CSIR, Jigyasa - Current Affairs Questions and Answers

ANSWER: Both a and b

Explanation:
In a completely different approach to drug discovery, Delhi’s CSIR-Institute of Genomics and Integrative Biology (CSIR-IGIB) has used a combination of approaches to predict potential drug targets in Mycobacterium tuberculosis.

This is a TB-causing bacteria.

The novel method not only helps in speeding up drug discovery by finding potential, non-toxic drug targets but will also cost far less by reducing the chances of failure.

The results were published in the journal Scientific Reports.

Conventionally, drug discovery was never looked at from a systems biology point of view.

The approach the scientists used was rather unconventional, aimed at finding targets first based on evolutionary conservation principle in an organism,

Based on a previous study that used the Systems Biology Spindle Map (SBSM) approach, the team was able to identify 890 novel, non-toxic gene drug targets.

Using computational approaches, the potential drug targets were reduced to 116 essential genes; these 116 genes are so vital that any inhibition would kill the bacteria.

In order to identify drug targets with the least likelihood of side effects, the 116 essential genes were compared with the human genome and human microbiome at the sequence level to identify genes that did not have any similarity (homology) with human genome sequences.

Of the 116 genes, 104 were found to have no similarity with the human genome sequences, meaning any drug developed targeting these 104 genes will only target the TB bacteria and not cause any harm to human cells.

The potential drug targets were further shortlisted to 33 genes.

The presence or absence of mutations in any of the 33 genes was evaluated using the Genome-wide Mycobacterium tuberculosis Variation (GMTV) database.

The genes which are essential for bacteria never undergo any mutations as that would be lethal for their survival.

The crystal structure, which is essential for carrying out drug discovery process, was available for 15 of the 33 targets.

Once scientists have the targets and have structures of these targets then can tailor-make molecules to inhibit even MDR-TB and XDR-TB,.

The team has already carried out druggability assessment (to find out if the targets have certain properties for a drug to bind to receptors) for all the 33 gene targets.

Most of the 33 genes were found to be highly druggable validating the study.

There is a need for drug discovery to move from Wright brothers’ era of trial and error method. The trial and error approach is slow and too expensive.

All the genes, targets and even ligands will be in open source so anyone can develop new drug molecules.

ANSWER: Seabed Resident Event Profiler

Explanation:
Scientists at CSIR-National Institute of Oceanography (NIO) have developed a robotic platform, Seabed Resident Event Profiler (SREP).

This is a platform that is capable of being stationed at any water depth from 0-200 metres to track the oceanic processes.

The robot has been designed to regularly record the water column information at every 10 to 25 cm during every profile four times a day.

The robot was tested during the recent voyage of RV Sindhu Sadhana, the latest state of the art research vessel of NIO.

The SREP robot has been designed particularly to carry out studies related to the monsoon, global climate and upwelling.

Upwelling is a phenomenon associated with the monsoon that sees the migration of deep sea oxygen minimum zone (OMZ) towards the coast.

It also brings the nutrient-rich water to the surface and enhances the biological productivity of the region.

Several sensors attached to SREP is capable of detecting the conditions associated with upwelling such as low temperature, low oxygen, high nutrients, and changes in density patterns etc.

This enables SREP to effectively track upwelling during June to September.

Upwelling is an important phenomenon for the ecosystem sustenance and fishery. Similarly, since south-west monsoon forms the backbone of the country’s economy, knowing the conditions for its onset forms one of the major goals of Seabed Resident Event Profiler.

The robot in its final configuration will be capable of sitting on the seabed for 100 days continuously to track the oceanic processes in the upcoming monsoon season.

CSIR-NIO: Know More

• CSIR-NIO CSIR-NIO was established on 1 January 1966.
• Its headquarters are at Dona Paula, Goa.
• It has regional centres at Kochi, Mumbai and Visakhapatnam.
• CSIR-NIO was established following the International Indian Ocean Expedition (IIOE) in the 1960s. CSIR-NIO primarily focuses on research over traditional branches of oceanography such as biological, chemical, geological/geophysical.
• It also involves physical as well as over ocean engineering, marine instrumentation and marine archaeology.

ANSWER: BGR-34

Explanation:
Scientists at the Centre for Scientific and Industrial Research were awarded for developing BGR-34, an Ayurvedic anti-diabetic drug

Senior principal scientists at CSIR said the drug has been found successful in controlling blood pressure.

• Developed around after 4 years of research at CSIR labs in Lucknow, drug was found to reduce a type of haemoglobin reflecting how well the body controls diabetes; this is called HbA1c
• Its levels reflect how well the body is controlling diabetes
• Studies on levels from 7.8 to 7.3 percent in diabetic patients given a daily dose of BGR-34 for 3 months showed that complications related to diabetes can be delayed by keeping this level below 7 percent
• Post prandial blood sugar levels reduced from 204 to 194 mg/dl
• In healthy adults, there should be less than 180 mg/dl of blood
• The drug not only controls diabetes, but also reduces the risk of co-morbidities such as hypertension and load on liver and kidney
• CSIR launched the drug late last year and it is available in pharmacies and online vendors like Amazon at the nominal cost of INR 5 per tablet
• The drug can be taken as a supplement along with allopathic medication

ANSWER: 12

Explanation:
Council of Scientific & Industrial Research has been ranked 12th in the world among government institutions in the world improving the position after rank 14 for 3 consecutive years, according to Scimago Institutions Rankings 2016.

• Overall rank of CSIR also improved from 110 to 99th position.
• CSIR leads the country and is the only Indian organisation to be among the top 100 international institutions.
• Scimago ranking is a classification of academic and research related institutions ranked by composite indicator combining three different sets of indicators based on research performance, innovation outputs and societal impact measured by web visibility.