Science Horizon Volume 4 Issue 10 October, 2019 President, Odisha Bigyan Academy Editorial Board Prof. Pramod Chandra Mishra Prof. Niranjan Barik Editor Prof. Ramesh Chandra Parida Er. Mayadhar Swain Dr. Choudhury Satyabrata Nanda Managing Editor Dr. Rajballav Mohanty Er. Bhagat Charan Mohanty Secretary, Odisha Bigyan Academy Dr. Nilambar Biswal CONTENTS Subject Author Page 1. Editorial : Science and Ethics Er. Mayadhar Swain 2 2. Evolutionary Links between Chimpanzee and Man Prof. Ramesh Chandra Parida 4 Himansu Sekhar Fatesingh 3. India Must Recover Metals from Scraps and other Prof. Dr. P.K. Jena 8 Metallic Wastes for Sustainable Development 4. Design of a Solar Panel Dr. Sadasiva Biswal 11 5. How Much We Know About Cereals Dr. Raj Ballav Mohanty 12 Dr. Taranisen Panda 6. Cyber Security Navya Nanda 14 7. Biofortification to Combat Hidden Hunger Ms. Tapaswini Prusty 17 Dr. Chitrotpala Devadarshini 8. The Eminent Physicist Sisir Kumar Mitra Sri Binod Chandra Jena 19 9. Terror of Chamki Fever in Bihar Dr. Sailendra Narayan Swain 23 10. Urban Mining Prof. Gopendra Kishore Roy 25 11. Lactobacillus Delbrueckii Subsp. Bulgaricus- Meena Kumar. P 29 A National Microbe of India 12. Kidney: The Cleaning Crew-4 Prof. Prafulla Kumar Mohanty 31 (Nutrition and Precaution) 13. Raman Spectroscopy to Detect Dr. Dwijesh Kumar Panda 35 Cancer Cells from Blood 14. Hidden Woman of Mathematics Er. Mayadhar Swain 37 15. Quiz: Human Body (Blood) Dr. Sachidananda Satapathy 45 16. Recent News on Science & Technology 46 The Cover Page depicts : Human Evolution Cover Design : Kalakar Sahoo OCTOBER, 2019 EDITORIAL SCIENCE AND ETHICS In the first week of September this year, theory deals with evaluation of human a 74 year old woman in Guntur city Andhra behaviour. Today, the meaning of ethics is Pradesh gave birth to twins through in vitro more or less equivalent to that of morals, fertilisation (IVF) method. The couple, though which comes from the Latin word mos, moris married for more than 50 years were issueless and also means custom or behaviour. and consulted a clinic. Although at this age the Our ancestors have inserted ethics into success rate is 10 to 20 percent and there are religion so that people can practice it. Anything some risks also, the couple agreed and finally in the religion was being accepted without any it was a success. Technically it is being termed question. Hence religion and ethics were two as an achievement and scientific breakthrough sides of the same coin. But after the and a record was set. development of modern science, it clashed However, gynaecologists and IVF experts with ethics and religion. It so happened that criticized it citing the health risks of the some scientists were punished for blasphemy. woman and the future of new born babies. For In Europe, Church was supreme power in this, as some gynaecologists say, the woman medieval period. It was the custodian of had to be given excess hormones which might religion, ethics and society. Earlier, people increase the risk of breast and uterine cancer. believed that Earth is the centre of Universe But the major criticism comes from ethics and Sun and planets revolve around this. This point of view. Doctors as well as social view is also written in the Bible. So anybody scientists oppose to have babies at this old opposing this view was considered as enemy age. In fact, Indias average life expectancy is of the society by the Church and he was put 70 years, then who will take care of the babies? under trial. In 1600, Giordano Bruno was On the other hand, the old couple were longing burnt to death, because he believed in free for a child and when they got a chance, they thinking in philosophy and science. Galileo went for it. Then who is to be blamed? There was put under arrest till his death by the is no law regarding the age limit of a woman Church for supporting heliocentric theory. Even for adopting IVF method. Some people say fearing the Church the discoverer of this that it is the doctors morality and judgement theory, Copernicus agreed to publish his book to deny this. Ethically this is not correct. containing this theory at the last stage of his What is ethics? It comes from the Greek life, though he had discovered it about 30 word ethos, meaning custom or behaviour. years earlier. The concept of ethics was originally proposed There are many instances of such by the Greek philosopher Aristotle. Ethics collision between science and ethics. For 2 Science Horizon OCTOBER, 2019 example, consider the case of family planning. even create a giant. Here, ethics has an Population increase has many effects such as important role to play. The Chinese researcher lack of resources, employment etc. But some He Jiankui announced that worlds first gene- people consider it as against religion and ethics edited baby had been born in October, 2018. In and do not accept. Earlier, the priests also this method, twin girls had been born. objected to dissection of dead bodies for So if we analyse, there is always conflict purpose of medical education. between science and ethics. When new Another example is cloning. When Ian scientific discoveries are put out, people are Wilmut in 1996 cloned the sheep Dolley, not prepared to accept it instantly, particularly scientists started doing research on cloning of if the traditional customs or behaviours are human which was opposed by many people. challenged by it. Even people did not accept Another example is debate on embryonic stem IVF initially and it has now become a boon to cells. Knowledge concerning human stem cells the infertile couple. can be used to devise new therapies which may Ethics is very much subjective. One thing benefit millions of patients, particularly for may be ethically correct to someone and it the treatment of Parkinsons disease and may not be accepted by other on ethical ground. diabetes. However, some people argue whether We can consider development of nuclear it is ethical to destroy human embryos to gain weapons. Although it is well known for its knowledge for curing some diseases. So the disastrous effect, scientists are still eagerly argument against the use of embryonic cells working on it. During World War II, the nuclear essentially deal with respect for human life scientists (many of them were Nobel and for human dignity. Laureates) worked together for making nuclear Genetically Modified (GM) plants have bomb. Eminent scientist Einstein wrote a letter also stirred a growing public controversy. to President of the USA for it. The scientists Though GM crops is one of the solutions to were called patriots. Hence, some pople level feed the ever growing population of the world, the scientists making the nuclear weapon as many people raise questions on their ethical unethical persons, where as they are respected implications. and honoured by the government and people as Now science has succeeded to edit the patriots. genomes of the baby. Tweaking genes to In conclusion, it can be told that ethics prevent child dying early from a genetic of a scientific work is to be left to the scientist, disorder would be acceptable to most people. but scientists should be concerned about the But how far should we go in this editing? use of scientific knowledge and they should Scientists are claiming that by editing genes, address the ensuing ethical questions. one can get a child as strong as Hanuman or as n intelligent as Ganesh. A mad scientist may Er. Mayadhar Swain Editor Science Horizon 3 OCTOBER, 2019 EVOLUTIONARY LINKS BETWEEN CHIMPANZEE AND MAN 1Prof. Ramesh Chandara Parida 2Himansu Sekhar Fatesingh From their decades-long extensive Lucy (Australopithecus afarensis). studies, the paleoanthropologists have come In the year 1974 several pieces of bone to the conclusion that nearly 6 to 7 million fossils were discovered by a team of years ago evolutionary changes began to split paleoanthropologists led by Donald Johanson the chimpanzee (Pan troglodytes) lineage of the Cleveland Museum of National History leading to a succession of a number of species, in Ohio, near the village Hadar in the Awash which gradually acquired traits like bipedal Valley of the Afar Triangle in Ethiopia. Those walking, flatter face and increased brain size. belonged to the parts of vertebrae , pelvis, Then our species, the Homo sapiens, appeared ribs, jaws etc, which when put together about 3,00,000 years from now, in Africa. represented 40% of the skeleton of a Hominin Serious efforts are still going on to dig out species, now known as Australopithecus more and more fossils to gather new knowledge afarensis that lived 3.2 million years ago. about those successive species. Out of those, Commonly called as Lucy it was probably 1.1 the Australopithecus species that evolved in meter tall, weighing 29 kg. With its small Eastern Africa about 4 million years ago and brain and little hand and neck it looked eventually faced extinction after 2 million years, somewhat like a chimpanzee. are believed to have played a very significant The creature had pelvis and leg bones part in the human evolution as the genus Homo completely identical to those of modern (to which humans belong) derived from them humans and therefore, was probably the first sometimes between 2 to 3 million years ago. In Humini that could stand upright and walk erect. addition, they were the first Hominids to possess The length ratio of its arm to thigh was more certain genes known as the duplicated SRGAP than the modern humans and less than the 2 , which increased the length and ability of chimpanzees, suggesting that either the arms neurons, thereby increasing the size of the of A.