BIO technology and Its applications
Biotechnology very important and it is the major area from Exam point of view since many questions are asked from Biotechnology
UPSC Prelims 2013
Mycorrhizal biotechnology has been used in rehabilitating degraded sites because mycorrhiza enables the plants to
- Resist drought and increase absorptive area
- tolerate extremes of PH
- Resist disease infestation
Select the correct answer using the codes given below:
- 1 only
- 2 and 3 only
- 1 and 3 only
- 1, 2 and 3
UPSC Prelims 2013
Consider the following organisms
- Agaricus
- Nostoc
- Spirogyra
Which of the above is / are used as biofertilizer / biofertilizers
- 1 and 2
- 2 only
- 2 and 3
- 3 only
What we learn here
- What is Bio Technology?
- Applications
- Bio Fuels (Bio fuels types)
- Oil removing Bacteria/Oil eating bacteria
- Tobacco Plants as Bio fuel
- Genome Sequencing Technology
- Increase plant tolerance to adverse conditions
- Conclusion
What is Bio Technology?
Utilization of living systems and organisms to develop any product that has some technological application for definite use or some approved general purpose usage termed as Biotechnology
Since times Biotechnology has expanded from limited usage like wine making to much more wide expansion technological advancements like gene sequencing
- Biotechnology has a wide application from human cell to Universe
- Biotechnology+nanotechnology= Nano-biotechnology
- Biotechnology+information technology= Bioinformatics
- Biotechnology+robotics= Bio-Robotics
- Etc
One can’t determine what the next innovation and combination, it can happen in any part of the world
Applications of Biotechnology
Let’s see some most useful biotechnology application with different technologies and the most valuable innovations by this biotechnology
Biotechnology can be used to manufacture existing medicines relatively easily and cheaply, applications like slowing down the process of food storage, genetic engineering (medicine), also it has made the production of human growth hormone easier, it is being used to engineer & adopt organisms especially micro-organisms in an effort to find sustainable way to clean up contaminated environments.
BIO fuels:
Biotechnology for Green Energy: Bio fuels
We know how the pollution in these days have gone up many convection at international level have stretched the importance to reduce the usage of fuels, but in this modern world saving earth without using fuels is highly impossible especially for developing countries which can’t compromise its industrial growth and cut it pollution levels, So developments in biotechnology can have a great substitutes in this dimension
Alternates of this fuel is bio-fuels which are made from plants and have less impact on the environment pollution bio-fuels are used mainly for transportation purpose Bio Fuels are of 2 types as given Below.
Bio ethanol: it is used as substitute of petrol, can produce by fermentation process of cellulose i.e. starch obtained from plants, which are the obtained from maize, sugar cane, sweet sorghum, sugar belt etc
Bio diesel: Produce from oil crops like palm soybeans, rapeseed seed, sunflower seed the production of these fuels depends on the availability of crops in these countries, Brazil is the leading position in production of bio fuels, 30% of transport fuel currently derived from biomass
Fossil fuel and electricity consumption are main sources of greenhouse gases. The Kyoto Protocol, an international agreement made under the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) was established with the aim of stabilizing greenhouse gas concentrations in the atmosphere at a level that would prevent dangerous human interference with global climate.
Oil removing bacteria/oil eating bacteria
- We regularly see in news and some accidents like boat sinks plane crashed into sea, we know that they carry a huge volume of oil, when such accidents happen the oil spills on the surface of the water which leads to water contamination and death of bio-diversity at that place which will have ill effects at that place
- Thought the development lagging in removing all oil spells but we can achieve ahead,
- Scientists in Europe sequenced the Genome for an oil eating bacteria (modification of bacteria genome for some specific application) which have the ability to eat the oil faster and effectively clean oil spills, scientists developed bacteria by modifying genome and called as Alcanivorax borkumensis,which have more hunger for oil, enable them to clean water
Tobacco Plants as Bio fuel
Bio-fuel: Used as substituent of hazardous fuels and interesting thing is it can be obtain from tobacco plant, but the problem is the hectare per yield is very low and the plants are used for other purpose, scientists of [Biotechnology Foundation Laboratories@Thomas Jefferson University] by using tobacco plant have identified a way to get more extraction of oil from tobacco leaves which early has a less production.
Genome Sequencing Technology
Gene sequencing: Many disease which are based on gene follows from generation to generation, gene sequencing has a much more impact in identifying the gene and proper sequencing of it reduces the effect but the cost involved in this gene sequences in very high, many institutes are working to sequence genes
The inventions in this dimension of biotechnology are Nano-pore based sequencer which read and decode Human sequences effectively many companies are working out to reduce the sequencing process such as VPS hosting, San Diegos LLLumina etc
Increase plant tolerance to adverse conditions
Increasing the plant production and self protection from a-bio-tic stress like usage of fertilizers, drought conditions
In serve conditions like droughts and scarce water available conditions plant can’t tolerate the stress, and plants are prone to many attacks by pests and pathogens, biotechnology have a great impact in this area developing the plants with improved resistance to stress and enhanced resistance to pests and pathogens examples are in RICE over expressing the chloro plastic guanine synthesis gene (GS 2) shows increase tolerance to soil salinity
Similarly some modified crops like Bt cotton, Bt maize, golden rice, Bt corn all have designed to offers resistance to pest and pathogens that have adverse effect on them
Some other fields where Bio technology has its applications are in Medicine, Agriculture, Industries (like wine production yeasts ) and many more
Conclusion
Promising Biotechnology with combination of others had the drastically changed the things that we use today, but how the innovations will take us is the question we need to see??
References
Wikipedia
Internet Research and others sources
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Biotechnology and its applications
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