A nano-world of technologies
There are high hopes that research in nanotechnology will translate into many products and devices that will help people. The technology will affect a wide range of fields, including transportation, sports, electronics, and medicine. Some of the current and future possibilities of nanotechnology includes:
Medicine: Researchers are working to develop nanorobots to help diagnose and treat health problems. Medical nanorobots, also called nanobots, could someday be injected into a person bloodstream. In theory, the nanobots would find and destroy harmful substances, deliver medicines, and repair damage.
Sports: Nanotechnology has been incorporated in outdoor fabrics to add insulation from the cold without adding bulk. In sports equipment, nanotech metals in golf clubs make the clubs stronger yet lighter, allowing for greater speed. Tennis balls coated with nanoparticles protect the ball from air, allowing it to bounce far longer than the typical tennis ball.
Materials Science: Nanotechnology has led to coatings that make fabric stain proof and paper water resistant. A car bumper developed with nanotechnology is lighter yet a lot harder to dent than conventional bumpers. And nanoparticles added to surfaces and paints could someday make them resistant to bacteria or prevent dirt from sticking.
Electronics: The field of nano-electronics is working on miniaturizing and increasing the power of computer parts. If researchers could build wires or computer processing chips out of molecules, it could dramatically shrink the size of many electronics.
Biotechnologies
What is Biotechnology?
At its simplest, biotechnology is technology based on biology - biotechnology harnesses cellular and bimolecular processes to develop technologies and products that help improve our lives and the health of our planet. We have used the biological processes of microorganisms for more than 6,000 years to make useful food products, such as bread and cheese, and to preserve dairy products. Modern biotechnology provides breakthrough products and technologies to combat debilitating and rare diseases, reduce our environmental footprint, feed the hungry, and use less and cleaner energy, and have safer, cleaner and more efficient industrial manufacturing processes. Currently, there are more than 250 biotechnology health care products and vaccines available to patients, many for previously untreatable diseases. More than 13.3 million farmers around the world use agricultural biotechnology to increase yields, prevent damage from insects and pests and reduce farming's impact on the environment. And more than 50 biorefineries are being built across North America to test and refine technologies to produce biofuels and chemicals from renewable biomass, which can help reduce greenhouse gas emissions. Recent advances in biotechnology are helping us prepare for and meet society’s most pressing challenges. Here's how:
Heal The World
Biotech is helping to heal the world by harnessing nature's own toolbox and using our own genetic makeup to heal and guide lines of research by:
Reducing rates of infectious disease; Saving millions of children's lives;
Changing the odds of serious, life-threatening conditions affecting millions around the world;
Tailoring treatments to individuals to minimize health risks and side effects;
Creating more precise tools for disease detection; and
Combating serious illnesses and everyday threats confronting the developing
world.
Fuel The World
Biotech uses biological processes such as fermentation and harnesses biocatalysts such as enzymes, yeast, and other microbes to become microscopic manufacturing plants. Biotech is helping to fuel the world by:
Streamlining the steps in chemical manufacturing processes by 80% or
more;
Lowering the temperature for cleaning clothes and potentially saving $4.1 billion annually;
Improving manufacturing process efficiency to save 50% or more on operating costs;
Reducing use of and reliance on petrochemicals;
Using biofuels to cut greenhouse gas emissions by 52% or more;
Decreasing water usage and waste generation; and
Tapping into the full potential of traditional biomass waste products.
Feed The World
Biotech improves crop insect resistance, enhances crop herbicide tolerance and facilitates the use of more environmentally sustainable farming practices. Biotech is helping to feed the world by:
Generating higher crop yields with fewer inputs;
Lowering volumes of agricultural chemicals required by crops-limiting the run-off of these products into the environment;
Using biotech crops that need fewer applications of pesticides and that allow farmers to reduce tilling farmland;
Developing crops with enhanced nutrition profiles that solve vitamin and nutrient deficiencies;
Producing foods free of allergens and toxins such as myco toxin; and
Improving food and crop oil content to help improve cardiovascular health.
Person and his health
Genetics of the person
Introduction to genetics:
Genetics is probably one of the most exciting lessons in biology.
At the same time, it can be a bit confusing because sometimes it is difficult to
imagine what the bare eyes cannot see. We will try to make things very simple and easy for you.
What is genetics?
Genetics is the science of studying how living things pass on characteristics (or traits) and its variations in their cell make-up from one generation to the other.
Simply, it is the study of how living things inherit features like eye-colour, nose shape, height and even behavior from their parents.
A scientist who studies genetics is called a geneticist.
Genetics is the study of genes, genetic variation, and heredity in living organisms.[1][2] It is generally considered a field of biology, but it intersects frequently with many of the life sciences and is strongly linked with the study of information systems.
The father of genetics is Gregory Mendel, a late 19th-century scientist and Augustinian friar. Mendel studied 'trait inheritance', patterns in the way traits were handed down from parents to offspring. He observed that organisms (pea plants) inherit traits by way of discrete "units of inheritance". This term, still used today, is a somewhat ambiguous definition of what is referred to as a gene.
Trait inheritance and molecular inheritance mechanisms of genes are still primary principles of genetics in the 21st century, but modern genetics has expanded beyond inheritance to studying the function and behavior of genes. Gene structure and function, variation, and distribution are studied within the context of the cell, the organism (e.g. dominance) and within the context of a population. Genetics has given rise to a number of sub-fields including epigenetic and population genetics. Organisms studied within the broad field span the domain of life, including bacteria, plants, animals, and humans.
Genetic processes work in combination with an organism's environment and experiences to influence development and behavior, often referred to as nature versus nurture. The intra - or extra-cellular environment of a cell or organism may switch gene transcription on or off. A classic example is two seeds of genetically identical corn, one placed in a temperate climate and one in an arid climate. While the average height of the two corn stalks may be genetically determined to be equal, the one in the arid climate only grows to half the height of the one in the temperate climate due to lack of water and nutrients in its environment.
Quality assurance and food safety to human health
The Importance of Quality Assurance and Food Safety in Modern Food Production Systems
The liberalization of the global trade, and the fact that the consumers in the industrialized countries are more and more demanding food to be not only economical, but also healthy, tasty, safe and sound in respect to animal welfare and the environment, are changing so far quantity-oriented food production, guaranteeing the nutrient supply for a nation, into an international quality-oriented food market, where commodities, production areas, production chains and brands compete each other. The competitiveness of food production will soon be more dependent on the
reliability of the safety and the quality of the food and acceptability of the production procedures than on quantity and price. In contrast to the quantity-oriented markets that are often subsidized and producers can always sell everything they produce, quality-oriented markets are market-driven. Thus, apart from the steady increase of the national and international standards for food safety and public health, there is a growing influence of the consumer's demands (often completely ignorant of agriculture) on the animal production, its allied industries, advisers, consultants and food animal veterinarians. All of this means that the agricultural supply of food production is facing remarkable changes in the years to come, which is both challenge and opportunity for food animal producers, packing plants and meat processors as well as for the veterinary profession.
In countries that have implemented a consistent mandatory meat inspection, this classical harvest food safety procedure and the more and more stringent rules for post-harvest food safety measures improving the hygiene standards during slaughter, meat processing, storage and distribution have led to a remarkable decline of meat related food-borne diseases in man. However, although meat inspection and food hygiene have been regarded as sufficient to guarantee safe meat over almost 100 years, new approaches to food safety and meat quality are becoming necessary.
The majority of the real and perceived reasons for the increased concerns with the safety and quality of meat apply to the pre-harvest area of the food production chain. Furthermore, it is true that the harvest food safety measures (inspection and removing carcasses unfit for human consumption from the food chain) is assuring the consumer's protection, but they do not prevent the major safety-related defects in the slaughter pig, i.e. they are only quality control at the end of the on-farm production phase. Industries with long experiences in growing competition initially used quality control to cope with increasing quality standards. The needs to produce and sell high quality products and increase the efficiency of the production process, however, have led to the development of quality assurance systems along production chains.
Quality control is the evaluation of a final product prior to its marketing, i.e. it is based on quality checks at the end of a production chain aiming at assigning the final product to quality categories such as "high quality", "regular quality", "low quality" and "non-marketable". Since, at the end of the production chain, there is no way to correct production failures or upgrade the quality of the final product, the low-quality products can only be sold at lower prices and the non-marketable products have to be discarded. Their production costs, however, had been as high as those of the high and regular quality products. Thus, quality control has only a limited potential to increase the quality and efficiency of a multi-step production procedure. Quality Assurance, in contrast to quality control, is the implementation of quality checks and procedures to immediately correct any failure and mistake that is able to reduce the quality of the interim products at every production step.
Technique on service of health of the person
Environmental health is targeted towards preventing disease and creating health-supportive environments. It includes the aspects of human health that are
determined by physical, chemical, biological and social factors in the environment.
Environmental health also works to assess and control these factors.
For several decades the computer technology made tremendous breakthrough in the development! And nobody is surprised by house computers. And cell phones are not luxury, but need. Let's talk about influence of the modern technique on health of the person, especially on the child's organism. Knowledge will help not only correctly and efficiently use achievements of science, but also to keep health. And first of all today we are interested in a question about health of our children.
Avoid harmful influence of inventions of the modern society how to teach them to be guided in variety appearing progress products. For this purpose it is necessary to be fully equipped, to know pluses and minuses of the modern technique.
Computer
It is known for all, that the child’s staying at the computer is harmful for his/her health. However, not all parents know how the computer influences on the child. There are four major harmful factors: load of vision, the constrained pose, load of mentality and radiation.
Mobile phones
The invention of the mobile phone became one of the gifts of scientific and technical progress. Today scientists consider it as the most potent mass irritant since the invention of the TV. Are mobile phones so dangerous for our health or not? The British physicians claim that mobile phones accelerate reactions of a brain and if we abuse conversation by the mobile phone, it is possible to get a brain cancer.
Person and environment
Interaction of the person with the nature
Man's influence on nature. Man is not only a dweller in nature, he also transforms it. From the very beginning of his existence, and with increasing intensity human society has adapted environing nature and made all kinds of incursions into it. An enormous amount of human labour has been spent on transforming nature. Humanity converts nature's wealth into the means of the cultural, historical life of society. Man has subdued and disciplined electricity and compelled it to serve the interests of society. Not only has man transferred various species of plants and animals to different climatic conditions; he has also changed the shape and climate of his habitation and transformed plants and animals. If we were to strip the geographical environment of the properties created by the labour of many generations, contemporary society would be unable to exist in such primeval conditions.
Man is constantly aware of the influence of nature in the form of the air he breathes, the water he drinks, the food he eats, and the flow of energy and information. And many of his troubles are a response to the natural processes and changes in the weather, intensified irradiation of cosmic energy, and the magnetic storms that rage around the earth. In short, we are connected with nature by "blood" ties and we cannot live outside nature. During their temporary departures from Earth spacemen take with them a bit of the biosphere. Nowhere does nature affect humanity
in exactly the same way. Its influence varies. Depending on where human beings happen to be on the earth's surface, it assigns them varying quantities of light, warmth, water, precipitation, flora and fauna. Human history offers any number of examples of how environmental conditions and the relief of our planet have promoted or retarded human development.
At any given moment a person comes under the influence of both subterranean processes and the cosmic environment. In a very subtle way he reflects in himself, in his functions the slightest oscillations occurring in nature. Electromagnetic radiations alone from the sun and stars may be broken down into a large number of categories, which are distinguishable from one another by their wavelength, the quantity of energy they emit, their power of penetration, and the good or harm they may do us. During the periods of peak solar activity we observe a deterioration in the health of people suffering from high blood pressure, arteriosclerosis or infarction of the myocardium. Disturbances occur in the nervous system and the blood vessels are more liable to suffer from spasms. At such times the number of road accidents increases, and so on. It has been noted that there is a dependence between any weakening in the Earth's magnetic field and acceleration of growth, and vice versa, growth is retarded when the magnetic field becomes stronger. The corpuscular, radioactive irradiations, cosmic dust, and gas molecules which fill all universal space are also powerful creators and regulators of human existence in biological life. The universe is in a state of dynamic balance and is constantly receiving various forms of energy. Some forms are on the increase or decrease, while others experience periodic fluctuations. Each of us is a sensitive resonator, a kind of echo of the energy flows of the universe. So it would be quite wrong to regard only the energy of the sun as the source of life on earth and humanity as its highest manifestation. The energy of distant cosmic bodies, such as the stars and the nebulae, have a tremendous influence on the life of man as an organism. For this reason our organisms adjust their existence and development to these flows of external energy. The human organism has developed receptors that utilise this energy or protect themselves from it, if it is harmful. It may be said, if we think of human beings as a high-grade biological substance, that they are accumulators of intense energy drives of the whole universe. We are only a response to the vibrations of the elemental forces of outer space, which bring us into unity with their oscillations. Every beat of the organic pulse of our existence is coordinated with the pulse of the cosmic heart. Cosmic rhythms exert a substantial influence on the energy processes in the human organism, which also has its own rhythmic beat.
Man and nature interact dialectically in such a way that, as society develops, man tends to become less dependent on nature directly, while indirectly his dependence grows. This is understandable. While he is getting to know more and more about nature, and on this basis transforming it, man's power over nature progressively increases, but in the same process, man comes into more and more extensive and profound contact with nature, bringing into the sphere of his activity growing quantities of matter, energy and information.
Humans interact with their environments in many ways: they may manipulate natural environments for economic purposes and change their surroundings using
culture and technology. Human and environmental interaction generally falls into three categories, which include adaptation, dependability and modification.
The problem of clean water
Drinking water, also known as potable water or improved drinking of water, is water safe enough for drinking and food preparation. Globally, in 2012, 89% of people had access to water suitable for drinking.[1] Nearly 4 billion had access to tap water while another 2.3 billion had access to wells or public taps.[1] 1.8 billion people still use an unsafe drinking water source which may be contaminated by feces.[1] This can result in infectious diarrhea such as cholera and typhoid among others.[1]
Water is essential for life. The amount of drinking water required is variable. It depends on physical activity, age, health issues, and environmental conditions.[2] It is estimated that the average American drinks about one liter of water a day with 95%
drinking less than three liters per day.[3] For those working in a hot climate, up to 16 liters a day may be required.[2]Water makes up about 60% of weight in men and 55% of weight in women.[4] Infants are about 70% to 80% water while the elderly are around 45%.[5]
Typically in developed countries, tap water meets drinking water quality standards, even though only a small proportion is actually consumed or used in food preparation. Other typical uses include washing, toilets, and irrigation. Grey water may also be used for toilets or irrigation. Its use for irrigation however may be associated with risks.[1] Water may also be unacceptable due to levels of toxins or suspended solids. Reduction of waterborne diseases and development of safe water resources is a major public health goal in developing countries. Bottled water is sold for public consumption in most parts of the world. The word potable came into English from the Late Latin potabilis, meaning drinkable.
Improved water sources
Access to safe drinking water is indicated by safe water sources. These improved drinking water sources include household connection, public standpipe, borehole condition, protected dug well, protected spring, and rain water collection. Sources that do not encourage improved drinking water to the same extent as previously mentioned include: unprotected wells, unprotected springs, rivers or ponds, vender -provided water, bottled water (consequential of limitations in quantity, not quality of water), and tanker truck water. Access to sanitary water comes hand in hand with access to improved sanitation facilities for excreta, such as connection to public sewer, connection to septic system, or a pit latrine with a slab or water seal.
Water treatment
Main articles: Water purification and Water treatment
Most water requires some type of treatment before use, even water from deep wells or springs. The extent of treatment depends on the source of the water.
Appropriate technology options in water treatment include both community-scale and household-scale point-of-use (POU) designs. Only few large urban areas such as Christchurch, New Zealand have access to sufficiently pure water of sufficient volume that no treatment of the raw water is required.
In emergency situations when conventional treatment systems have been compromised, waterborne pathogens may be killed or inactivated by boiling but this requires abundant sources of fuel, and can be very onerous on consumers, especially where it is difficult to store boiled water in sterile conditions. Other techniques, such as filtration, chemical disinfection, and exposure to ultraviolet radiation (including solar UV) have been demonstrated in an array of randomized control trials to significantly reduce levels of water-borne disease among users in low-income countries,[51] but these suffer from the same problems as boiling methods.
Another type of water treatment is called desalination and is used mainly in dry areas with access to large bodies of saltwater.
Ecological problems
Global warming is the average warming of Earth's atmosphere and surface. Although global warming has occurred frequently in Earth's past, in the modern use of the term global warming describes increases in average temperatures outside of changes expected as a result of natural, cyclic variations. A related term, anthropogenic (human-caused) global warming (AGW), is used to indicate that global warming is the result of human activity, especially agricultural and industrial practices that emit greenhouse gases. Global warming does not mean that all places on Earth experience higher temperatures, nor does it demand that warming increase steadily each year, but rather that Earth's overall atmospheric, land, and sea temperatures increase over time.
Climate is defined as the average weather of a region over time. Temperature, rainfall, storms, and other weather-related or environmental conditions are short-term facets of longer-term climate conditions. There is an increasing consensus of data and expert opinion that climate change driven by global warming is observable, measurable, and --without prompt mitigation (efforts to reduce) is predicted to pose increasing perils to life on Earth. The 2007 Assessment Report of the United Nations' Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) stated that global warming was "unequivocal" and that it is more than 90 percent likely that most of the global warming observed since the mid-twentieth century is caused by anthropogenic releases of greenhouse gases.
Global Warming
Light from the Sun passes through the atmosphere and warms Earth's surface. The energy associated with heating is re-radiated as infrared light absorbed in the atmosphere by greenhouse gases, including carbon dioxide (CO2 ), water vapor, methane (CH4), ozone, nitrous oxide (N2O), and the human-made chlorofluorocarbons (CFCs). This atmospheric warming is called the greenhouse
effect and is both natural and essential for life on Earth. Without the greenhouse effect, Earth's average global temperature would be too cold to support most forms of animal and plant life. However, an overabundance of greenhouse gases can increase the greenhouse effect and force abnormal global warming.
Carbon dioxide--a by-product of burning fossil fuels and modern forests--is the most abundant greenhouse gas. Depending on the specific measurements, in the early twenty-first century, there is at least 30 to 40 percent more CO2 in the atmosphere than in 1850. There have also been significant increases in methane, a more potent greenhouse gas.
In some ways, adding greenhouse gases to the atmosphere is like throwing another blanket on Earth; the consequent rise in global temperature is known as global warming. Despite the fact that climate is a complex system and climate models are difficult to construct, scientists must use climate models to predict the impacts of various concentrations of greenhouse gases on global warming, and in turn, on global climate. Some models show average global temperature increasing as much as 9 degrees Fahrenheit (5 degrees Celsius) by 2100. Because ocean water absorbs more heat than land, the Southern Hemisphere (which has more water) will warm less than the Northern Hemisphere; hence, any temperature increase will not be uniform. Atmospheric circulation patterns will bring the greatest warming, as much as 14 to 18 degrees Fahrenheit (8 to 10 degrees Celsius), to Earth's poles.
Since the IPCC's 2007 report, new scientific findings have tended to worsen the climate change picture. In early 2009, scientists at two major gatherings--one at the University of Copenhagen, the other at the annual meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Science--presented evidence that climate change was occurring more quickly than the IPCC had conservatively forecasted in 2007. In addition, carbon dioxide increased faster than the IPCC's most pessimistic forecasts.
Climate change skeptics often cite Berkley professor of physics Richard A. Muller's (1944-) past criticisms of the scientific consensus on anthropogenic climate change. In 2010, Muller founded the Berkeley Earth Surface Temperature Study to analyze climate data. In 2012, Muller recanted his skepticism over anthropogenic climate change, titling his op-ed in the New York Times "The Conversion of a Climate-Change Skeptic." Muller states that his work at Berkeley Earth provides the most convincing evidence to date that human activity over the last 250 years has altered Earth's climate. Muller notes that his findings go even further than the 2007 Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) Assessment Report, which only attributed temperature rises since the mid-twentieth century as "very likely" due to human activity.
Climate Change
According to the IPPC and the vast majority of global leaders and climate experts, climate change driven by AGW will fundamentally impact the security, health, and global economy of nations for generations. Hundreds of millions of people and scores of societies, economies, and cultures are already threatened by
rising sea levels, disrupted food production, extreme weather, and emergent diseases. While such irreversible losses as species extinctions and lost lives cannot be calculated in monetary terms, the most conservative estimates of the costs of climate change over the next century range in the trillions of dollars. Moreover, the most severe effects of climate change are predicted to most strongly impact the world's poorest and most vulnerable human populations.
Green Chemistry
What is Green Chemistry?
The concept of greening chemistry is a relatively new idea which developed in the business and regulatory communities as a natural evolution of pollution prevention initiatives. In our efforts to improve crop protection, commercial products, and medicines, we also caused unintended harm to our planet and humans. By the mid-20th century, some of the long-term negative effects of these advancements could not be ignored. Pollution choked many of the world's waterways and acid rain deteriorated forest health. There were measurable holes in the earth's ozone. Some chemicals in common use were suspected of causing or directly linked to human cancer and other adverse human and environmental health outcomes. Many governments began to regulate the generation and disposal of industrial wastes and emissions. The United States formed the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) in 1970, which was charged with protecting human and environmental health through setting and enforcing environmental regulations. Green chemistry takes the EPA's mandate a step further and creates a new reality for chemistry and engineering by asking chemists and engineers to design chemicals, chemical processes and commercial products in a way that, at the very least, avoids the creation of toxics and waste. Green Chemistry is not politics. Green Chemistry is not a public relations ploy. Green chemistry is not a pipe dream. We are able to develop chemical processes and earth-friendly products that will prevent pollution in the first place. Through the practice of green chemistry, we can create alternatives to hazardous substances we use as our source materials. We can design chemical processes that reduce waste and reduce demand on diminishing resources. We can employ processes that use smaller amounts of energy. We can do all of this and still maintain economic growth and opportunities while providing affordable products and services to a growing world population. This is a field open for innovation, new ideas, and revolutionary progress. This is the future of chemistry. This is green chemistry. To learn more, read the definition of green chemistry. Green Chemistry Definition Sustainable and green chemistry in very simple terms is just a different way of thinking about how chemistry and chemical engineering can be done. Over the years
different principles have been proposed that can be used when thinking about the design, development and implementation of chemical products and processes. These principles enable scientists and engineers to protect and benefit the economy, people and the planet by finding creative and innovative ways to reduce waste, conserve energy, and discover replacements for hazardous substances. It’s important to note that the scope of these of green chemistry and engineering principles go beyond concerns over hazards from chemical toxicity and include energy conservation, waste reduction, and life cycle considerations such as the use of more sustainable or renewable feed stocks and designing for end of life or the final disposition of the product. Green chemistry can also be defined through the use of metrics. While a unified set of metrics has not been established, many ways to quantify greener processes and products have been proposed. These metrics include ones for mass, energy, hazardous substance reduction or elimination, and life cycle environmental impacts. Learn more about the principles of green chemistry and engineering. Green chemistry. What is Green Chemistry?
Definition:
Green chemistry, also called sustainable chemistry, is an area of chemistry and chemical engineering focused on the designing of products and processes that minimize the use and generation of hazardous substances.[1] Whereas environmental chemistry focuses on the effects of polluting chemicals on nature, green chemistry
focuses on technological approaches to preventing pollution and reducing consumption of nonrenewable resources.[2][3][4][5][6][7]
Green chemistry overlaps with all subdisciplines of chemistry but with a particular focus on chemical synthesis, process chemistry, and chemical engineering, in industrial applications. To a lesser extent, the principles of green chemistry also affect laboratory practices. The overarching goals of green chemistry—namely, more resource-efficient and inherently safer design of molecules, materials, products, and processes—can be pursued in a wide range of contexts.
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