentioned IIPM articles.
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