India praised for water testing technology

India was praised for its "constructive and thought-provoking inputs" into the functioning of U N environment and habitat agencies in Nairobi recently, with its innovative water testing technology being particularly appreciated by countries. Klaus Toepfer, the director general of the United Nations Office in Nairobi (UNION), said: "India has been playing a very positive and constructive role in HABITAT's (U N Centre for Human Settlements--UNCHS-HABITAT) ultimate objective of shelter for all. "Although we are still far from achieving that goal, Dr Arcot Ramachandran of India, the first executive director of HABITAT from the day it was established in 1978, gave the U N body a sense of purpose and a direction which we are trying to follow until today," he said.
Toepfer, who is also executive director of the U N Environment Programme (UNEP) and acting executive director of HABITAT, was speaking at a reception of diplomats hosted by India's High Commissioner to Kenya Rajiv Bhatia, who is the country's permanentrepresentative to the UNION. The reception was held in honour of visiting Urban Development minister Ram Jethmalani, who was in Nairobi to participate in the 17th session of the Commission on Human Settlements, the governing body for HABITAT.

Toepfer said Jethmalani had announced a contribution of $1 million by New Delhi for the 1999 programme of HABITAT, whose total budget for the 1999-2000 biennium is $20 million. He also praised Jethmalani for his "moving and inspirational address to the delegates which set the tone of the deliberations during the remaining part of the session." Toepfer said delegates were particularly impressed by India's water-testing technology. "In fact, the various delegates and Kenyan government officials are going to make a presentation of 24 India-made water-testing kits to a Nairobi NGO for distribution to six schools in a slum area," he said.

The water-testing kit, an innovation by an Indian NGO called Development Alternatives, is small, portable and durable, "and has beenthoroughly tested by schools in New Delhi," he added.

Toepfer said, "Use of the kits in slums will inspire similar efforts by schools in other communities and countries in Africa and the findings could re-focus water policy and budget priorities throughout the continent."

Source: Indian Express Newspapers (Bombay) Ltd.

DNA chip can catch eye disease pathogens

Hyderabad, Dec. 22An indigenously-developed DNA Chip which can pinpoint the culprit organism that is causing a particular eye disease in the shortest possible time has hit the commercial market.

Bangalore-based XCyton Diagnostics has launched the DNA macro chip, a molecular diagnostic kit, for identifying a range of pathogens causing eye diseases in the country recently.

The Managing Director of XCyton, Dr B.V. Ravi Kumar, said the company has created a Rs 3-crore facility in Bangalore to develop a range of DNA-based diagnostic products using this new platform. Work is on to develop a Deoxyribonucleac Acid (DNA)-based kit to detect Septecemia and a range of fevers like dengue, chikungunya, and typhoid, wherein early detection of the virus was key to managing the disease.

Awareness programme


XCyton, a product development company in human diagnostics, which has brought several diagnostic products for HIV, and Hepatitis C among others, has launched an awareness programme for doctors and clinicians on the new product. It is offering services to laboratories as well, Dr Ravi told Business Line.

Scientists from the Centre for Cellular & Molecular Biology (CCMB) along with clinicians at the L V Prasad Eye Institute, both in Hyderabad; from Sankara Nethralaya, Chennai, and the RP Centre, New Delhi, have under the New Millennium Indian Technology Leadership Initiative (NMITLI) programme of the Council of Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR), developed the DNA based diagnostic chip.

According to Dr Ch Mohan Rao, Deputy Director of CCMB, eye infections are the major causes of eye diseases and subsequent impairment of vision. Most of these diseases are curable, provided the infecting agent is identified at an early stage.

Common method


At present, the widely used method for detecting the infecting organisms is microbial culture. However, this process is time-consuming and the results are not immediately available to clinicians for making treatment decisions, he said.

Scientists have exploited the fact that by deploying the PCR method it is possible to detect the unique regions on a pathogen’s DNA, which can then be used as a signature. PCR methods are more sensitive and rapid.

M. Somasekhar