A Thought for Today-685: Thornton Wilder

Seek the lofty by reading, hearing and seeing great work at some moment every day - Thornton Wilder

Q&A-1: What percentage of the human body is bacteria?

What percentage of the human body is bacteria?

Jun 13, 2012

3 percent

The human body contains trillions of microorganisms — outnumbering human cells by 10 to 1. Because of their small size, however, microorganisms make up only about 1 to 3 percent of the body's mass (in a 200-pound adult, that's 2 to 6 pounds of bacteria), but play a vital role in human health.

Source: Google.com

India Watch-23: The Right to Vote

We are the only nation in the world which gave every adult the right to vote from its first day. In the US the world’s second largest democracy this right was given more than 150 years after their independence.

Courtesy: Facebook

Eyecatchers-188: 2015 floods recharged Chennai's groundwater, but polluted it

2015 floods recharged Chennai's groundwater, but polluted it

Ram Sundaram | TNN | Oct 12, 2017, 08:08 IST

Researchers collected water samples from 22 spots along the adyar after the floods and in April 2016.

The 2015 floods may have recharged aquifers across the city, but it con taminated the groundwater with bacteria and chemical ions, a re search by Anna University has found. Bacterial counts and chemical ions in groundwater samples collected across the city exceeded Bureau of Indian Standard's (BIS) recommended limits, concludes the research recently published in `Nature'.

Researchers found presence of V Cholerae and S Typhi among other pathogens, which can cause cholera, typhoid, urinary tract and respiratory infections. These pathogens, when isolated from groundwater, have shown resistance to widely prescribed antibiotics like ceftriaxone, doxycycline and nalidixic acid.

Continued showers during the last fortnight of November 2015 and unprecedented rainfall on December 1 in the catchment area of Adyar inundated the bank of the river the next day . Samples were collected from 22 areas along the river soon after the floods and six months later in April 2016.

The research team during field visits found that several wells located on either side of the banks were flooded in December 2015 and in all the bore wells, the annular space between the casing and discharge pipe was not securely protected with water tight seals. One of the researchers, professor L Elango, said this led to the direct entry of surface water into the ground through the annular space.

The top few meters were highly weathered and turned into regolith, layer of unconsolidated solid material covering the bedrock, and a thin layer of alluvium (3m to 5 m) formed in some regions along the river, the research paper observed. "This supported sorption [a process by which a substance becomes attached to another] of contaminated urban run-off carrying sewage, water from industrial and domestic sources, printed papers, metal, batteries, oil and paint," said G Gowrisankar, who was also a part of this study .

The team compared the groundwater quality with drinking water standards specified by BIS and suggested that groundwater not only in flood-affected areas, but also in some non-affected locations were unsuitable for direct domestic use. Concern for water quality based on chemical constituents was mainly due to calcium (>200 miligraml) and sulphate (400 mgl) as they exceeded the BIS limits.

The study found that the total bacterial count (TBC) in groundwater was high in most of the affected locations. The runoff carrying domestic sewage entered the contaminated Adyar river and increased microbial counts in groundwater of affected areas. In non-affected regions, it was comparatively lower.Though these pathogens isolated from the groundwater showed resistance to antibiotics, namely ceftriaxone, doxycycline and nalidixic acid, they were sensitive to others including chloramphenicol, ciprofloxacin, norfloxacin, and tetracycline, the report concluded.

Courtesy: The Times of India dated

Grateful thanks to Mr.Ram Sundaram, TNN and The Times of India

Facts and Figures-85: Sivakasi Fireworks

SIVAKASI FIREWORKS

NOT  SPARKLING!

No. of fireworks manufacturing units in Sivakasi: 800

Annual Business Turnover: Rs.4000 crore

No. of people engaged in manufacturing fireworks: 1.75 lakh

Courtesy: The Times of India

Self-Improvement-157: Create safe spaces for yourself....

Create safe spaces for yourself.  Wrap yourself in goodness and warmth and love. Stay surrounded by people who are genuine - Think twice if you can't trust them with your heart. You are allowed to protect your peace. Be mindful and aware of all energy that you allow into your life - Alex Elle

A Thought for Today-684: Benjamin Disraeli

Nurture great thoughts; for, you will never go higher than your thoughts – Benjamin Disraeli

Eyecatchers-187: Cracking the body clock code wins trio a Nobel Prize

Cracking the body clock code wins trio a Nobel Prize

Three Americans recognized for discovering the cellular gears that drive circadian rhythms

By  Tina Hesman Saey and Aimee Cunningham, October 2, 2017

Discoveries about the molecular ups and downs of fruit flies’ daily lives have won Jeffrey C. Hall, Michael Rosbash and Michael W. Young the Nobel Prize in physiology or medicine.

These three Americans were honored October 2 by the Nobel Assembly at the Karolinska Institute in Stockholm for their work in discovering important gears in the circadian clocks of animals. The trio will equally split the 9 million Swedish kronor prize — each taking home the equivalent of $367,000.

The researchers did their work in fruit flies. But “an awful lot of what was subsequently found out in the fruit flies turns out also to be true and of huge relevance to humans,” says John O’Neill, a circadian cell biologist at the MRC Laboratory of Molecular Biology in Cambridge, England. Mammals, humans included, have circadian clocks that work with the same logic and many of the same gears found in fruit flies, say Jennifer Loros and Jay Dunlap, geneticists at the Geisel School of Medicine at Dartmouth College.

Excerpt from Science News
https://www.sciencenews.org/article/cracking-body-clock-code-wins-trio-nobel-prize

Grateful thanks to ScienceNews.org

Self-Improvement-156: GIVE YOURSELF A BREAK

GIVE  YOURSELF  A  BREAK

Stop beating yourself up!

Everyone makes mistakes, has setbacks and failures.

You don’t come with a book on how to get it right all the time.

You will fail sometimes, not because you planned to, but simply

Because you are human.  Failure is a part of creating a great life.

-         Les Brown, tinybuddha.com

Gratful thanks to Les Brown and tinybuddha.com

A Thought for Today-683: Emerson

Beware of what you want; for, you will get it – Emerson

India Watch-22: The world's leading receiver of remittances

Remittances to India are money transfers from non-resident Indians (NRIs) employed outside the country to family, friends or relatives residing in India. India is the world's leading receiver of remittances, claiming more than 12% of the world's remittances in 2015.

 Remittances to India stood at US$68.91 billion in 2015, accounting for over 4% of the country's GDP. As per the Ministry of Overseas Indian Affairs (MOIA), remittance is received from the approximately 25 million members of the Indian diaspora.

Source: Wikipedia

Grateful thanks to Wikipedia, the Free Encyclopedia

Q&A-5: How many organisms are in the human body?

How many organisms are in the human body?

Researchers hope the advance marks an important step towards understanding how microbes help make humans human. The human body contains about 100 trillion cells, but only maybe one in 10 of those cells is actually — human. The rest are from bacteria, viruses and other microorganisms.

Grateful thanks to Google, Jun 13, 2012

Facts and Figures-85: Incredible number of Lifeforms living on your skin

There are more lifeforms living on your skin than there are people on the planet.

http://all-that-is-interesting.com/interesting-facts-about-the-world#2

Eyecatchers-186: Supreme Court for 3-tier right to privacy: Intimate, private and public

Supreme Court for 3-tier right to privacy: Intimate, private and public

Dhananjay Mahapatra| TNN | Updated: Aug 3, 2017, 08:13 AM IST

HIGHLIGHTS

· 1st zone: It's concerning marriage, sexuality, relationships.

· 2nd zone: It involves imparting personal data through credit card,  social networking sites, I-T declarations, etc.

· 3rd zone: Here, the privacy protection requires minimal            regulation. The individual will retain his privacy to body & mind.

The Supreme Court on Wednesday outlined a three-tier, graded approach to the question whether privacy is a fundamental right by examining the issue through its intimate, private and public aspects even as it reserved its verdict in the case. 

Prior to completion of the two-week-long hearing that attracted arguments for and against conferring fundamental right status to privacy+ but which saw all parties accepting its intrinsic importance for an individual, a nine-judge bench headed by Chief Justice J S Khehar said privacy could be configured into three zones. 

Justice D Y Chandrachud set out the tentative thought process and drew support from Justice R F Nariman. He said, 

"The first zone could be the most intimate zone of privacy concerning marriage, sexuality, relations with family and the law should frown upon any intrusion. The state could still intrude into this intimate zone in extraordinary circumstances provided it met stringent norms. 

"The second zone would be the private zone, which involved parting of personal data+ by use of credit card, social networking platforms, income tax declarations. In this sphere, sharing of personal data by an individual will be used only for the purpose for which it is shared by an individual.

 "The third is the public zone where privacy protection requires minimal regulation. Here, the personal data shared will not mean the right to privacy is surrendered. The individual will retain his privacy to body and mind." The formulation suggests right to privacy may not be unfettered.

Excerpt from The Times of India dated Aug.3, 2017

Grateful thanks to  Mr. Dhananjay Mahapatra and The Times of India.

Self-Improvement-155: Speak Five Lines to Yourself Every Morning

* I am the Best
* I can Do It
* God is always with me
* I am a Winner
* Today is My Day

APJ Abdul Kalam

A Thought for Today-682: Celebrate Life!

Take chances. Tell the truth.  Learn to say NO. Spend money on the things you love. Laugh till your stomach hurts. Dance even if you are too bad at it.  Pose stupidly for photos. Be child-like.  Celebrate this event called LIFE - Unknown

Q&A-4: Is it illegal to watch movies online for free?

It is not inherently illegal for the viewer to watch a movie online. On the other hand, downloading a copy onto your computer without some sort of license to do so is a violation of civil law and the downloader may be subject to a lawsuit from the copyright holder.

Courtesy: Google

India Watch-21: Best Brains of India

Sundar Pichai – CEO, Google

Satya Nadela – CEO, Microsoft

Thomas Kurian – CEO, Oracle

Sajay Kumar Jha – CEO, Global Foundries

Nikesh Arora – CEO, Softbank Internet and Media

Francisco D’Souza – CEO, Cognizant

Dinesh Paliwal – CEO, Harman International

Sanjay Mehrotra – CEO, SanDisk Corporation

George Kurian – CEO, NetApp

Shantanu Narayan – CEO, Adobe

Vinod Dham -  Founder, Pentium Chip

Vinod Khosla – Founder, Sun Microsystems

Indira Nui, CEO, Pepsi

Ajaypal Singh Banga – CEO, Mastercard

Ivan Menzes, CEO, Diageo, Biggest Alcoholic Beverage Co.

Rakesh Kapoor, CEO, Reckitt Benkiser

L N Mittal, Chairman, Arcelor Mittal Steels

The list goes on…

One in every three employee in Apple is an Indian

38% Doctors in US are Indians

36% of NASA scientists are Indians

36% of Employees in Microsoft are Indians

28% of Employees of IBM are Indians

Courtesy: Himanshu Jain, Lecturer in Chemistry, Allen Classes, Kota

Hujn02@gmail.com

Gratefulthanks to Mr.Himanshu Jain

Facts and Figures-84: India likely to be the Third Largest Economy in 10 years

India is expected to be a USD 6 trillion economy - the third largest in the world - in the next 10 years, majorly helped by digitisation, says a report.

For the full article:
The Hindu dated Sep.28, 2017
http://www.thehindu.com/business/Economy/india-likely-to-be-third-largest-economy-in-10-years-morgan-stanley/article19768047.ece

Eyecatchers-185: Germany bans Meat at all Govt Functions

Barbara Hendricks, Germany's Federal Minister for Environment, issued a statement saying that hereafter only vegetarian food will be served at Govt functions and cited the environmental burden that intensive meat production places on the planet.  She added that the Ministry has a duty to mitigate against the negative effects of meat consumption and must set an example.  Animal agriculture accounts for a significant proportion of greenhouse gas emissions.