Rishi View Point

In our fossil-fuel age, oil spills remain a major problem. From the Exxon Valdez to the recent Prestige disaster in Spain, several million tons of oil soils the world's seas every year, causing ecological catastrophe. Scientists developing cleanup strategies have looked to the microbes that thrive in the wake of such spills as one solution. Now, thanks to a detailed breakdown of one of the most effective of these oil-eaters, they are closer to having biologically based remedies for such environmental disasters. Alcanivorax borkumensis is a rod-shaped bacteria that relies on oil to provide it with energy. Relatively rare in unpolluted seas it quickly comes to dominate the marine microbial ecosystem after an oil spill, and it can be found throughout the world's oceans. V�tor A. P. Martins dos Santos of the German Research Center for Biotechnology and his colleagues broke the marine organism's genome into more than 3 million base pairs and then pieced them together into a c...

New Delhi metallo-ß-lactamase-1, or NDM-1 for short, is a gene carried by bacteria that makes the strain resistant to carbapenem antibiotics. This is concerning because these antibiotics are some of the most powerful ones, used on hard-to-treat infections that evade other drugs. NDM-1 (or more precisely the DNA code for this enzyme) can easily now jump from one strain of bacteria to another. Experts are worried that it may end up in another bacterium which is already resistant to many other antibiotics. Ultimately, it could produce dangerous infections that would spread rapidly from person to person and be almost impossible to treat. Other treatment options are available to fight these infections but they present major challenges for clinicians and will often demand combinations of antibiotics are used. Scientists have identified some strains that have been resistant to all known antibiotics So far, many of the UK cases have been in patients who have recently travelled to India or Paki...

The Kosi River, called Koshi in Nepal (कोशी नदी), is a transboundary river between Nepal and India, and is one of the largest tributaries of the Ganges. The river, along with its tributaries, drains a total area of 69,300 km2 (26,800 sq mi) up to its confluence with the Ganges in India (29,400 km2/11,400 sq mi in China, 30,700 km2/11,900 sq mi in Nepal and 9,200 km2/3,600 sq mi in India). The watershed also includes part of Tibet, such as the Mount Everest region, and the eastern third of Nepal. The river basin is surrounded by the ridges separating it from the Brahmaputra in the north, the Gandaki in the west, the Mahananda in the east, and by the Ganges in the south. The river is joined by major tributaries, approximately 48 km (30 mi) north of the Indo-Nepal border, breaking into more than twelve distinct channels with shifting courses due to flooding. Kamlā, Bāghmati (Kareh) and Budhi Gandak are major tributaries of Koshi in India, besides minor tributaries like Bhutahi Balān. Over...

Once a train was moving on the railway line. Suddenly the train got down from the railway line and started moving into the fields.The passengers got angry and decided to punish the train driver.When the train stopped, all the passengers came to the driver and asked:"Why did you take the train off the track into the fields."Driver: A man came in front and was standing on the railway line.Passeners: Why did you risk the life of so many passengers in order to save the life of one man.You should have driven the train on that man.Driver: I was going to do this only but the man ran towards the field. Banta: “My grandfather’s watch fell into a well and when it was found after 30 years, it was still keeping correct time” Santa: What is so great about it? Once my grandfather fell into a well, and after thirty years when he was taken out, he was still alive.” Banta: “How can it be possible? What was he doing in the well for thirty years?” Santa: “He was winding your grandfather’s wrist...