N.E.quest Vol 3, Issue 4 January 2010

Newsletter of North East India Research Forum

N. E. Quest; Volume 3, Issue 4, January 2010.

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Newsletter Of NORTH EAST INDIA RESEARCH FORUM

Cover page: The collage includes pictures extracted from the Large HadronCollider at CERN, overground surface in Switzerland and France above the accelerator ring and simulated production of black hole in ATLAS.

http://tech.groups.yahoo.com/group/northeast_india_research/ www.neindiaresearch.org


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EditorialIt is really an honor and privilege for me to pen the editorial of the North East Quest, the news letter of the North East India Research Forum. At first I must thank Dr. Arindam Adhikari for his fine dream and action leading to the creation of this wonderful forum. I think many of his dreams are near realization. This forum is proved to be a useful media for sharing papers, reprints, and other scientific and career related information among the members. Now lets come to some important issues of the region. If the advancement of knowledge and human resources are prerequisites for social and economic growth, then the brain drain from this remote region needs to be checked immediately. Every year especially after the declaration of 10+2 results, a large number of students along with a huge amount of money move out to other Indian cities mostly southern for better education for a competitive globalised job market. Some families consider education outsourcing as a status symbol either. And the prevailing political situation is also responsible for this unabated exodus of students from this region. However resource and infrastructure of many of those technical institutions are not adequate. Hope this does not sound something like the ONGREJI HATAO (Remove English) slogan of our freedom fighters. Of course, this is not a totally new development. At the time of British era, best minds went mostly to Calcutta, now the destinations have changed. So, without compromising quality, higher education must be expanded along with innovative programs of study. Of late there is a movement to set up some institutions like IIT, IIM, NIT, Royal Institute of Managements, etc. have ushered a hope to become north east a potential destination and may also contribute to the development of an integrated NE personality. Among other factors, a peaceful political situation is crucial for science to flourish. In todays global economy, scientific discovery and innovation is considered as an engine for social and economic progress. Economists estimated, for instance, that more than 40 percent growth in US economy over the second half of 20th century came from the investments in fundamental research. Coming to the political situation, it is really sad to see the region, even after six decades of independence, continued to be plagued with insurgency and violence. Kidnapping, extortion, killing, bomb blast and bandh are some day to day events. In fact, the post-independence political developments have reduced the region into a peripheral outpost barring from all affairs of the nation and its consequences were ignored over the decades. Today, considering the complex nature of the problems, situation demands a flexible but robust conflict management policy. There should be proper analysis of conflict situations and its diverse aspects without any prejudice, and address them seriously and sincerely. Governments desperate attempts to maintain status quo need to be changed at least partially. The talks with NSCN (IM) are continuing for years without any resolution in sight. After all, we cannot solve todays problem using yesterdays tools. From this issue a new column is introduced software of the issue and for the beginning Gaussian 09 is included. Many software packages are available; some of them are widely used by researchers and scientists. Something of all those softwares is worth knowing and so the column should to continue. Before logging out, I thank the editorial board members and contributors for their committed support towards the survival of North East Quest. I am also thankful to Panacea studio (Anirban Adhikari) for designing the cover page. Wish a glorious journey of the North East Quest. -- Abdul Wahab


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1. THE FORUM 2. SCIENCE NEWS & DISCOVERIES 3. SCIENCE BREAKTHROUGH OF 2009 4. NORTHEAST INDIANS MADE US PROUD 5. MEMBERS IN NEWS, AWARDS /FELLOWSHIPS 6. INSTRUMENT OF THE ISSUE MALDI Khirud Gogoi 7. SOFTWARE OF THE ISSUE Gaussian 09 8. ARTICLES SECTION

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a) Electrochemical Supercapacitors: A Newly Developing Science and Technology for Electrochemical Energy StorageNurul Alam Choudhury (Invited article)

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b) Automotive exhaust catalysisPankaj Bharali

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c) Sonoelectrochemical Processes: Scale up from Sonovoltammetry to Pre-Pilot Plant for Trichloroacetic Acid DegradationM.D. Esclapez, V. Sez, D. Miln-Yez, I. Tudela, O. Louisnard, J. Gonzlez-Garca (Guest article)

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d) Indigenous Knowledge on Natural Dye of NE Region towards Green ChemistryChandan Tamuly

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e) Experiencing the Nobel WeekArindam Adhikari

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f) Climate Confusion Science Must End Climate Confusion 9. THESIS ABSTRACT Synthesis and Application of Shape Tunable Metal and Metal Oxide NanoparticlesMd. Harunar Rashid 10. MEMBERS FACE 11. PhD/POSTDOC OPPORTUNITIES 12. CONFERENCE CALL 13. THROUGH THE LENS OF THE MEMBERS -------

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North East India Research Forum wasth

created on 13 November 2004. 1. How we are growing. Every forum has to pass through difficult phases at the time of birth. NE India Research Forum is also no exception. At the very beginning, it was a march hardly with few members (from chemistry only) and today the forum comprised of a force of more than 300 elite members. Now we are in a position such that people voluntarily come and join the group irrespective of disciplines.

4. Corruption = 18% 5. Apathy from Central Govt. = 4% Which area of science is going to dominate by creating a great impact on society in next decade? 1. Nanoscience & nanotechnology = 22% 2. Biotechnology = 11% 3. Nanobiotechnology = 38% 4. Chemical Engineering = 0% 5. Medicine = 11% 6. Others = 16% 7. None = 0% Kindly let us know your view regarding the following topic. What activities of this group you like most? 1. Research articles = 33% 2. Information about vacancy/positions available = 10% 3. Way to have a contact with all members = 29% 4. Scientific discussions = 14% 5. Others = 2% Selection of name for Newsletter

Graph of no of members w.r.t. months

2. Discussions held in the forum Necessity of directory of all the members of the forum. Possibility of organising conference in the N. E. India. Taking initiation on setting up of South East Asian Scientific Institute. On selection of Best paper award. Let us introspect.

There were total 36 proposals submitted by members of the forum for the Newsletter. The name proposed by Mr. Abhishek Choudhury, N.E. QUEST received the maximum number of votes and hence it is accepted as the name of the Newsletter. How often should we publish our newsletter '' N. E. Quest? 1. Every 3 months = 61% 2. Every 6 months = 38% 3. Once a year = 0%

3. Poll conducted and results North East India is lacking behind the rest of the country due to1. Geographical constrain = 0% 2. Bad leadership = 40% 3. Lack of work culture = 36%N. E. Quest; Volume 3, Issue 4, January 2010.

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4. Editors of Previous NE-Quest Issues 1. Vol 1 Issue 1 April, 2007 Editor: Dr. Arindam Adhikari 2. Vol 1 Issue 2 July 2007 Editor: Dr. Tankeswar Nath 3. Vol 1 Issue 3 October 2007 Editor: Dr. Ashim Jyoti Thakur 4. Vol 1 Issue 4 January 2008 Editor: Mr. Pranjal Saikia 5. Vol 2 Issue 1 April 2008 Editor: Dr. Sasanka Deka 6. Vol 2 Issue 2 July 2008 Editor: Dr. Rashmi Rekha Devi 7. Vol 2 Issue 3 October 2008 Editor: Dr. Prodeep Phukan 8. Vol 2 Issue 4 January 2009 Editor: Dr. Manab Sharma 9. Vol 3 Issue 1 April 2009 Editor: Dr. Debananda Ningthoujam 10. Vol 3 Issue 2 July 2009 Editor: Dr. Robert Singh Thangjam 11. Vol 3 Issue 3 October 2009 Editor: Dr. Pankaj Bharali 12. Vol. 3 Issue 4 January 2010 Editor: Dr. Abdul Wahab (Current issue) 5. A domain in the name of www. neindiaresearch.org is booked. 6. Future activities Proper planning and consequent implementation always play an important role in every aspect. Some of the topics / activities / suggestions which were being discussed, time to time in the forum will get top priorities in our future activities. Those are mentioned here, Preparing complete online database of N.E. researchers with details. Organising conference in the N.E. region-proposed by Dr. Utpal Bora.

Research collaboration forum members.

among

Motivate student to opt for science education. Help masters students in doing projects in different organisationproposed by Dr. Khirud Gogoi. Supporting schools in rural areas by different ways. Best paper awards. Compilation of book on Education system of different countries. Initiative for this project is taken by Dr. Mantu Bhuyan, NEIST, Jorhat, Assam

7. New activity HiMedia Laboratories Pvt. Ltd is willing to sponsor some future activities of the forum and have asked for space to advertise for their products in the N..E.Quest. Starting this issue (July 2009) N.E.Quest is providing one page for the advertisement. Details about this deal will be informed soon once finalised. Thanks to Dr. Robert Thangjam for his initiative in this matter.

North East India Research Forum cells have been started in the following universities and colleges, Cell in the Dibrugarh University Contact: Dr. Jitu Ranjan Chetia Dept. of Chemistry Email: [email protected] Cell in Tezpur University Contact: Dr. Ashim J. Thakur Dept. of Chemistry Email: [email protected]


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Phone: +91 (3712) 267008/9/10 extn 5059 Cell in Manipur University Contact: Dr. Debananda S. Ningthoujam Coordinator, Microbial Biotech Lab Reader & Head, Dept of Biochemistry, Manipur University, Canchipur, Imphal, India Email: [email protected] Cell in Mizoram University Contact: Dr. Thangjam Robert Singh Assistant Professor Department of Biotechnology Mizoram University, Aizawl, India Email: [email protected] Phone: +91 389-2330861/2330859 (O) Cell in Govt. Science College, Jorhat (Jorhat Institute of Technology) Contact: Mr. Prasanta Kumar Bordoloi, Senior Lecturer Email: [email protected] Mobile: +91-9957036339 Cell in Arya Vidyapeth College, Guwahati Contact: Mr. Pabitra Kalita, Senior Lecturer Email: [email protected] Mobile No: +91-9613133859 & Dr. Pradip Bhattacharyya, Senior Lecturer Email: [email protected] Mobile No: +91-9864087494 Cell in Pandu College, Pandu Contact: Mr. Sanchay Jyoti Bora Lecturer, Department of Chemistry E-mail: [email protected] Mobile: (+91) 9854078814 Cell in Bajali college, Pathsala Contact: Mr. Arindam Talukdar, Lecturer, Environment and Tourism Dept.

Email: [email protected] & Mr. Satyendra Nath Kalita, Lecturer, Deptt. of Zoology Email: [email protected] To run the forum smoothly, to make it more organised and to speed up activities, formation of a committee/team is essential. The combined discussion of the moderators and senior members make the forum feel the importance of Advisors, coordinator, volunteer, webmasters etc. Of course it needs more discussion and will be approved by poll. 8. Guidelines for the forum The moderators formulated some guidelines for the forum which are as follow. These guidelines were kept open for discussion in the forum. With time and need the guidelines will be changed. 1. Anybody in the forum can start a meaningful and constructive discussion after discussion with moderators. 2. Comments from the individual members do not necessarily reflect the view of the forum. 3. No single moderator can take a crucial decision. All decision would be taken by the moderators unanimously or together with the group as majority. 4. One should not write any massage to the forum addressing some particular members. It should always start with Dear all / Dear esteemed members etc. 5. If one has to write a mail to a particular member she/he should write personal mail. 6. Everyone has the freedom to speak but that doesnt mean that one should attack personally. Of course


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we do have differences. There can be debate or discussion, but it should always be a healthy one. Ones personal comment should be written in such a way that it reflects his/her view only. It should not touch other's sentiments/emotions. 7. Whenever we are in a forum, society, home, members should be sensitive / caring enough to their comments so that it does not hurt sentiment of any second members. 8. Members should not post greetings messages (Bihu wish, New Year wish etc) to the forum. 9. Members should post authentic news only. The source of the news should be authentic. No controversial news or comment should be posted to the forum. 10. Our main aim is to discuss science to generate science consciousness, scientific temperament, sensitivity, awareness and research for the benefit of the mankind in general and North East India in particular. 11. In severe cases, moderators can take a hard decision unanimously or majority wise (may be through poll). (This point needs to be accepted by all the members). While sending request or while fulfilling request for articles please follow the following points. The forum has been formed to help each other. When a member requests articles/literature to forum, members of the forum are always happy to help the person by supplying the articles. But at this stage we have to keep in mind that the article should be sent to the person who requested it, not to the whole forum as it creates lots of unnecessary mails in the message box of the forum. Moreover if it

continues, it becomes an irritation also for many members. It is also the duty of the person who requests article to acknowledge the person who helped him/her. This can be done by writing ' Request fulfilled by......' in the subject area while composing the mail and write a thanking message in the main message board. Once this is done, then if some other members want to send the article will know about the status of the request. This will also help members in keeping mailbox clean. Before asking for article, he/she should always check his/her institute/university libraries (online resources). If it is not available or accessible then only the member should request to the forum. Moreover sending articles (copyright protected articles) to the open forum violates copyright act. So please send the article to the person who requests not to everybody through this open forum.

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The Large Hadron Collider, Revived

CSIR team maps Indias first human genome

It is largest science experiment ever conducted. The Large Hadron Collider (LHC) at CERN, the European Organization for Nuclear Research, took a quarter of a century to plan and about $10 billion to build. Housed in a 17-mile underground ring, the LHC has been designed to accelerate particles at temperatures colder than that of deep space to a velocity approaching the speed of light. Beset by a series of hiccups and delays, the CERN scientists on Nov. 29 finally recorded a benchmark achievement, powering up a proton beam to an energy of 1.05 trillion electron volts (TeV), overtaking the Tevatron accelerator at Fermilab in Illinois as the world's most powerful accelerator. Eventually the machine will power up to as much as 7 TeV, causing collisions of such high energy that they will re-create the conditions in the seconds after the Big Bang. Amid the by-products of these collisions, physicists will be searching for signs of a hypothetical subatomic particle called the Higgs boson, which according to current theory is responsible for imparting mass to all things in the universe. Other scientists are hoping for even deeper clues, like confirmation of an ambitious theory called supersymmetry. Let the physics begin.(Source: www.time.com)

A team of scientists of Institute of Genomics and Integrative Biology (IGIB), a council of scientific and industrial research (CSIR) lab, on 8th December 2009 declared success in decoding the genome sequencing of an Indian citizen, a move that opens vistas for low cost healthcare and predictive medicine for the masses. The sequencing of the genome puts India in a select group of countries including the US, the UK, Canada, Korea and China, who have demonstrated such capability, Samir Brahmachari, director general of CSIR, told reporters at New Delhi. He said the genome has 3.1 billion base pairs and the team at IGIB generated over 51 Gigabases of data using next generation sequencing technology. The sequencing of first human genome in India, sets the stage for Indias entry into the elite club which will open up new possibilities in diagnostics, treatment and low-cost affordable healthcare in future for the masses, he said. The Indian genome sequence, achieved in about nine weeks at a cost of $30,000, is among sequences of 14 persons available worldwide, IGIB director Rajesh Gokhale said. The first genome sequencing was a global effort achieved by several scientists across the world over a period of 13 years


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beginning in 1990 with an investment of $3.5 billion.(Source: The Times of India)

(Source: www.time.com)

The Fundamental Lemma, Solved

A New Planet (or Brown Dwarf?) Discovered

In last December, an international team of astronomers announced it had spotted a planet like object orbiting a star much like our sun. The star lies 300 trillion miles, or about 50 light-years, from Earth; the planet like object is estimated to be 10 to 40 times the size of Jupiter. Using a new planet-hunting instrument on the Subaru telescope in Hawaii, scientists were able to get direct images of this new object which may or may not be a brown dwarf (a failed star). Although direct images of other solar systems have been taken before, this is the first time astronomers have captured a star this similar to the sun in size and temperature. Scientists say the real surprise is the location of the orbit of GJ 758 B, as the newly identified object was dubbed: it was previously thought that large planets form either closer to or farther from their stars, but not in the location of GJ 758 B, which is about as far from its star as Neptune is from the sun. Alan Boss, an astronomer at the Carnegie Institute for Science who was not involved in the research, said the "beautiful detection of a very low-mass companion to a sun like star reminds us again how little we truly know" about the planets around nearby stars.

In 1979 the Canadian-American mathematician Robert Langlands developed an ambitious and revolutionary theory that connected two branches of mathematics called number theory and group theory. In a dazzling set of conjectures and insights, the theory captured deep symmetries associated with equations that involve whole numbers, laying out what is now known as the Langlands program. Langlands knew that the task of proving the assumptions that underlie his theory would be the work of generations. But he was convinced that one stepping stone that needed confirmation dubbed the "fundamental lemma" would be reasonably straightforward. He, his collaborators and his students were able to prove special cases of this fundamental theorem. But proving the general case proved more difficult than Langlands anticipated so difficult, in fact, that it took 30 years to finally achieve. Over the past few years, Ngo Bao Chau, a Vietnamese mathematician working at Universit Paris-Sud and the Institute for Advanced Study (IAS) in Princeton, formulated an ingenious proof of the fundamental lemma. When it was checked this year and confirmed to be correct, mathematicians around the globe breathed a sigh of relief. Mathematicians' work in this area in the last three decades was predicated on the principle that the fundamental lemma was indeed accurate and would one day be proved. "It's as if people were 10



working on the far side of the river waiting for someone to throw this bridge across," says Peter Sarnak, a number theorist at IAS. "And now all of sudden everyone's work on the other side of the river has been proven."(Source: www.time.com)

Water on the Moon

Inching our reality ever closer to Star Trek's, scientists at the University of Maryland's Joint Quantum Institute successfully teleported data from one atom to another in a container a meter away. A landmark in the brain-bending field known as quantum information processing, the experiment doesn't quite have the cool factor of body transportation; one atom merely transforms the other so it acts just like the first. Still, atom-to-atom teleportation has major implications for creating supersecure, ultra-fast computers.(Source: www.time.com)

AIDS Vaccine There is water on the moon, scientists stated unequivocally in last November. Gallons of it. On Oct. 9, NASA used a rocket to punch a hole about 100 ft. across the moon's surface, then measured about 25 gal. of water vapor and ice in the resulting debris. Some scientists speculated that there may be enough water in the craters of the moon's poles to sustain future colonies of astronauts. Others said the ice could hold a historical record of the solar system. NASA said the first priority was to figure out where the water came from and measure how much of it there is. Meanwhile, the discovery had a more immediate and widespread impact among the rest of us: the rekindling of an old thrill. In 2009, the moon, our recently neglected neighbor, regained her mystery.(Source: www.time.com)

Teleportation!

In a field that has seen more failure than success, experts received the news of an effective new AIDS vaccine with a fair share of skepticism. In last September, a $105 million trial of a novel combination of two older vaccines was the first to show protection against HIV infection. The results of the trial, which involved more than 16,000 volunteers, suggested that the vaccine was 31% effective at preventing infection among those who were inoculated. It was a modest outcome, given that behaviorbased prevention methods, like condom use, can be equally if not more effective. The volunteers were also largely heterosexual and monogamous, putting them at low-to-moderate risk for HIV infection rather than highrisk, like intravenous drug users and prompting questions about how impressive the results of the study


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really were. But given that no other inoculation has shown any effect against the AIDS virus, it was reason to celebrate cautiously.(Source: www.time.com)

Breeding Tuna on Land

In Australia, a tankful of southern bluefin tuna regal, predatory fish prized for their buttery sashimi meat began to spawn, and they didn't stop for more than a month. "People said, 'It can't be done, it can't be done," said Hagen Stehr, founder of Clean Seas, the Australian company that operates the breeding facility. "Now we've done it." Scientists believe that the breeding population of the highly migratory southern bluefin has probably plummeted more than 90% since the 1950s. Others have gotten Pacific bluefin to spawn and grow in ocean cages, but by coaxing the notoriously fussy southern bluefin to breed in landlocked tanks, Clean Seas may finally have given the future of bluefin aquaculture legs.(Source: www.time.com)

The birth of yet another laboratory mouse is hardly worth noting unless the furry creature is the first to be developed from stem cells that do not involve embryonic cells. That deserves to be called a breakthrough. The new pups, whose creation in two separate labs in China was announced in July, were the first to be bred from induced pluripotent stem (iPS) cells. These are adult cells (usually skin cells) that scientists reprogram back to their embryonic state by introducing four genes. The reprogrammed stem cells are then programmed again to develop into mice, a feat that has been accomplished before only using embryonic stem cells. Breeding an entire mouse that is itself capable of reproducing as the mice did in one of the Chinese labs is a strong sign that iPS cells may be as useful as embryonic stem cells for a potential source of treatments for disease, scientists said.(Source: www.time.com)

The Human Epigenome, Decoded

Stem-Cell-Created Mice

The decoding of the human genome nearly a decade ago fueled expectations that an understanding of all human hereditary influences was within sight. But the connections between genes and, say, disease turned out to be far more complicated than imagined. What has since emerged is a new frontier in the study of genetic signaling known as epigenetics, which holds that the behavior of genes can be 12



modified by environmental influences and that those changes can be passed down through generations. So people who smoke cigarettes in their youth, for example, sustain certain epigenetic changes, which may then increase the risk that their children's children will reach puberty early. In October, a team led by Joseph Ecker at the Salk Institute in La Jolla, California, studied human skin and stem cells to produce the first detailed map of the human epigenome. By comparing this with the epigenomes of diseased cells, scientists will be able to work out how glitches in the epigenome may lead to cancers and other diseases. The study, which was published in the journal Nature, is a giant leap in geneticists' quest to better understand the strange witches' brew of nature and nurture that makes us who we are.(Source: www.time.com)

results were shocking to most "We said it was possible, but every single person I talked to said, 'Absolutely not,' " said study co-author Jay Neitz of the University of Washington and raised the possibility that a range of vision defects could someday be cured. That's a transformative prospect in itself, but the discovery further suggests that it may be possible to enhance senses in "healthy" people too, truly revolutionizing the way we see the world.(Source: www.time.com)

A Robot Performs Science

Gene Therapy Cures Color Blindness By any standard, it was an elementary discovery the identification of the role of about a dozen genes in a yeast cell. But what made this finding a major breakthrough was the unlikely form of the scientist: a robot. In April, "Adam," a machine designed at Aberystwyth University in Wales, became the first robotic system to make a novel scientific discovery with virtually no human intellectual input. Robots have long been used in experiments their vast computational power assisted in the sequencing of the human genome, for example but Adam was the first to complete the cycle from hypothesis to experiment to reformulated hypothesis without human intervention. Interviewed after Adam's experiment appeared in Science, inventor Ross King argued that artificial intelligence had almost limitless scientific potential and that 13

Modern science already offers ways to enhance your mood, sex drive, athletic performance, concentration levels and overall health, but a discovery in September suggests that truly revolutionary human enhancement may soon move from science fiction to reality. A study in Nature reported that a team of ophthalmologists had injected genes that produce color-detecting proteins into the eyes of two color-blind monkeys, allowing the animals to see red and green for the first time. The



a computer would one day make a discovery akin to Einstein's special theory of relativity. "There isn't any intrinsic reason why that wouldn't happen," he said. "A computer can make beautiful chess moves, but it's not doing anything special. In my view, that's what's going to happen in science."(Source: www.time.com)

Asia Populated in One Migratory Swoop(Large genetic study brings message of ancestral unity.)

Researchers mapping a massive array of genomes across Asia say they have found evidence that humans covered the continent in a single migratory wave, and share a common ancestry. The findings were released by the Human Genome Organisation (HUGO) Pan-Asian SNP Consortium which looks at single-nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs), or variations at individual bases that make up the genetic code. The results challenge the view that Asia was populated by at least two waves of migration. "In Asia, we are all related," says Edison Liu, a lead author from the Genome Institute of Singapore. "It brings us closer together." It is thought that a wave of humans emerged from Africa some 60,000 75,000 years ago and travelled along the southern coast of India, into southeast Asia and down to Oceania. But scientists struggled to explain some of the variation seen in Asia today such as the obvious physical differences between Malaysian and Filipino Negrito populations and other Asians. Some researchers have postulated that a second wave, or series of waves, from a northern route largely repopulated the area, leaving the Negrito and others as relicts of the earlier migration.

The new study, a five-year examination of variation at some 55,000 SNPs in 1928 individuals, found that Negrito populations had a high level of genetic overlap with other southeast Asia populations, suggesting a common ancestry. East Asians, the analysis suggests, share a large degree of common genetic background with southeast Asians but very little with central Asians, seeming to preclude a peopling of east Asia through a northern route via the Eurasian Steppes. And genetic variation within local populations decreased from southeast to northeast Asia. The two observations suggest that diverse peoples living in southeast Asia migrated northwards.

Negrito populations in Malaysia are more closely related to other Asians than previously thought. F. Grehan/CORBIS

Asian unity. Merely organizing the work was a massive task. Researchers in 11 countries and regions took samples from 73 populations, requiring countries often at political or economic loggerheads to share ideas, technology and genomes. For countries lacking the technological capabilities to do the genetic analysis but loath to ship genetic samples to another country, Liu established a system by which researchers could bring the samples to host countries and do the studies themselves, in collaboration with their hosts. "The chain of custody was never


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broken," he says. "It was extraordinarily collegial." The result is not a complete shock. While this study provides the most detailed analysis of genetic diversity among Asians to date, a 2005 study on mitochondrial DNA came to a similar conclusion. Martin Richards, at the University of Leeds, UK, is a specialist in genetic variation in southeast Asia who led that study. "By and large, (the new study) is not surprising for fans of mitochondrial DNA, I think, but naturally it is very heart-warming," he says. The new study also supports mitochondrial DNA evidence that challenges the customary "out of Taiwan" model, in which migration from mainland China through Taiwan led to the settlement of southeast Asia and the Pacific islands. Instead it seems Taiwan may have been largely settled from islands in southeast Asia. But the results are not conclusive, as the authors admit. Stoneking says he was "very surprised that the Negrito populations were not more genetically distinct", and would like to see other supposed relict populations, such as those in New Guinea and Australia, studied in the same kind of detail. He argues that it is not possible to tell whether extensive genetic intermingling with surrounding populations might have obscured evidence for two waves of migration. He says he has evidence to support the two-wave theory in work yet to be published that looks specifically at mitochondrial DNA and Y-chromosomes of Negrito populations. Liu says he is discussing plans for a second phase study with much higher resolution based on 600,0001 million SNPs. Possible extensions for the new project will be a look at copy number variation (duplications in sections of DNA), a resequencing of mitochondrial DNA and a focus on

specific genetic components such as differences between enzymes that metabolize drugs, and human leukocyte antigen variations. It will be especially tantalizing, says Liu, to see if drugmetabolism genes show the same northsouth variation in east Asia. "There would be implications for drug response and clinical trials," he says although he adds that it will not be possible to link specific health information to genotypes across the continent.(Source: www.bbc.co.uk )

Arctic Tern's Epic Journey Mapped (The Arctic tern's extraordinary pole-topole migration has been detailed by an international team of scientists.)

The researchers fitted the birds with tiny tracking devices to see precisely which routes the animals took on their 70,000 km (43,000 miles) round trip. The study reveals they fly down either the African or Brazilian coasts but then return in an "S"-shaped path up the middle of the Atlantic Ocean. The longdistance adventure is described in the US journal PNAS. "From ringing, we knew where the Arctic tern travelled," said Carsten Egevang of the Greenland Institute of Natural Resources. "The new thing is that we've now been able to track the bird during a full year of migration, all the way from the breeding grounds to the wintering grounds and back again." The avian world is known for its great migrations. Albatrosses, godwits, and sooty shearwaters all undertake epic journeys.


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But none can quite match the Arctic tern's colossal trip. Starting in August and September, this small bird which weighs little more than 100g (3.5oz) will head away from Greenland with the intention of getting to the Weddell Sea, on the shores of Antarctica.

revolutionising our understanding of migration patterns, but the resulting data on distribution also help address the requirement to identify important biological hotspots," said Richard Phillips from BAS, a co-author of the PNAS paper.

With such a small bird, the trackers also need to be tiny.

After setting out (yellow line) the birds pause in the North Atlantic (red circle) to feed. Going home (orange line), they follow the winds. Total distance travelled 70,900km On southbound leg: 34,600km Daily progress south: 330km On northbound leg: 25,700km Daily progress north: 520km Within winter grounds: 10,900km

It will spend about four or five months in the deep south before heading back to the far north, arriving home in May or June. A team from Greenland, Denmark, the US, the UK and Iceland attached small (1.4g/0.05oz) "geolocators" to the animals to find out exactly where they went on this polar round trip. The devices record light intensity. This gives an estimate of the local day length, and the times of sunrise and sunset; and from this information it is possible to work out a geographical position of the birds. The geolocators were provided by the British Antarctic Survey (BAS). "The use of these devices on seabirds is not onlyN. E. Quest; Volume 3, Issue 4, January 2010.

The first surprise is that the terns do not make straight for the Antarctic when they leave the Arctic, but make a lengthy stop-over in the middle of the North Atlantic, about 1,000 km (620 miles) north of the Azores. Here, they feed on zooplankton and fish to fuel themselves for the long journey ahead. "We were able to compare biological productivity in the ocean from satellite imagery and we could see a high productive area that the birds will spend time in," said Mr Egevang. "Even more importantly, it's the last high productive area before they enter tropical waters where we know productivity is low."

Scientific name: Sterna paradisaea Average wingspan of 75-85cm Breeds in Arctic and sub-Arctic Lays eggs in small ground scrape Feeds on fish and crustaceans Birds live more than 30 years.

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The birds then head south along the coast of western Europe and western Africa before making a choice, either to continue hugging Africa or sweep across the Atlantic from the Cape Verde Islands to continue the journey along the Brazilian coast. About half the birds that were tracked decided to take the South American path. It is not clear why, but the researchers believe wind might make either route seem favourable to the terns. After spending their northern winter months in Antarctic waters, the terns then fly back towards the Arctic. But rather than retracing their southward flight paths, the birds follow a gigantic "S" pattern up the middle of the Atlantic Ocean. "They make a detour of several thousand km but once we start comparing the route to the prevailing wind system, it makes perfect sense moving in a counter-clockwise direction in the Southern Hemisphere, and clockwise in the Northern Hemisphere. It's just more energyefficient for them to do that even though they are travelling several thousand more km than if they flew in a straight line."(Source: www.bbc.co.uk )

Strain of Escherichia Coli (E. Coli) Bacteria to Produce Biodiesel Fuel

A microbe that can produce an advanced biofuel directly from biomass has been developed by a team of scientists from the US Department of Energy's Joint BioEnergy Institute (JBEI).

Deploying the tools of synthetic biology, the JBEI researchers engineered a strain of Escherichia coli (E. coli) bacteria to produce biodiesel fuel and other important chemicals derived from fatty acids. "The fact that our microbes can produce a diesel fuel directly from biomass with no additional chemical modifications is exciting and important," said Jay Keasling, the Chief Executive Officer for JBEI, and a leading scientific authority on synthetic biology. "Given that the costs of recovering biodiesel are nowhere near the costs required to distill ethanol, we believe our results can significantly contribute to the ultimate goal of producing scalable and cost effective advanced biofuels and renewable chemicals," he added. Keasling led the collaboration, which was made up of a team from JBEI's Fuels Synthesis Division that included Eric Steen, Yisheng Kang and Gregory Bokinsky, and a team from LS9, a privately-held industrial biotechnology firm based in South San Francisco. E. coli is a well-studied microorganism whose natural ability to synthesize fatty acids and exceptional amenability to genetic manipulation make it an ideal target for biofuels research. The combination of E. coli with new biochemical reactions realized through synthetic biology, enabled Keasling, Steen and their colleagues to produce structurally tailored fatty esters (biodiesel), alcohols and waxes directly from simple sugars. "Biosynthesis of microbial fatty acids produces fatty acids bound to a carrier protein, the accumulation of which inhibits the making of additional fatty acids," Steen said. "Normally E. coli doesn't waste energy making excess fat, but by cleaving fatty acids from their carrier proteins, we're able to unlock the natural regulation and make an


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abundance of fatty acids that can be converted into a number of valuable products," he added. "Further, we engineered our E. coli to no longer eat fatty acids or use them for energy," he further added. After successfully diverting fatty acid metabolism toward the production of fuels and other chemicals from glucose, the JBEI researchers engineered their new strain of E. coli to produce hemicellulases - enzymes that are able to ferment hemicellulose, the complex sugars that are a major constituent of cellulosic biomass and a prime repository for the energy locked within plant cell walls.(Source-ANI)

July 25, 1978. Louise Brown, a.k.a. the "test-tube baby," is born in England. Brown, pictured on a newspaper cover soon after her birth, is the first baby in the world to be conceived by in-vitro fertilization (IVF), a procedure that combines egg and sperm outside the mother's womb. Today, assisted reproductive technology is responsible for an estimated 250,000 babies born every year, but there is much debate about the fate of unused embryos, which play a vital role in stem-cell research.

A History of Embryonic-Stem-Cell Research Embryonic-stem-cell research is barely 12 years old, but it has provoked more controversypolitical, religious, and ethicalthan almost any other field of scientific inquiry. And it has seen enormous highs and lows: the thrill of new discoveries, the debacle of faked research. So far nobody has been cured using embryonic stem cells, but scientists believe these cells have the potential to unravel mysteries about biological development and treat vexing diseases. Last year, US President Obama lifted Bush-era restrictions on the research, making far more federal funding available to scientists. As a new chapter begins, we look back at the evolution of a scientific discipline.

March 28, 1984. Zoe Leyland, seen here as an infant, is the first baby born from a frozen IVF embryo, enters the


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world in Australia. An estimated 400,000-plus frozen embryos are now stored in fertility clinics across the U.S. Some will become babies one day; others will be discarded or remain frozen for years on end. (Image: Monash Review) Nov. 5, 1998. The first human embryonic-stem-cell line is isolated by Dr. James Thomson (shown here in 2003), a developmental biologist at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, and colleagues. The team derived the cells from embryos donated by individuals who were undergoing treatment at fertility clinics. (Image: Jeff Miller)

specific" lines, carrying the genetic signature of patients with diabetes, spinal cord injury, or a genetic blood disorder. The notion that human embryonic-stem-cell lines can be derived from eggs aloneand not human embryoscreates a major buzz. But a report released by a Seoul National University panel two years later finds that Hwang fabricated evidence for his research. In this photo, Hwang is seen arriving for a 2006 court hearing in Seoul. In October 2009 he is convicted of falsifying his papers and embezzling government funds, and is sentenced to a suspended two-year prison term. The scandal rocks the stem-cell-research world. (Image: Seokyong Lee/Getty Images)

Aug. 9, 2001. President Bush limits federal funding of embryonic-stem-cell research to cells that were derived prior to his announcement. Scientists, patients' advocates, religious leaders, politicians, and the public begin taking sides in the great embryonic-stem-cell debate. At one end: those who find the research morally unacceptable and oppose it altogether. At the other: those scientists and supporters who say Bush's criteria will handcuff research and stall medical advances. March 12, 2004. The premiere journal Science publishes an eyepopping paper by Korean researcher Hwang Woo Suk. Hwang and his team report that they have created a single human embryonic-stem-cell line through cloning. A second report published one year later claims the creation of 11 additional "patient-

Nov. 2, 2004. Embryonic-stem-cell research polarizes voters in the 2004 US presidential election. On Election Day, Californians vote to allocate $3 billion in state funds over 10 years to stem-cell research. Other states including Maryland, New Jersey, and Massachusettsand private institutions begin investing in embryonic-stem-cell research as well, sidestepping federal restrictions. July 19, 2006. President Bush vetoes a bill that would allow federal funding for stem-cell research on embryos discarded by IVF patients. In a press conference, shown here, he is joined by children produced by "adopted" embryos, often referred to as "snowflake" families. "These boys and


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girls are not spare parts," he says. Most couples, however, do not want to donate their embryos to other couples. (Image: Charles Dharapak/AP)

received FDA clearance to launch the world's first human embryonic-stemcell clinical trial. Geron, which plans to test an embryonic-stem-cell-based therapy in patients with acute spinalcord injuries, hoped to begin recruiting patients last summer, but the trial is currently on hold as the company conducts additional research. (Image: Getty Images)

Nov. 20, 2007. Two teams of scientists report that they have created "induced pluripotent" stem cells (iPS cells), which have similar properties to embryonic stem cells, without human embryos. One team, led by Kyoto University researcher Shinya Yamanaka, uses adult human skin cells to derive the iPS cells; the other, led by the University of Wisconsin-Madison's Dr. James Thomson, uses newborn foreskin cells. (Pictured here is Junying Yu, an associate scientist on Thomson's team who was the lead author of the study.) Both sides of the embryonicstem-cell debate hail the advance but disagree on what it means. Opponents say researchers no longer need to conduct research on human embryos; scientists say embryonic stem cells remain the gold standard and the science must proceed on all fronts. (Image: Bryce Richter/Reuters) March 9, 2009. President Obama signs an executive order lifting Bushera limitations on human embryonicstem-cell research (pictured here). The National Institutes of Health (NIH) crafts new draft guidelines for scientists, then receives 49,015 comments in response. NIH publishes its final guidelines in July. (Image: Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images)

Jan. 23, 2009. California biotech company Geron announces that it has


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Dec. 2, 2009. The NIH approves 13 human embryonic-stem-cell lines for federally funded research. NIH Director Dr. Francis Collins, an evangelical Christian, tells reporters in a conference call that even people who believe in the inherent sanctity of the human embryo can ethically support research on embryos that would otherwise be discarded. "Many people who've looked at this have come to that conclusion, including me," he says. Two weeks later, 27 additional lines are approved. The total for 2009: 40. (Image: Jeff Miller)(Source: www.newsweek.com)

Scientists' Stem Cell Breakthrough Ends Ethical Dilemma

Scientists have found a way to make an almost limitless supply of stem cells that could safely be used in patients while avoiding the ethical dilemma of destroying embryos. In a breakthrough that could have huge implications, British and Canadian scientists have found a way of reprogramming skin cells taken from adults, effectively winding the clock back on the cells until they were in an embryonic form. The work has been hailed as a major step forward and welcomed by pro-life organisations, who called on researchers to halt other experiments which use stem cells collected from embryos made at IVF clinics. Sir Ian Wilmut, who led the team that cloned Dolly the Sheep and heads the MRC Centre for Regenerative Medicine at Edinburgh University, said: "This is a significant step in the right direction. The team has made great progress and combining this work with that of other scientists working on stem cell differentiation, there is hope that the promise of regenerative medicine could soon be met." Stem cells have the potential to be turned into any tissue in the body, an ability that has led researchers to believe they could be used to make "spare parts" to replace diseased and damaged organs and treat conditions as diverse as Parkinson's disease, diabetes and spinal cord injury. Scientists showed they could make stem cells from adult cells more than a year ago, but the cells could never be used in patients because the procedure involved injecting viruses that could cause cancer. Now, scientists at the universities of Edinburgh and Toronto have found a way to achieve the same feat without using viruses, making socalled induced pluripotent stem (iPS) cell therapies a realistic prospect for the first time.(Source: www.guardian.co.uk)


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Our Oldest Ancestor, "Ardi"(The discovery of a fossilised skeleton that has become a "central character in the story of human evolution" has been named the science breakthrough of 2009 by the editors of the journal Science.)

Only a handful of individual fossils have become known as central characters in the story of human evolution. They include the first ancient human skeleton ever found, a Neandertal from Germany's Neander Valley; the Taung child from South Africa, which in 1924 showed for the first time that human ancestors lived in Africa; and the famous Lucy, whose partial skeleton further revealed a key stage in our evolution. In 2009, this small cast got a new member: Ardi, now the oldest known skeleton of a putative human ancestor, found in the Afar Depression of Ethiopia with parts of at least 35 other individuals of her species. Ever since Lucy was discovered in 1974, researchers wondered what her own ancestors looked like and where and how they might have lived. Lucy was a primitive hominin, with a brain roughly the size of a chimpanzee's, but at 3.2 million years old, she already walked upright like we do. Even the earliest members of her species, Australopithecus afarensis, lived millions of years after the last common ancestor we shared with chimpanzees.

The first act of the human story was still missing. Now comes Ardi, a 4.4-millionyear-old female who shines bright new light on an obscure time in our past. Her discoverers named her species Ardipithecus ramidus, from the Afar words for "root" and "ground," to describe a ground-living ape near the root of the human family tree. Although some hominins are even older, Ardi is by far the most complete specimen of such antiquity. The 125 pieces of her skeleton include most of the skull and teeth, as well as the pelvis, hands, arms, legs, and feet. (The 47-million-year-old fossil of the early primate called Ida is also remarkably complete, but she is not a direct ancestor to humans, as initially claimed during her debut this year.)

It's not a chimp. It's not a human. It shows us what we used to be. Prof. Tim White, University of California, Berkeley

When the first fossils of Ardi's species were found in 1994, they were immediately recognized as the most important since Lucy. But the excitement was quickly tempered by Ardi's poor condition: The larger bones were crushed and brittle, and it took a multidisciplinary team 15 years (of 47 scientists of diverse expertise from nine


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nations) to excavate Ardi, digitally remove distortions, and analyze her bones. Ardi's long-awaited skeleton was finally unveiled in 11 papers in print and online in October (Science, 2 October, pp. 60106). Her discoverers proposed that she was a new kind of hominin, the family that includes humans and our ancestors but not the ancestors of other living apes. They say that Ardi's unusual anatomy was unlike that of living apes or later hominins, such as Lucy. Instead, Ardi reveals the ancient anatomical changes that laid the foundation for upright walking. Not all paleoanthropologists are convinced that Ardi. ramidus was our ancestor or even a hominin. But no one disputes the importance of the new evidence. Only a half-dozen partial skeletons of hominins older than 1 million years have ever been published. And having a skeleton rather than bits and pieces from different individuals not only provides a good look at the whole animal but also serves as a Rosetta stone to help decipher more fragmentary fossils. As the expected debate over Ardi's anatomy and relations to other primates begins, researchers agree that she and the other specimens of her species provide a wealth of new and surprising data on some of the most fundamental questions of human evolution: How can we identify the earliest members of the human family? How did upright walking evolve? What did our last common ancestor with chimpanzees look like? From now on, researchers asking those questions will refer to Ardi. Body of evidence Ardi's biggest surprise is not transitional Australopithecus and ancestor that looked chimpanzees and gorillas.

centimeters tall, Ardi had a body and brain only slightly larger than a chimpanzee's, and she was far more primitive than Lucy. But she did not look like an African ape, or even much like the known fragments of more ancient apes.

Ancient upstart. Ardi may have moved upright on branches and on the ground, a key step in the evolution of upright walking.

that she was between a common like living Standing 120

When researchers studied her face and teeth, they found derived features that tie Ardipithecus to all later hominins, including Lucy's species and us. For example, Ardi's muzzle juts out less than a chimpanzee's does. Even males of her species lacked the large, sharp, daggerlike upper canines seen in chimpanzees. The base of her skull is short from front to back, as in upright walkers, rather than elongated, as in quadrupedal apes. In addition, Ardi's pelvis convinced her discoverers that she did indeed walk uprightlong the defining trait for being a member of the human family. The upper blades of Ardi's pelvis are shorter and broader than in living apes, lowering her center of gravity so she could balance on one leg at a time while walking, for example. But she didn't walk as well as humans or Lucy. Her pelvis was useful for both climbing and upright walking, making her a "facultative" biped, according to her discoverers.


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Ardi's remarkably complete hand and foot bones add to this picture. Her wrist joints were not as stiff as those of African apes, and the bones of her palm were short, indicating that she did not knuckle-walk like chimpanzees or swing beneath tree branches, the discoverers say. Yet Ardi's foot was more rigid than a chimpanzee's, suggesting that it was an odd mosaic used for both upright walking on the ground and careful climbing and walking atop branches in the trees. Indeed, Ardi's long curving fingers and opposable big toe suggest she grasped tree branches.

Human relations At face value, Ardi is a homininif you define hominin on the basis of traits in the face, skull, and teeth. Many researchers who have read the descriptions of Ardipithecus or seen casts of the fossils agree on this. But since Lucy's discovery, the gold standard for identifying a hominin has been walking upright. Among primates, only humans and our closest relatives were habitual bipeds. On this point, Ardi stands on shakier ground.

By hand or by foot? Ardi's foot (right) has an opposable toe for grasping branches.

Lucy, meet Ardi. Ardi (left) this year joined Lucy as one of the rare fossil hominin skeletons that shape our understanding of human evolution.

If so, our ancestors began walking upright while still living primarily in a woodland rather than in more open, grassy terrain, as once believed. The international discovery team went to great lengths to reconstruct the scene where Ardi took her first steps, collecting 150,000 specimens of fossil plants and animals from Aramis and nearby. After using radiometric methods to tightly date the fossilbearing sediments to 4.4 million years ago, the team concluded that Ardi lived on an ancient floodplain covered in sylvan woodlands, climbing among hackberry, fig, and palm trees, and coexisting with monkeys, kudu antelopes, and peafowl.

The pelvis, which provides the pivotal evidence for upright walking, is fragmentary and crushedparts of it have been called "Irish stew"and outside researchers want to review its reconstruction. The discoverers note, however, that the interpretation of upright walking rests on traits in the foot and on the best-preserved portions of the original pelvis, not the reconstruction. A few outside researchers who have already seen the cast of the pelvis agree that it shares some key traits with later hominins, such as the shape and size of a large opening known as the sciatic notch. Yet Ardi's hands and feet are so primitive that some researchers strongly question whether she really walked upright more often than other


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apes or was less able to climb and swing beneath branches. The next steps will be to further compare Ardi's bones with those of more ancient apes and to see how her unique anatomical features affected how she moved. Many researchers also challenge the papers' forceful argument that Ardi reveals the basic body plan of the common ancestor of humans and chimpanzees. They point out that Ardi lived perhaps 1 million to 3 million years after that ancestorplenty of time for evolutionary change. Some also question the social implications of Ardipithecus males' reduced canines, which the discovery team interprets as implying less male-male aggression than is seen in chimps. The debate reveals how hard it is to identify upright walking in such an early hominin. Must Ardi walk upright like an australopithecine to be admitted to the human family? Or is it enough that she walked upright in an intermediate manner, if her face, skull, and canines align her with later protohumans? Ardi is already prompting some to ask whether habitual upright walking is essential to being a hominin. Perhaps some ancient apes became hominins head first. There's precedent for new hominin fossils provoking controversy and redefining what it means to be a member of the human family. Many thought a big brain and tool use emerged in concert with upright walkinguntil Lucy, with her chimpsized brain, proved that upright walking came first. As researchers ponder the definition of a hominin, they also wonder exactly where Ardi fits in our family tree. The discovery team suggested as one hypothesis that Ardipithecus gave rise to Lucy's genus Australopithecus, which is generally thought to have led to our own genus, Homo. But they also noted that Ardi

could have been a side branch, an extinct lineage that was a sister species to our direct ancestors. As the study of Ardi widens to include new collaborators, the team is granting requests to view the casts and will return to Aramis to search for more fossils. In the year of the bicentennial of Darwin's birth, it seems fitting that researchers finally broke through the 4million-year barrier to understanding our origins. Models for our earliest ancestors can now be informed by plenty of fresh data and at least one body of hard evidence.(Source www.sciencemag.org)

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Today, more than ever, scientists and engineers across the globe need each other if we are to continue to achieve the remarkable advances in human understanding: the kind of breakthroughs that the world will always require to improve the welfare of human beings.Bruce Alberts Editor-in-Chief of Science


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1. Dr. Darlando T. Khathing

Prof. Darlando T. Khathing is the ViceChancellor of the newly established Central University of Jharkhand, Ranchi. He has joined the University on 1st March, 2009. Dr. Khathing originally hails from Manipur. He consistently maintained a very good academic career (1st class throughout) and was trained in top institutions of the country (St. Edmunds College, Shillong; St. Stephens College, Delhi; and Bose Institute, Kolkata, where he did his Ph.D.). He was the recipient of the Jawaharlal Nehru Memorial Trust Fellowship for his postdoctoral research at the Atomic Energy Research Establishment, Oxfordshire, England. The selection for the fellowship then was too tough as only one individual once in two years for the combined science faculties including medical sciences was awarded. Dr. Khathing is a Professor of Physics at the North-Eastern Hill University (NEHU) and is a Nuclear Scientist by training. He started his early research career at the Bhaba Atomic Research Centre, Trombay. His research group has been using different nuclear facilities at Kolkata, Delhi, Trombay and Germany. His administrative responsibilities have not stopped him from pursuing his research interests and he continues to publish regularly in international journals. He has authored over 70 research articles in refereed international journals of repute. Even as the Registrar of his

University, he was the Principal Investigator of one the largest science projects in NEHU. Owing to the successful completion of that project, at least eight other new projects were conceived and sanctioned subsequently. He is a life member of many national scientific societies. He served as the Executive of many of them. He was also the founding Chairman of several regional Chapters of the national bodies. He is a member of Selection Committees and Governing Councils in many central institutions. Dr. Khathing headed, for fifteen years, the Regional Sophisticated Instrumentation Centre, Shillong, which jurisdiction covered seven North Eastern States and was actively involved in coordinating and encouraging interaction between the analytical scientists and researchers of the region. He held several important posts in his former University Chief Proctor, Public Relations, Chief Vigilance Officer and lastly as the Registrar for over eight years. He contributed immensely to the University earning the status of University with Potential for Excellence. Only nine Universities in the country have this status. He played a leading role in the successful holding of the 96th Indian Science Congress Session at NEHU, Shillong, where he was one of the two Local Secretaries. Dr. Khathing is the first person from the entire North East region to be appointed Vice-Chancellor of a Central University located outside the region. His University is the first among the twelve new Central Universities, to start its academic sessions. Dr. Khathing is the son of late Major Bob Khathing, IFAS, MBE, MC, Padmashree 1957, and late Mrs. Klerisnorah Khathing, nee Lyngdoh, one of the early Meghalaya graduates


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from Scottish Church College, Kolkata. His wife Nokdila is the daughter of late Mr. Shashimeren Aier, IAS, often known as Father of Modern Nagaland, and Mrs. Metongla Aier, first Naga lady evangelist. Dr. and Mrs. Khathing are blessed with a son, Alexander, and two daughters, Sirawon and Imtina. 2. Dr. Prashant Goswami

Dr. Prashant Goswami of CSIR Centre for Mathematical Modelling and Computer Simulation (C-MMACS), Bangalore, is one of the country's most outstanding scientists in the field of climate and environmental research. A direct descendent of Pandit Hemchandra Goswami, Dr. Goswami was born in Sanmari, Golaghat, Assam. He studied Physics in Science College, Jorhat, Dibrugarh University and Gauhati University and earned, respectively, his B.Sc. in 1978 and M.Sc. in 1982 with specialization in Theoretical Physics. He completed his Ph.D. in 1987, the thesis entitled A unified geometrical framework gauge symmetries, from the Department of Physics, Indian Institute of Science, Bangalore. After his Ph.D., Dr. Goswami joined Centre for Atmospheric and Oceanic Sciences, Indian Institute of Science, as a PostDoctoral Fellow and then the Department of Physics, I I T- Kanpur as a Visiting Faculty; in 1993 he joined CSIR C-MMACS. He won the prestigious Bhatnagar Award, in Earth,

Atmosphere, Ocean and Planetary Sciences, for his outstanding contributions in the field of atmospheric sciences. Dr. Goswamis research contributions include a novel system of accurate weather prediction almost a season in advance; it is a neural network model that resembles the way a human brain works. In India, Dr. Goswami was the first to employ this method as an experimental weather forecast system. Dr. Goswami's work has received recognition and acclaim through a number of publications in prestigious international journals of science, presentations in international and national conferences and invited talks in many national and international institutes. Dr. Goswami has held the prestigious position of Invited Professor in the Laboratory for Dynamic Meteorology, Fcole Normale Superieure, France. He is an elected member of the New York Academy of Sciences, USA. He also conducts activities of the Indian node of an IndoFrench Centre for Environment and Climate. He has also represented India as the Nodal Officer of Indo-Chinese Bilateral Programme on Weather and Climate under Department of Science and Technology, Govt. Of India. He is also associated with a number of other international projects. In India he serves a number of committees in different agencies in different capacities. He has supervised several Ph.D. students and many M.Sc./M.Tech. projects, with a sizable number from Assam. He is also the coordinator of the collaboration between CSIR and Tezpur University. The north-east has a fragile climate and eco-system. Dr. Goswami, under a CSIR project, is currently engaged in setting up of a national climate monitoring network, with several stations in the north-east; the work has begun in Tezpur (Tezpur University) and Jorhat ( NEIST).


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Dr. Thangjam Robert Singh, Assistant Professor, Department of Biotechnology, Mizoram University, is selected for the award of DBT Overseas Associateship (2009-2010). His major scientific fields of interest are bioprospecting of plant bioresources for novel products/genes/metabolites and micropropagation and genetic improvement through biotechnological approaches. Mr. Ashok Patowary along with his coworkers recently came to limelight when a team of scientists of Institute of Genomics and Integrative Biology (IGIB) declared success in decoding the whole genome sequencing of an Indian citizen. He was one of the students who are actively working on this project. Earlier they completed the genome sequencing of an organism, Zebrafish, first such effort in India. Mr. Patowary did his B.Sc. in Zoology (2004) from B. Barooah College, Guwahati and M.Sc. in Molecular Biology and Biotechnology from Tezpur University (2006). Since August 2006, he is pursuing towards his Ph.D. at IGIB with Dr. Sridhar Sivasubbu. Dr. Pranjal Saikia has recently joined the Institute of Science and Technology of the Department of Chemical Sciences, Gauhati University, Guwahat as a faculty. He obtained his Ph.D. degree from Indian Institute of Chemical Technology (IICT) and Osmania University, Hyderabad in 2009. He was a DST-DAAD exchange fellow to Ruhr University, Bochum, Germany for three months. He did his postdoctoral research at University of Cincinnati, USA before joining the Gauhati University. Dr. Binoy Kumar Saikia has joined the Indian Oil Corporation Limited,Kolkota as a Quality Control Officer in

December 2009. He finished his doctoral thesis on X-ray crystallography at North East Institute of Science and Technology, Jorhat, directed by Dr. Rajani K Boruah.

Dr. Maiurima Borthakur has recently joined Jubilant Chemsys, Noida as a Research Scientist. She did her Ph.D. at Medicinal Chemistry Division, NEIST, Jorhat under the guidance of Dr. Romesh Chandra Boruah. She was awarded both JRF and SRF for her doctoral thesis at NEIST. She also achieved the best performing SRF award of NEIST for the year 2008-09. Dr. Madan Gopal Borthakur has recently joined the Guwahati Biotech Park, IIT Guwahati, as a faculty. He carried out his Ph.D. at Medicinal Chemistry Division, NEIST, Jorhat under the supervision of Dr. Romesh Chandra Boruah. Mr. Golap Kalita has received the prestigious JSPS fellowship for the financial year 2010. He would soon join the Department of Electrical and Electronics Engineering, Chubu University, Aichi, Japan, after submitting his Ph.D. thesis in March 2010. He has been working in the same department since 2006 for his doctoral thesis. Dr. Saitanya Kumar Bharadwaj joins the University of Mississippi as a visiting research scholar by the end of February. He finished his Ph.D. at IIT Guwahati under the supervision of Professor M. K. Chaudhuri. He attended several national and international conferences including PAN-IIT Global conference at California and 59th meeting of Nobel Laureates and students 2009 at Lindau Germany. ------0------


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Matrix-Assisted Laser Desorption/Ionization (MALDI)Khirud Gogoi Introduction Matrix-assisted laser desorption/ ionization (MALDI) is a soft ionization technique used in mass spectrometry, allowing the analysis of biomolecules (biopolymers such as proteins, peptides, nucleic acids and sugars) and large organic molecules (such as polymers, dendrimers and other macromolecules), which tend to be fragile and fragment when ionized by more conventional ionization methods. It is most similar in character to electrospray ionization both in relative softness and the ions produced (although it causes many fewer multiply charged ions). The ionization is triggered by a laser beam (normally a nitrogen laser). A matrix is used to protect the biomolecule from being destroyed by direct laser beam and to facilitate vaporization and ionization.

easily if it was mixed with the amino acid tryptophan and irradiated with a pulsed 266 nm laser. The tryptophan was absorbing the laser energy and helping to ionize the non-absorbing alanine. The breakthrough for large molecule laser desorption ionization came in 1987 when Koichi Tanaka of Shimadzu Corp. and his co-workers used what they called the ultra fine metal plus liquid matrix method that combined 30 nm cobalt particles in glycerol with a 337 nm nitrogen laser for ionization. Using this laser and matrix combination, Tanaka was able to ionize biomolecules as large as the 34,472 Da protein carboxypeptidase-A. Tanaka received one-quarter of the 2002 Nobel Prize in Chemistry for demonstrating that, with the proper combination of laser wavelength and matrix, a protein can be ionized. Karas and Hillenkamp were subsequently able to ionize the 67 kDa protein albumin using a nicotinic acid matrix and a 266 nm laser. The availability of small and relatively inexpensive nitrogen lasers operating at 337 nm wavelength and the first commercial instruments introduced in the early 1990s brought MALDI to an increasing number of researchers. Today, mostly organic matrices are used for MALDI mass spectrometry. Matrix The matrix consists of crystallized molecules, of which the three most commonly used are 3,5-dimethoxy-4hydroxycinnamic acid (sinapinic acid), -cyano-4-hydroxycinnamic acid (alpha-cyano or alpha-matrix) and 2,5dihydroxybenzoic acid (DHB). The identity of suitable matrix compounds is determined to some extent by trial and error, but they are based on some specific molecular design considerations: They are of a fairly low 29

Figure 1: Schematic representation of a MALDI-TOF Mass Spectrometer.

History The term matrix-assisted laser desorption ionization (MALDI) was coined in 1985 by Franz Hillenkamp, Michael Karas and their colleagues. These researchers found that the amino acid alanine could be ionized more



molecular weight (to allow facile vaporization), but are large enough (with a low enough vapor pressure) not to evaporate during sample preparation or while standing in the spectrometer. They are often acidic, therefore act as a proton source to encourage ionization of the analyte. Basic matrices have also been reported. They have a strong optical absorption in either the UV or IR range, so that they rapidly and efficiently absorb the laser irradiation. They are functionalized with polar groups, allowing their use in aqueous solutions. The matrix solution is mixed with the analyte (e.g. proteinsample). The organic solvent allows hydrophobic molecules to dissolve into the solution, while the water allows for water-soluble (hydrophilic) molecules to do the same. This solution is spotted onto a MALDI plate (usually a metal plate designed for this purpose). The solvents vaporize, leaving only the recrystallized matrix, but now with analyte molecules spread throughout the crystals. The matrix and the analyte are said to be co-crystallized in a MALDI spot.

neutral molecule [M] and an added or removed ion. Together, they form a quasimolecular ion, for example [M+H]+ in the case of an added proton, [M+Na]+ in the case of an added sodium ion, or [M-H]- in the case of a removed proton. MALDI is capable of creating singly charged ions, but multiply charged ions ([M+nH] n+) can also be created, as a function of the matrix, the laser intensity and/or the voltage used. Note that these are all even-electron species. Ion signals of radical cations can be observed eg. in case of matrix molecules and other stable molecules.

Figure 2. MALDI TOF mass spectrometer.

Laser The laser is fired at the crystals in the MALDI spot. The matrix absorbs the laser energy and it is thought that primarily the matrix is ionized by this event. The matrix is then thought to transfer part of its charge to the analyte molecules (e.g. protein), thus ionizing them while still protecting them from the disruptive energy of the laser. Ions observed after this process consist of aN. E. Quest; Volume 3, Issue 4, January 2010.

Figure 3. MALDI-TOF sample plate.

Applications of MALDI In Biochemistry. In proteomics, MALDI is used for the identification of proteins isolated through gel electrophoresis: SDS-PAGE, size exclusion chromatography, and twodimensional gel electrophoresis. One 30


method used is peptide mass fingerprinting by MALDI-MS, or with post ionization decay or collisioninduced dissociation.

Figure 4. MALDI-TOF Spectra for Poly(Propylene Glycol).

References 1. Koichi Tanaka, The Origin of Macromolecule Ionization by Laser Irradiation, Nobel Lecture, December 8, 2002. 2. Jasna Peter-Katalinic; Franz Hillenkamp (2007). MALDI MS: A Practical Guide to Instrumentation, Methods and Applications. Weinheim: WileyVCH. ISBN 3-527-31440-7 3. Hardouin J (2007). "Protein sequence information by matrixassisted laser desorption/ionization in-source decay mass spectrometry". Mass spectrometry reviews 26 (5): 67282. ***********************

Figure 5. Analysis of Protein by Peptide mass fingerprinting.

In Organic Chemistry. Some synthetic macromolecules, such as catenanes and rotaxanes, dendrimers and hyperbranched polymers, and other assemblies, have molecular weights extending into the thousands or tens of thousands, where most ionization techniques have difficulty producing molecular ions. MALDI is a simple and rapid analytical method that can allow chemists to analyze the results of such syntheses and verify their results. In Polymer Chemistry. In polymer chemistry MALDI can be used to determine the molar mass distribution. Polymers with polydispersity greater than 1.2 are difficult to characterize with MALDI due to the signal intensity discrimination against higher mass oligomers.


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Gaussian 09Introduction Gaussian 09 is the latest in the Gaussian series of electronic structure programs. It provides state-of-the-art capabilities for electronic structure modeling. Gaussian 09 is licensed for a wide variety of computer systems. All versions of Gaussian 09 contain every scientific/modeling feature, and none imposes any artifical limitations on calculations other than our computing resources and patience. The Gaussian 09 versions for Windows computers and Power-PC-based Mac OS X computers are known as Gaussian 09W and Gaussian 09M, respectively. Gaussian 09 for Intel-based Mac OS X computers is generally licensed in the same way as other Linux/UNIX versions. A single-CPU 32-bit version is also available as a shrink-wrap licensed product which is known as Gaussian 09IM. All Linux/UNIX versions of Gaussian 09 can run on single CPU systems and in parallel on shared-memory multiprocessor systems. Gaussian 09W is available in separate single CPU and multiprocessor versions. Gaussian 09M is available in a single-CPU version only. For cluster and network parallel execution, the Linda parallel computing environment software must also be licensed. History Gaussian was initially released in 1970 by John Pople and his research group at Carnegie-Mellon University as Gaussian 70. It has been continuously updated since then. The name originates from Pople's use of Gaussian orbitals to speed up calculations compared to those using Slater-type orbitals, a choice made to improve performance on the limited computing capacities of then-current computer hardware for Hartree-Fock calculations. Gaussian quickly became a popular and widely-used electronic structure program. Prof. Pople and his students and postdocs were among those who pushed the development of the

package, including cutting-edge research in quantum chemistry and other fields. Originally available through the Quantum Chemistry Program Exchange, it was later licensed out of CMU, and since 1987 has been developed and licensed by Gaussian, Inc. Major releases of the program are: Gaussian70, Gaussian76, Gaussian77, Gaussian78, Gaussian80, Gaussian82, Gaussian83, Gaussian85, Gaussian86, Gaussian88, Gaussian90, Gaussian92, Gaussian93, Gaussian94, Gaussian95, Gaussian96, Gaussian98, Gaussian 03, and latest Gaussian 09. Expanding the limits of computations Gaussian 09, the latest version of the Gaussian programs, is extensively used by chemists, chemical engineers, biochemists, physicists and other scientists worldwide. Starting from the fundamental laws of quantum mechanics, Gaussian 09 predicts the energies, molecular structures, vibrational frequencies and molecular properties of molecules and reactions in a wide variety of chemical environments. Gaussian 09s models can be applied to both stable species and compounds which are difficult or impossible to observe experimentally, e.g., short-lived intermediates and transition structures. Gaussian 09 provides the most advanced modeling capabilities available today, and it includes many new features and enhancements which significantly expand the range of problems and systems which can be studied. With Gaussian 09, one can model larger systems and more complex problems than ever before, even on modest computer hardware. Comprehensive investigations of molecules and reactions With Gaussian 09, one can thoroughly investigate the chemical problems of interest. For example, not only one can minimize molecular structures rapidly and reliably, one can also predict the structures of transition states, and verify that the located stationary points are in fact minima and transition states. We can go on to compute the reaction path by following the intrinsic reaction coordinate (IRC) and


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Newsletter of North East India Research Forum determine which reactants and products are connected by a given transition structure. Once we have a complete picture of the potential energy surface, reaction energies and barriers can be accurately predicted. Researchers have used these fundamental capabilities of Gaussian 09 to study isopenicillin N synthase (IPNS), a member of a family of mononuclear nonheme iron enzymes (Figure 1). Transition metal enzymes catalyze some of the most important biochemical processes, and they can also serve as inspiration for novel biomimetic catalysis. In the latter context, these researchers wanted to determine how the metal center and the protein matrix separately contribute to the enzyme systems catalytic activity. They analyzed the catalytic mechanism of IPNS, exploring the potential energy surface for the transformation of the tripeptide substrate -(L--aminoadipoyl)-L-cysteinylD-valine (ACV) to isopenicillin N (IPN). The ONIOM facility in Gaussian 09 enables the transition structures and reaction paths to be computed for the reactions involving large proteins like this system. Predicting and interpreting spectra Spectroscopy is a fundamental tool for investigating molecular structures and properties. However, observed spectra are often difficult to interpret. The results of electronic structure calculations can be vital to this process. For example, predicted spectra can be examined in order to determine peak assignments in observed spectra as well as comparing peak locations and intensities with experimental data. Gaussian 09 can also compute relevant spectroscopic constants and related molecular properties with accuracy. Gaussian 09 can predict a variety of spectra including IR and Raman, NMR, UV/Visible, Vibrational circular dichroism (VCD), Raman optical activity (ROA), Electronic circular dichroism (ECD), Optical rotary dispersion (ORD), Hyperfine spectra (microwave spectroscopy), FranckCondon, Herzberg-Teller and FranckCondon/Herzberg-Teller analyses. Modeling NMR. Spin-spin coupling constants are one of the most difficult spectral data to produce quantitatively. The accuracy of calculations is highly dependent on the basis set used. While the standard basis sets of quantum chemistry are well developed for valence electrons, a more sophisticated description of the electron density closer to the nuclei is needed for predicting the Fermi contact (FC) term (often the spin-spin coupling constants largest component). Researchers at Gaussian, Inc. have developed modified basis sets suitable for modeling these quantities within a DFT framework; their results are summarized in the Table. When requested, Gaussian 09 will automatically perform a two-step calculation for NMR spin-spin coupling, using the standard basis set for the general calculation and the corresponding modified basis set for the FC term. Standard basis sets produce large errors when computing Fermi contact contributions to NMR spin-spin coupling constants. Gaussian 09 provides specialized basis sets which produce very good agreement with experiment for these quantities. Table 1. Basis Sets for Computing NMR Spin-Spin Coupling Constants

Figure 1. The reactants (left), transition structure (center) and products (right), as well as the IRC reaction path for a proton transfer reaction, are all computed using the ONIOM facility. The highlighted inset focuses on the active atoms in the high accuracy layer, treated with DFT. The grey region outside is a tiny portion of the low accuracy layer, treated with molecular mechanics in the integrated QM:MM method. Ref. JCTC 5 (2009) 222.


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Newsletter of North East India Research Forum The IR and VCD spectra for these systems were studied in solution with Gaussian 09. Results for Ala25 appear in Figure 3. The calculations successfully reproduce the experimental observations and are additionally able to quantify the degree of fraying. They also indicate that confidence can be placed in the reported molecular structures. Predicting optical spectra. Steadystate spectroscopy is one of the most fundamental tools for investigating equilibrium structures and potential energy surfaces for different electronic states. However, interpreting such experimental data is often not straightforward. Such situations often benefit greatly from calculations which aid in interpreting and assigning each spectral feature.

Basis Derived Set from uTZw aug-ccpVTZ

Accuracy Improvement 650% (AAE=-20 Hz, AAE=3.6 Hz) 590% (AAE=-41 Hz, AAE=8.7 Hz) 415% (AAE=-33 Hz, AAE=10.3 Hz)

uDZ- aug-ccw pVDZ uG-w 6311+G(d,p)

Larger improvement percentages are better (AAE: average absolute error with respect to the basis set limit). Ref. JCTC 2 (2006) 1028.

Studying chirality. Chiral molecules are of great importance in many research contexts. Gaussian 09 can study chirality with several techniques including two of the latest spectroscopic classes: VCD and ROA. For example, researchers have used the VCD facility to model helical peptides. The structures of peptides composed of alanine are dominantly -helical with the C terminus being coil-like. VCD experiments used isotopic labeling to demonstrate that the -helix in Ala20 and in Ala25 (shown in Figure 2) noncooperatively unwinds from the ends with increasing temperature.

Figure 4. Herzberg-Teller absorption and fluorescence Qx spectra of free-base porphyrin. These graphs compare the high definition quasiline absorption and emission bands, plotting the computed and experimental intensities divided by (absorption) or 3 (emission), and demonstrate good agreement. Ref. J. Chem. Phys. 128 (2008) 224311. Figure 3. Alanine.

Figure 3. Ref. PNAS 97 (2000) 8313; JACS 126 (2004) 2346.

The time-dependent DFT method produces high quality descriptions of excited state systems (comparable to DFT for the ground state), and Franck-Condon and Herzberg-Teller analyses can be used for computing the amplitudes for electronic transitions from the ground and excited state frequency analyses. The combination of the two can be used to effectively treat both transitions with large oscillator strengths and forbidden transitions (Figure 4). Solvation effects can be included in these models. Predicting hyperfine spectra. Gaussian 09 computes the most important tensors which contribute to hyperfine


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Newsletter of North East India Research Forum spectra. Calculations can suggest regions in which to look for transitions, which can make experiments more efficient. Theoretical results are also useful for making spectral assignments for observed peaks, which can be difficult or impossible to determine solely from the raw experimental data. Computed tensors can also be combined with observations in fitting operations. Using computations to aid in interpreting and fitting observed results should make non-linear molecules as amenable to study as linear ones. difluoroprop-2-ynyl radical, F2CCCH, a partially fluorinated variant of the propargyl radical. The combination of the observed microwave spectral data and calculation of various hyperfine tensors determined that the compound has a planar structure, a somewhat unexpected result. Exploring diverse chemical arenas Gaussian 09s predictive powers are just as extensive in other chemical contexts as they are in spectroscopy. Thermochemistry. Accurate predictions of G are vital to understanding many chemical reactions. Gaussian 09 offers a variety of very accurate energy methods for predicting thermochemical quantities, including the Complete Basis Set (CBS) methods, the Gaussian-1 through Gaussian-4 method families, and the W1 methods. In

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N.E.quest Vol 3, Issue 4 January 2010

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