INDIA ’ S FIRST NATIONAL REPOSITORY FOR LIFE SCIENCE DATA SET UP AT FARIDABAD
Union Minister of State for Science and Technology , Dr Jitendra Singh dedicated to the nation India ’ s first national repository for life science data , Indian Biological Data Center ( IBDC ) at Faridabad , Haryana . Supported by the Department of Biotechnology , the repository has been established at Regional Centre of Biotechnology , Faridabad with a data ‘ Disaster Recovery ’ site at National Informatics Centre , Bhubaneshwar . It has a data storage capacity of about 4 petabytes and houses the ‘ Brahm ’ High Performance Computing facility . The computational infrastructure at IBDC is also made available for researchers interested in performing computational-intensive analysis .
Dr Jitendra Singh informed that IBDC has started nucleotide data submission services via two data portals viz . the ‘ Indian Nucleotide Data Archive ( INDA )’ and ‘ Indian Nucleotide Data Archive – Controlled Access ( INDA-CA )’ and has accumulated over 200 billion bases from 2,08,055 submissions from more than 50 research labs across India . It also hosts an online ‘ Dashboard ’ for the genomic surveillance data generated by the INSACOG labs . The dashboard provides customized data submission , access , data analysis services , and real-time SARS- CoV-2 variant monitoring across India . Data submission and access portals for other data types are under development and would be launched shortly .
INDIAN IMMUNOLOGICALS ’ FMD VACCINE BECOMES WORLD ’ S FIRST ANIMAL VACCINE TO BE TRANSPORTED THROUGH DRONES
Indian Immunologicals Limited ( IIL ) has made a history in transporting animal vaccines through the use of drones for the first time in the world . Department of Animal Husbandry and Dairying , Government of India , Dept of Agriculture and Animal Husbandry , Government of Arunachal Pradesh , along with IIL and drone service provider came together for the maiden drone flight from Roing to Paghlam in Arunachal Pradesh . Drone delivery of vaccines is expected to not only reach remote difficult terrains faster but also help in providing critical vaccines on time for the protection of livestock from several diseases .
Tage Taki , Minister for Agriculture and Animal Husbandry , Government of Arunachal Pradesh ; Upamanyu Basu , Joint Secretary ( LH ), Dept of Animal Husbandry and Dairying , Government of India ; Sujit Nayak , Joint Commissioner ( LH ), Dept of Animal Husbandry and Dairying , Government of India were present along with IIL ’ s representatives – D Banerjee and Mainak Sen .
Dr . K Anand Kumar , Managing Director , Indian Immunologicals Limited , expressed great hope for further technological intervention in making vaccines available to remote locations in the country . With this , IIL has amply demonstrated the delivery of “ medicines from the sky ”.
AVAY BIOSCIENCES LAUNCHES ‘ MITO PLUS ,’ AN INDIGENOUS BIO 3D PRINTER TO PRINT HUMAN TISSUES
Indian tech startup , Avay Biosciences has launched Mito Plus , an indigenous state-of-the-art Bio 3D Printer that can print human tissues . Mito Plus is the advanced version of the Bio 3D printer developed with inputs on the prototype from the research lab of Dr Bikramjit Basu at IISc , and developed by Avay which was co-founded by an IIT Madras Alumnus . It is one of the advanced 3D Bioprinters in India . Avay Biosciences provides completely indigenous development of both software and hardware for end-to-end Bio 3D Printing Solutions in India .
The first prototype of Mito Plus was installed at Indian Institute of Science , Bangalore , the top ranked Science Research institute by NIRF Rankings . The startup is already partnering with premier Research and Development institutes across India including IIT Madras , Institute of Chemical Technology ( ICT ), Mumbai , National Institute of Pharmaceutical Education And Research ( NIPER ), Hyderabad , and BITS Pilani ( Goa Campus ) as customers and collaborators .
Elaborating on the key applications of ‘ Mito Plus ,’ Mr . Manish Amin , Chief Executive Officer , Avay Biosciences , said , “ MITO plus is one of the advanced bioprinter at its price range . A wide range of biomaterials can be printed in MITO plus . This printer will also have UV curing options inbuilt in the printer . The printer has HEPA filter and the major feature is the Temperature control where the printhead and the printbed can be cooled up to 4 degree Celsius as well as heated up to 80 degrees Celsius . MITO plus can be used for pharmaceutical drug discovery and drug testing application , It can also be used in the cancer biology and cosmetology applications .”
NATIONAL BIOENERGY PROGRAMME APPROVED WITH BUDGET OUTLAY OF RS 858 CRORE FOR PHASE-1
The Ministry of New and Renewable Energy ( MNRE ), Government of India has notified the National Bioenergy Programme on November 2 , 2022 . Approved with a budget outlay of Rs . 858 crore , the National Bioenergy Programme for the period from FY 2021-22 to 2025- 26 has been recommended for implementation in two Phases . Programme will comprise of Waste to Energy Programme to support setting up of large Biogas , BioCNG and Power plants . It will also include the Biomass Programme ( Scheme to Support Manufacturing of Briquettes and Pellets and Promotion of Biomass ( non-bagasse ) based cogeneration in Industries ) to support setting up of pellets and briquettes for use in power generation and non-bagasse-based power generation projects . It will also have Biogas Programme to support setting up of family and medium size Biogas in rural areas .
To utilize huge surplus biomass , cattle dung , industrial and
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BioVoiceNews | December 2022