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Year: 2020

A bridge between plant biotechnology with engineering and law: post-COVID-19 future of medicinal plant sector

Faculty member: Dr. Moumita Gangopadhyay, Associate Professor, Department of Biotechnology, School of Life Science and Biotechnology, Adamas University

Scholar member: Ms. Samanwita Das and Ms. Arunima Saha, Department of Biotechnology, Adamas University

Student members: Indrajit Ghosh, Surjayuti Paul, Dipanwita Palai, B.Sc. LLB, 2nd Semester, School of Law and Justice, , Adamas University

The novel Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19), is one of the perilous global health concerns and worldwide panic since December 2019 and the reason is the Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome Coronavirus-2 (SARS-CoV-2). Meanwhile then till now, COVID-19 has spread all over the world covering every continent and the World Health Organization (WHO) has declared a Public Health Emergency of International Concern on 30 January 2020 following the announcement of a worldwide pandemic from 11th March 2020. Unfortunately, there are no specific treatments for this highly transmissible disease, though few old repurposing drugs are used by medical practitioners which showing many side effects on human health. From a research standpoint, researches are very curious about how to provide the best protection to the public before a vaccine can be produced available. Plants have offered an innumerable of possibilities to cure human diseases historically and its ability to treat can be drawn back to 6000 years. They also have tremendous metabolic potential, which has enabled the generation of medicinal compounds that have served to ameliorate symptoms of many diseases or to treat them, but many of which are still prevalent today. Henceforth, by repurposing these valuable Indian medicinal plants, more treatment options, and innovative preventive measures can be penned down for their role in combating this viral transmission. With the COVID-19 outbreak, to meet industrial demand the use of wild plants as herbal ingredients in the formulations for Traditional Herbal Medicine, as well as other herbal-based nutraceuticals all over the world, is expected to increase dramatically. Generally, these herbs are used for significant benefits for pre boosting our innate immune system which acts as potential arsenal if anyone encounters viral attack. Taking these herbs raw or as the formulated product improves various physiological activities including decreasing body temperature, cough and breathing difficulties, decreasing dosages of corticosteroids, improving the absorption of pulmonary infiltration, and improving quality of life.[vc_row][vc_column][vc_single_image image=”7882″ img_size=”full” alignment=”center”][vc_column_text]

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COVID-19:  why the sustainability of medicinal plants trade matters

In this overwhelming situation, the medical health emergency and unavailability of specific treatment protocol nowadays demand for medicinal plant possessing potentiality against COVID-19 is increasing worldwide due to growing recognition, being non-narcotic, no side-effects, a less expensive and less risk-prone route to drug development. The indiscriminate collection to meet ever-growing market demand has resulted in gradual disappearance from its natural habitat and at present, its number is highly reduced in the wild and enlisted as endangered species. Henceforth to save important genetic resources, there is no way but to produce the plant species out the site of their habitat. In this context, organized cultivation is a well-monitored area with suitable maintenance is the utmost prioritized research area today. The” greening” of this strategy is key to ensconce the long-term anointing of aromatic and medicinal plant species, that could build the basis of different medicinal formulations. Nowadays, current research focuses on the possible efficacy of herbal and ayurvedic medicines to support health care, but there is a lack of care to ensuring the sustainability of supply chains, providing the herbal ingredients, in particular those sourced from the wild. The future emergence of plant materials to support human health is dependent on prioritizing the sustainable use and conservation of their mother species in the long-term.

Interdisciplinary knowledge of engineering with plant biotechnology may find a possible solution

Medicinal plants that are under an organized cultivation system require more labor which faces a great challenge due to lockdown and maintains social distances. the plants that grown in the cultivation field are suffering from the lack of maintenance, i.e. they are not getting water which was sprayed regularly by the maintenance workers. If this situation doesn’t recover immediately or the lockdown continues, then plants will have to suffer a lot for this also. The farmers will not be able to take care of their plants, they won’t be able to provide fertilizers, water plants to protect them from harmful insects & bacteria. Ultimately, the production will be severely affected which ultimately affects human health as healthy raw materials only produce hygiene products.

Following are the putative solutions to meet with the aforementioned challenges:

ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE –Artificial Intelligence and Automationtechnologies can reflect a significant role in this context. It is useful for getting more production from the land during the time of using resources more sustainably, which can help farmers further, hence they can do monitoring of soil, plant, and the entire land. They can also provide data of the land to authorities that can help them predict the condition of plants and soil. AI systems can also help improve the irrigation quality and accuracy by detecting the diseases in plants, pests, and more.

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Image Reference : https://www.slideshare.net/Student_Via/ai-in-farming

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If we look into some recent reports we can see, Blue River Technology developed a robot called See and Spray, which uses computer vision technologies to monitor and preciously spray weedicide. Besides this, a Berlin-based agriculture technological start-up has developed an application, named Plantix, which uses image recognition to identify nutrient deficiencies and defects in the soil through images.

DRONES – Rapid advances in the spread of the technology are now paving the affordability of the drone which in terms fuelling an ever-widening range of current uses; including aerial mapping, plant health monitoring, Ariel sprinkling, etc.  A recent report disclosed that, for the large-scale drone survey mapping, the eBee fixed-winged drone has been used. It is the lightest and most portable one, which helps to fly further and longer at the resolution.

SMART IRRIGATION SYSTEMS – Further, irrigation can be done by using some useful processes such as Ram Pump, agricultural sprinkler, Nelson irrigation, etc.

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Image Ref: https://www.elprocus.com/?s=SMart+Iot

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Several tech giants as well as start-ups are trying to fight agricultural & planting issues by creating irrigation and weather technology solutions. Microsoft precision planting, for instance, attempts to democratizing artificial intelligence worldwide. 

Production and Protection of Medicinal Plants need bridging knowledge between Law and Plant Biotechnology

Endangered Plant Protection Laws of India has one of the richest, oldest, and most diverse cultural tradition deeply associated with the use of various parts of the medicinal plant for curing several diseases. Due to the growing demand of medicinal plant produce at national and international level made the availability of many species of the wild medicinal plant under the threshold of extinction. The adverse effect of various anthropogenic activities likes destruction and loss of forest habitat; overexploitation of forests for commercial purposes and illegal trade in precious medicinal plant produce made the present position very alarming.

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Awareness about few important laws in medicinal plants are discussed as follows: 

Forest Act, the Wildlife (Protection) Act: The enactment of the Forest Act, 1930 has commenced centralized and commerce-oriented management of natural resources, that strictly controls the ingress of local communities to forests. The Forest Act considers wild trees, timber, and forest produce as an important source of revenue. Along with it some important herbs and medicinal plants continue to be regarded as minor forest produce. The Government has wide powers to regulate the sale and removal of trees and forest produce. In addition to the exploitative scheme envisaged under the Forest Act, the ever-increasing and unbridled heartless exploitation of forest resources even after the colonial rule has been attributed to the implementation of misguided economic policies focussing exclusively on planning for productivity.

The Act is modeled on the lines of the central Wild Life Protection Act, 1972 which itself has borrowed the model of protected areas from the west. The worst effect of de-recognition of the local people and their traditional practices is that they have lost a considerable part of their very large store of knowledge related to wild biodiversity on the one hand while the population of certain species of wildlife has considerably gone down due to overexploitation, poaching, and habitat destruction.

Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of wild flora and fauna (C.I.T.E.S.):  All CITES App I & App II plant species obtained from the wild is prohibited for export from India. Only cultivated/ artificially propagated plant species listed under App. II is allowed for export under cover of CITES export permit and Legal Procurement Certificate (L. P. C.) or certificate of cultivation from the designated authorities. Export of following vulnerable and endangered plant species requires ‘certificate of cultivation’ or Legal Procurement Certificate’ from the Forest Department’s entitled authorities as per MOEF circular dt. 4.10.2000.

Although, there is legislation enacted to protect the plant species available in India, very few people are aware of it. In “wildlife protection act 1972” itself there is a separate provision enlisted in schedule VI for plant species by Govt. of India. Besides the above, there are many laws in India for protection of wild flora out of which convention on international trade in endangered species of wild flora & fauna (CITES); Foreign Trade (Development and Regulation) Act 1992; Export-Import Policy; Plant Fruit and seeds (regulation of import into India) order 1989 and convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) are the main laws.

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#BiotechnologyNext : The COVID-19 pandemic: present status and future opportunities for students

In the current pandemic COVID-19, the importance of civic responsibilities is immense to curb the spread of the infection. Unfortunately, it appears that at least in India the lack of civic responsibility is one of the reasons for the recent spike in the number of infections. As of 5th August 2020, the total number of coronavirus cases in India has crossed 1.9 million with over 39,000 deaths (2.1% mortality rate), whereas worldwide total infected cases are over 18.8 million with more than 700,000 deaths (3.8% mortality rate). Initially, India has managed to curtail the spread of the virus mainly due to its timely strict lockdown and social distancing regulations, but the recent relaxation on the lockdown appears to increase the total number of infections. 

India is known for its rich diversity where various religions coexist in harmony, but sometimes diversity, religious beliefs create roadblocks especially what we have seen during the lockdown period in India. It was not an easy task to enforce social distancing norms where social mixing is what loved by most of the 135 billion people in India. Despite all the hurdles India appears to curtail the spread of the virus significantly compared to several developed nations in the world. India fared much better, in terms of mortality rate, compared to the nations with highest numbers of COVID-19 deaths like USA (3.3% mortality rate), Brazil (3.4% mortality rate), UK (15.1% mortality rate), Mexico (10.9% mortality rate), Italy (14.1% mortality rate), France (15.6% mortality rate), and Spain (8.1% mortality rate). Although these numbers are dependent on how many testing is done in each country, at this point most of the countries have increased their capacities significantly; for example, India is currently testing more than 0.4 million per day and increasing its capacity to test 1 million samples a day. 

Despite apparent better management and low mortality rates compared to most of the other nations, the medical treatment offered by the healthcare professionals in India needs serious rethinking. The Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR) under the supervision of the central government has recommended hydroxychloroquine (HCQ) for prophylaxis to healthcare workers treating COVID-19 patients and asymptomatic persons who have been in contact with a positive patient. In some cases, HCQ was found to be administered along with azithromycin to ailing COVID-19 patients. The hype around the HCQ, coined as ‘wonder-drug’, fizzles out recently when reports have started to show that HCQ does not affect the COVID-19 patients. No other country in the world has recommended HCQ as a prophylactic. The use of HCQ, therefore, has to be regulated as it may cause serious damages to the COVID-19 patients if taken unsupervised by the doctors. HCQ is cheap and readily available in the Indian market and that prompts the general population to embrace it as the cure for COVID-19. Although there are some positive effects of HCQ found in some COVID-19 patients, the use of the drug without the recommendation of doctors should be strictly controlled.

Unfortunately, in India, not too many alternatives are available to HCQ for treating COVID-19 patients. The drug remdesivir which has shown some benefits to COVID-19 patients is available in India but too expensive for most of the patients. Another alternative Indian government looking at is convalescent plasma therapy where recovered patients plasma with antibodies against coronavirus is used to treat new patients, but again for a pandemic like COVID-19 plasma therapy has its limitations. Another immunosuppressive drug tocilizumab is being used in some critical patients having signs of ‘cytokine storm’ which can destroy a patient’s lung and cause multi-organ failure. Unfortunately, the drug is costly and requires monitoring of the patient’s IL-6 levels which again is a costly affair in India. Until the discovery of potent drugs or vaccines to treat COVID-19 supportive treatment is the only option, but the use of HCQ requires extreme caution especially in India. Therefore, strict social or physical distancing norms and other safety measures are only remedies available for the general population to stop the spread of the virus, but the recent relaxation of the lockdown in India and the spike in the number of infections proves that we need to be very careful about the physical distancing and should maintain civic responsibilities strictly if there is any hope to curb the spread of COVID-19 in absence of any potent drug or vaccine for the foreseeable future.

At present 37 coronavirus candidate vaccines are under various phases of clinical trials (source: https://www.bioworld.com/COVID19products), and three of them are at the final phase III trials. Several Indian companies/organizations are also developing coronavirus vaccines, e.g., Serum Institute of India, Bharat Biotech, Zydus Cadila, etc. Therefore, the opportunities in the field of vaccine development and allied fields have increased multifold in recent times. Students from various biology fields, e.g., Biotechnology, Microbiology, and Biochemistry, are in demand. Even in the post-COVID-19 era, the demand for the students from Biotechnology, Microbiology, and Biochemistry streams are going to increase as there will be a stronger focus on health henceforward. SARS-CoV-2 is not the last virus discovered that can infect humans as many more are predicted to be discovered in the future. Therefore, government and non-government funding are expected to increase in understanding these pathogens and how to develop drugs or vaccines against them in the future. Students who know about Molecular Biology, Genetics, Bioinformatics, Genetic Engineering, Immunology, Virology, etc. are going to be in demand at present and the future.

Top Reasons why Studying Electronics and Communication Engineering can be a Transformative Experience

A professional career program always begins with a question, “What shall I become after graduation?” Well, this question has several answers and depends upon the choice of the program. Students will be ready to step in to the professional world with transformative educational experience after completing their B. Tech Degree. In order to project into the same, Department of Electronics and Communication Engineering at Adamas university has started multiple rationalized programs to cater to present requirement of society in a wider sense. Let’s find out how a student since the inception carries out his/her journey with an ECE program.

Importance of ECE Engineering: First, I like to say, Electronics & Communication Engineering is a branch of studies which deals with the science of electrons that covers a wide range of applications like Television, Radio, computers, telecommunication etc. which make our life easier and enjoyable. ECE is backbone of modern communication system which rules rocket science to telecommunication everything. Present-day scenario, modern applications like Internet of things (IOT), Robotics, and Embedded Systems are highly dependent on the knowledge of ECE. Now a day, we are unable to think our daily life without the elements or devices connecting with electronics and communication engineering. As an example, it is very difficult to spend even a single day without mobile phone or television.

For understanding purpose, I give you one small example that how Electronics & Communication Engineering relates with the current scenario:

Nanotechnology is helping to create high speed switching devices, the evolution from Intel Pentium 1 processor to recent core i7 processor only because of the requirement of high speed, and micro architecture, so these are the part of electronics, and these electronics parts when utilized to make the various computing devices like: smart watch, laptops, smart phones and they are interconnected each other to send the information via wireless medium, then the communication process is done.

So, all these things keep in mind, we are trying to create our curriculum of the B Tech program that can be directly link to the emerging technologies leading to Industry 4.0

Department has provided collaborative environment open to the free exchange of ideas, where research, creativity, innovation and entrepreneurship can flourish, and ensured students achieve their full potential.

I have mentioned the roadmap of the ECE students where students have the multiple options to customize their courses.[vc_row][vc_column][vc_single_image image=”7871″ img_size=”full” alignment=”center”][vc_column_text]

Story Board of ECE Department

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The student can choose a regular B. Tech degree (in ECE with duration of 4 years). In addition, Department also offers B Tech (Hons.) programs designed with specialization subjects in different areas along with Project Based Learning in big ticket areas like Autonomous Electrical Vehicles, Aerial Robotics, Smart City, subject like Emotional Quotient, Design Thinking and students’ social responsibility project like ‘Adamas Foundation’.

Now the question is why these specialization programs are required:

ECE Engineers are very much responsible to provide innovative solutions to meet the needs of our modern world. For that purpose, student need to develop their skills and knowledge to get a head start in an engineering career that requires specialist skills and adaptability. This four-year program is designed to give the student an overall education in ECE as well as specialist knowledge in fields such as Internet of Things, Embedded Systems and Robotics. You’ll graduate with comprehensive knowledge of engineering and a range of practical skills that mean you’ll be experienced and ready to work.

We all know that the rapid growth of the “Internet of Things” is changing the modern era where embedded system plays an important role due to its unique features such as real time computing, low power consumption, low maintenance and high availability.  In today’s world, when we are looking for smart cities, environmental monitoring system, smart home appliances and smart health care system where internet of things are applied.

Robotics is another very important area which deals with the design and application of robots.  Today, robots are used in various fields like:  industrial manufacturing process, nuclear science, defence system, service for communication and many more. In fact, during this lock down situation, where social distancing is required, demanding the use of robots for sanitization, city monitoring and to help the doctors. 

If I give one small example: like Amazon built a Voice-Controlled Robot named as “Alexa”, now a days very popular in daily life. Using this device through the mobile Alexa app, we connect the other home appliances using Internet of Things technology.

In today’s scenario, the graduate with knowledge of IoT or robotics having a tremendous market demand.

So, all these things keep in mind, department of ECE has introduced two B. Tech+ courses (new generation programs) in addition with the regular course.

  1. B. Tech in ECE with specialization in IOT and Embedded System
  2. B. Tech in ECE with specialization in Robotics

In this context, a third-year student can choose one specialization among 2 different paths. This specialization is also optional. But it is highly recommended to study in one specialized path to place him/herself in a frontline position.

ECE students can choose their career in different areas:

Option1: A student while admissions can choose B. Tech in ECE (Regular Program) with Diploma in Management (offered by School of Business and Economics) and get a B. Tech degree with a Diploma in Management. After the successful completion of this program, job opportunities for a student will be opened in service industries as well as in FMCG, Logistic, Manufacturing, Automobile industries. In addition, if students choose two years MBA program, they will get an edge over other students having vanilla (regular) B. Tech and also, management knowledge extrapolate if someone wants to initiate Start-ups.

Option 2: A student while admissions can choose to study B. Tech regular program with Minors (from other relevant departments/domains).

This has three possible areas (anyone can choose):

  • Minor in CSE (Offered by Computer Science and Engineering Dept.): After the successful completion of this program, students are eager to join in various industrial sectors such as consulting, software development, database manager, data scientist etc.
  • Minor in Biotechnology (Offered by School of Life Science and Biotechnology): Students enjoy huge demand in various industrial sectors such as food and beverage, biological products, medicines, pharmaceuticals, agriculture, animal husbandry, nutrition, tissue culture and environmental conservation. Career opportunities in the field are numerous and include positions like medical researcher, database manager or software developer.
  • Minor in Production Management (Offered by Mechanical Engineering Dept.): Minor Program in Production Management prepare for ECE students to apply the concept of Production & Management. The Program offers ample scope to apply into action a mix of Engineering knowledge and Managerial skills. There are various sectors in which a Production Management graduate can get jobs i.e- Heavy Machinery, Refineries, Paper Industry, Automobile Industry etc.

Optional Add-On courses: Apart from that, an ECE student can choose some Add-On courses like Beautiful Mind Program /Club Activities etc. along with their core program.

  • Beautiful Mind Program: It is a parallel learning system where students have to register for any one learning path out of six learning paths or domains given below:
    • Application Software Development
    • System Software Development
    • Artificial Intelligence and Machine Learning
    • Cloud Based Software Development
    • Mobile and Web Application Development
    • Internet of Things

Process:

  • After registering various problems will be given stage wise.
  • After clearing one stage the next stage will be activated.
  • Clearing every stage will generate certificate.
  • Final stage will generate “master” certificate.
  • Duration for every learning path is at least one year. 
  • Various Club Activities: There are several clubs in our University like Robotics Club, Entrepreneurship club, Dramatics Club, Music Club etc. where students can engage themselves and do some creative works in different areas as per their own interest.

Finally, I can say to build a great and diverse career after higher secondary, B. Tech in ECE is one of the most promising option where student may opt for multidisciplinary careers. But the most important thing is time management. So, all these things keep in mind, we have designed the B. Tech+ courses in such a manner that it will be completed within 4 years.

N.B. An additional certificate along with Regular B.Tech. Program will be awarded to those students who will choose any one of these Specializations, Minors or Diploma program.

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#PositiveCorona : Covid 19 Impact On Graduates & Opportunities

Nisarga Chand1,
Assistant Professor1

Shouvik Chowdhury1
3rd Year Student1

Department of Electronics & Communication Engineering School of Engineering & Technology, Adamas University

The world is at shut down mode every country is forced to accept lockdown, the threat has forced to maintain strict social distancing and adaption of distance learning. And habituating people to adapt Virtual learning (untested and unproven protocol) and it really works.

Continuous spreading of the threat has led educational institutions to shut down and mostly impacted the (final year & pre final year) graduates about the placements, internship, publications and their future goals, even they are in confusion and cannot decide to put the efforts on getting placed or to continue the Higher education. Students plans on studying abroad has also affected.

Though it has impacted and will be impacting but history tells us to be remembered

             “The more you know, the less it is” – ARISTOTLE

EDUCATION PROFILE UPDATE:

The school and colleges which used to the hub for learning and engaging with others is now no more, the ecosystem has been impacted significantly the higher education and the graduates. In maximum cases, those students are studying in abroad and those are planned to go, they are facing in trouble.

Based on the statistics from UNESCO, we have found that schools are closed in 188 countries, affecting more than 1.5 billion students and 63 million primary and secondary teachers worldwide.[vc_row][vc_column][vc_single_image image=”7864″ img_size=”full” alignment=”center”][vc_column_text]

Pic collected from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:COVID-19_school_closures.svg

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But we are not stopped yet, the COVID-19 pandemic has been the ‘revolutionizing point’ for reform of the Indian education system. The new education policy will forever transform INDIA and result into prosperous, challenging Indians to grow and under great leadership (CEO), no more requirement to go outside. Even India will able to create a Hub for international education.

THE NEW EDUCATION POLICY KEY POINTS:

  • A single regulator for higher education institutions.
  • Multiple entry and exit options in degree courses.
  • Discontinuation of MPhil programmes.
  • Low stakes board exams.
  • Common entrance exams for university. 

CHANGES THAT THIS COVID 19 HAS MADE POSSIBLE:

Paradigm shift: Instead of acting being digital to actually being digital.

This way of digital implementation on education and learning is trouble, as it unproven and forced to adapt. So, this has resulted in new education policy by the Indian education leaders.

The new education policy (NEO) focuses on easier board exams, reduction in syllabus to retain “core essentials” and brainstorming with “experimental learning” and “critical thinking”. The NEP make the students until class 5 should be taught in regional language. It also acknowledges teachers will be encouraged to use bilingual approach, including bilingual teaching, students whose home language may be different from medium of school.

GRADUATES PROFILE UPDATE:

The ministry of human resources development recorded 16 lakh graduates from MBA and Engineering last year and the numbers are quite comparable for 2020, and now is such a pandemic situation, majority of the graduates will have to face huge difficulty. COVID 19 has not only threatened their employment rates but also backdated the skillets earned so far by students and it has also made graduates and business, government to be aware of a situation and of a country.

Due to lockdown IT firms are facing stagnation due to which hiring, promotions have slowed down. Manufacturing firms are busy in repurposing their manufacturing form cosmetics to sanitizers, masks so that which will affects less as possible and keep the manufacturing on its way. Many IT electronics firms have transformed in building in mass amounts ventilators and other essential medical equipment’s. 

OPPURTUNITIES FOR GRADUATES DURING AND AFTER COVID 19:

The covid19 has also open opportunities for graduates and student pursuing higher education. Ample amount of time is granted with no disturbance except self-discipline.  It’s the time now to develop and nurture skills and given themselves a chance on being aware and pursue their big goals and be hopeful, confident, competitive, Impatient and build a CV to stand out of the crowd, be a special case thrived from such a situation.

OUR MINDSET TO GET PLACED SHOULD BE:

We should not only find a job, but we should search for a job that potential employers are seeking during and after the pandemic. Skilled up yourself through best online courses, project-based learning, critical thinking etc.     

OUTCOMES FOR A GRADUATE:

Under this circumstance, social network like Facebook or Professional network like LinkedIn are so much active compare to previous. Many students with their technical skills, got a chance for internship or placed in top level companies after applying in various professional networks through online. Virtual interviews are taking a part so that students grab their jobs easily while sitting at home. Many companies provide training through online and they are using virtual labs also to give an idea of real time applications. 

STARTUPS PROFILE UPDATE

Due to increase in unemployment and government unable to manage employments, peoples choose a career to start their own business and give employment to others, hence which reduces unemployment rates and leads to increase in country economic.

But the situation is different now and quite critical the business itself has got into stagnation. Planning and busy in description of their business on how they can favor their potential customers and market and get their business with fresh start. Indian government is also not behind the government also started with project “Aatma Nirbhar Bharat campaign”. This project aims in creating an ecosystem for innovation and entrepreneurship to thrive and make every India to adopt Aatma-Nirbhar Bharat campaign to transform “Local” India into “Global” India.

Aatma Nirbhar Bharat App Innovation Challenge

The App innovation challenge has two aspects which are promotion of existing apps and development of new apps. It also states it for those people who have such a working product or if they feel they have the vision and the expertise to create one.

Insight on Aatma Nirbhar Bharat by Ashok Gulati, Infosys chair professor for agriculture

Ashok gulati says india is a bulk exporter for agri-products. Gulati looks at the data and finds that the biggest item is edible oils – worth about $10 billion, and states” This is where there is a need to create ‘aatma nirbharta”.

CONCLUSION:

Though the novel coronavirus may be claiming victims all across the globe and keeping people sealed indoors due to the fear and mass confusion, but it can’t stop the innovative minds also the work ability. So last we can say “Stars can’t shine without darkness”

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#PositveCorona: Positive Impact of COVID-19 on Pharmaceutical Sectors: Indian Scenario

COVID-19 Outbreak

Originating from China, the novel corona virus (COVID-19) drastically spread throughout the world in quick span of time and affected almost all countries across the globe. In the last 8 months, COVID-19 has been spread rapidly and infected about 17 million world populations out of which more than 6.5 lacs people died. In Indian scenario, the rate of infection increased abundantly in the last few days which make India the 3rd most affected countries in World. Subjects suffering from infectious and non-infectious diseases of the lungs are found to be more risk from this viral infection due to the lower immune system. Hence, enhancing the immunity (natural body system) may possess the major contribution as a prophylactic measure against multiple pathogenic conditions as well as maintaining optimum health. In recent study in Spain, results showed that only a small population of people have secondary antibodies due to COVID-19 infection which indicates that the immunity developed after COVID-19 infection will not persist for a long time. Hence, there is a high need of development of pharmaceutical sectors including synthetic drug industries, herbal industries and pharmaceutical biotechnology in India.

Literature suggests that COVID-19 outbreak can worsen many business related to tourism and entertainment, however, there are many positive impact of COVID-19 in pharmaceutical industries in India. 

Pharmaceutical Industries and Clinical Research

Till date, there are no specific antiviral drugs to cure COVID-19 infection. There are several ongoing clinical trials in many countries to develop a successful drug to combat COVID-19 infection. Indian pharma industry occupies 3rd position in the world and India is a chief provider of low-priced drugs all over the world and is truly recognized as the ‘Pharmacy of the World’. Fifty percent of the US generic drug needs are met by India. The Indian pharma industry aspires to become the world’s largest supplier of drugs by 2030. Zydus, a foremost manufacturer of hydroxychloroquine (HCQ) has already augmented its capacity to produce both the API and the other formulation manifold. Honorable Prime Minister Mr. Narendra Modi cleared HCQ supplies from India to countries like the US, Brazil and Israel. Current global relation among the developed countries suggests that many foreign countries including Europe, USA and Japan might shift their pharmaceutical companies to India. In this context, it may be predicted that there will be an enormous development in pharmaceutical industries in India in future. 

Herbal Drug Industries

Ayurveda utilizes the concept of “Dinacharya” and “Ritucharya” to maintain healthy life that utilizes the gifts of nature (herbal medicines) as daily/seasonal regimes to maintain a healthy life. Ayurveda; a plant-based science suggests in simplifying the lifestyle, and also promotes the awareness in uplifting and maintaining owns immune system via the utilization of many plants/herbs which are easily available at the kitchen garden of a majority of the society. Recent studies showed the beneficial effect of many immunomodulator plants like Kalmegh and Ashwagandha and their constituents by inhibiting the interaction of the associated proteins involved in COVID-19 infection. Ministry of AYUSH in collaboration with Council of Scientific & Industrial Research (CSIR) and Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR) initiated many clinical trials of herbal preparation for the treatment of COVID-19. Recently, Patanjali Ayurved Ltd. developed a formulation “Coronil” which might be helpful of combating COVID-19.  In spite of the traditional effect of the Ayurvedic and herbal drugs, the acceptability in foreign markets depends on the scientific data of their safety/toxicity and pharmacology. So, the Ayurvedic companies started to develop the pharmacological/toxicological research in their companies or depend on the pharmaceutical research organizations. Hence, there may be a huge success in the field of Indian traditional system of medicine like Ayurveda as well as pharmaceutical companies after the development of herbal industries. 

Pharmaceutical Biotechnology Industries

Pharmaceutical biotechnology companies around the globe are rising to the challenges offered by the COVID-19 from supporting the development of prophylactic vaccines to diagnostic assays. Currently almost 250 COVID-19 vaccine candidates are in Phase 1-3 trials, as well as major candidates in pre-clinical stages of development. Moderna’s mRNA-127, the University of Oxford and Astra Zeneca’s AZD1222, Pfizer and BioNTech’s BNT162 are in pipeline with promising results. Since India is one of the largest vaccine producers in the world, the research institute with industries collaborative work on its way to fast-track vaccine development process. The Drugs Controller General of India (DCGI) has permitted two vaccines, viz., COVAXIN; developed by Bharat Biotech International Limited in collaboration with the Indian Council of Medical Research and another one ZyCoV-D by Zydas Cadila Healthcare Ltd to go in for the first and second phase of human clinical trials. In search of an effective treatment for COVID 19, biotech industries found an old method of fighting infectious disease resurfaced as Convalescent Plasma Therapy. On May 4, 2020, ICMR (Indian Council of Medical Research) has approved 21 institutions in the PLACID trial which was registered with CTRI (Clinical Trial Registry of India).Though ICMR does not recommend this as a treatment option outside of clinical trials, The Ministry of Health and Family Welfare, Government of India has incorporated ‘Convalescent plasma’ as an investigational therapy in patients with moderate disease who are not improving despite use of steroids. Meanwhile, there’s been other experimental fruitful data synergize the development of monoclonal antibody therapies for COVID-19 and provokes the urgent need for actual treatments for COVID-19 by the readjusting of approved immunomodulatory mAbs and other protein candidate through clinical trial projects to get a promising drug molecule

Conclusions

Hence, it is concluded that in spite of the deadly effect of COVID-19, there may a positive impact on pharmaceutical industries in India in future. However, Indian pharmaceutical companies depend on China for the raw materials like active pharmaceutical ingredients which require some amendment of the policy makers of Indian government to develop the active pharmaceutical ingredient sector.

#PositiveCovid: Five Things To Reckon As You Enter Communication Industry That Has Changed Forever

Incessant honking in a maddening crowd. Coffee machine gossip. Team meeting with fresh cookies. Running late and forgetting to punch the time register. Frustration due to a broken air conditioner.  A smile from a colleague that made our day. A whiff of jasmine in the super-crowded lift. Office drama that beat KJo’s family horror movies. The television behind us showing horrifying pictures of human tragedy, bodies soaked in blood somewhere in the Middle East.  

And then arrived an organism of around 125 nm (.125 μm) size. A soap-water fearing killer virus that hunted more than half a million people across the world while paralyzing economies.    In 180-plus anxious days our lives changed forever. We now work from home vis-à-vis the earlier dictum “don’t bring work at home”. Jostling at grocery shops has become a prehistoric affair as we are pampered by delivery players like Big basket, or Grofers. Social media blared with the declaration of António Guterres, the Secretary-General of the United Nations (UN) “It’s time to put armed conflict on lockdown,”. ABC news brought happiness to the peace-loving populace as Saudis declared a ceasefire while fighting Houthi rebels in Yemen. Humanity survived another day.

Homo sapiens being the most adaptable and resilient species fought back. In this process, many things about us changed. We have become less wasteful and more productive than earlier. With vaccines around the corner, I welcome you to the era of post COVID-19.  

I. Massive adoption of virtual work: Organizations have gone virtual. We are meeting everyone and work goes on as usual – all from home. Think of clutter free roads, fresh oxygen to breathe instead of mindless travel every day due to status quo. TCS, Google, Facebook and many other top MNCs have already gone for WFH as the way of life, same as Adamas University. Companies are slated to save huge with WFH. An article in business.com notes savings of two big companies. Sun Microsystems identified savings of $68 million a year in its real estate costs, while Dow Chemical and Nortel saved over 30% on non-real estate costs.

Opportunities for future brand managers: As the world becomes virtual, outdoor physical media, like banners, posters, in-shop branding, cinema hall branding etc may be less helpful. How can one brand the virtual world? Possibilities are enormous and infinite.  “Upload” a web series available on Amazon Prime recently offered me a few virtual branding inspirations. There are others too.   

II. The empathetic chatbots:
Companies are facing communication disruptions. With the virus forcing the migratory population to return home, many now face patchy internet connections. Chatbots are now your new customer care executives addressing anxious minds answering regular questions, updates etc. Enhanced versions are on the way – highly indistinguishable while conversing with a human, raising a number of ethical issues.   

Opportunities for future brand managers: Making chatbots empathetic. While technology will support in enhancing its cognitive capabilities, chatbots now need to make human connection to a lonely soul or a tense mind. Can it sell solutions as a friend with a genuine intent to help a buyer instead of being “salesy”?

III. Human connection for change:

We are now more connected like never before. People are rediscovering unity in humanity.

Police officers singing and dancing in Spain, Italians playing music with instruments at their balconies, Parisians clapping, Vietnamese health officials and lyricist Khac Hung producing an animated music video called “Jealous Coronavirus”, Bangkok SkyTrain staff dancing, cleaning and wiping down handrails – all these have resulted into a war cry that “humans will survive”.

Facebook group “The Kindness Pandemic”, are getting filled with hundreds of daily posts. NGOs are inundated with requests for formal and informal volunteering. Unlike big bang deafening campaigns full of razzmatazz, we might just transition into making an actual change.  

Opportunities for future brand managers: Think differently. Focus on issues that need our support. Every campaign you design, weigh it in terms of how it can enhance the spirit of connectedness.

IV. Breaking of psychological silos impacting perception:

Liquor industry, frowned upon by many as “evil”, joined hands to make ethanol-based hand sanitizers that saved millions of lives. Can governments, regulatory bodies and society going further remain as unforgiving to this industry as they are in present times? As perception changes, the branding for this around two-billion-dollar industry will change permanently.

Opportunities for future brand managers: Think of connections where you can benefit the society. How distilleries can be rebranded? Instead of “spinning”, think of genuine contributions to life that the industry can make. Make your case for various industries where turnarounds in terms of branding are possible.

V. Creativity wins:

Show-off goes, so goes lookalike campaigns and mediocrity that thrives on imitation. The medium can be the same, e.g., YouTube, or doodle or animation – but the construct can be totally different.  With people spending more time with themselves, cognitive scientist Margaret Boden notes that “psychological creativity” i.e, “capacity of an individual to create something that is valuable and surprising to themselves” is on rise. Hence, social media gets filled with creative memes, many have turned to dancing, singing, baking, painting, sculpting, physical exercises or learning to play musical instruments etc.

Opportunities for future brand managers: People get bored due to lack of distraction. Can you be creative to offer them a window to see the new world full of dreams, fellow-feeling and love? Your job is no longer a way of earning your survival or a daily drudgery that has to be done to earn money, but a way of self-fulfillment for yourself while catering to others in the tribe called the human. Are you ready?

Challenges, Opportunities, and Innovations for Effective Waste-Management during SARS-CoV—2 Pandemic

The novel coronavirus SARS-CoV—2 has created an unprecedented impact in most countries of the world. Coronavirus pandemic, since the first report in December 2019, has spread to nearly every corner of the globe. Till date, more than 18 million people are infected and ~ 700 thousand human toll. In this unprecedented circumstances, the principal scheme of government policies are focused mainly on the safety of lives and livelihoods of the people. The health care sectors are facing massive challenges to handle patients in need of urgent care with the existing infrastructure and limited availability of safety equipment to face this pandemic. Preventive methods like upgrading medical norms, aggressive testing campaigns, regulation of public policies are implemented so far to combat this public health catastrophe.

Certainly the world has witnessed the positive environmental implications of nationwide lockdowns inflicted by Covid—19 such as cleaner rivers and clearer skies due to significant reduction of industrial pollution. However, Covid—19 pandemic has disrupted the global waste generation dynamics, creating woes among policymakers and sanitary workforces. World health orgaization (WHO) recommended several types of personal protective equipment (PPE) such as medical gloves, facemasks, faceshields, and aprons for essential service workers (e.g., doctors, nurses, caregivers, etc.) and people inviolved in handling the coronavirus infected patients. Most of the countries have recommended its people to wear facemasks when going to public places. This has created colossal demand for personal safety equipments. Millions of PPEs are manufactured and used daily during the pandemic. Consequently, medical and hazardous waste including contaminnated masks, gloves, surfacewipes, and other protective equipment, along with a large amount of non-contaminated waste of the same nature are produced during an contagious outbreak. Improper collection practices could lead to contamination of general municipal solid waste with the virus, which could create a seriuos risk of transmission. Therefore, the safe management and eventual disposal of this waste is very critical for an efficient emergency measure. Appropriate identifcation, assortment, separation, storage, transportation, treatment, and disposal, as well as important associated aspects including proper sanitazation, training and protection of waste collecttion workforces, become part of effective supervision of biomedical and health-care waste. With each day passing by, the quantities of bimedical waste from health care facilities is increasing rapidly (e.g. 11 tons/day in Delhi, 9 tons/day in Mumbai). To add to the distresses, with looming uncertainty, and restrictions on movement, the pandemic in many countries has also lead to stockpiling of supplies, hoarding, and in some instances, panic buying. These more extreme retorts have been accompanied by more subtle consumption changes. Suppliers and end users are switching to single-use products for hygiene and convenience, using disposable wipes for disinfecting surfaces, carrying small hand sanitizer bottles, and certainly the facemasks, which may well continue to wash up on shores, during and long after the pandemic recedes.[vc_row][vc_column][vc_single_image image=”7787″ img_size=”full” alignment=”center”][vc_column_text]

Fig. 1.  The potential exposure and transmission risk of SARS-CoV-2 [Resources, Conservation & Recycling 162 (2020) 105043]

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There are other possible routes where improper management of used PPEs can pose a serious threat by creating a chain of transmission of SARS-CoV—2. Therefore, government policies to treat waste management of medical, household, and other hazardous waste are of paramount importance and waste management is appropriately declared as essential public service to minimize possible cascading impacts on health and environment. Alarmingly, almost 95% components of the materials used for PPEs are plastic and are neither biodegradable nor recyclable. Amid this ongoing health catastrophes, they are creating an unexpected impact on the environment instigating “a silent, invisible health hazard for a large number of people”. Therefore, any lack of alacrity or failure to address the biomedical waste concerns can lead to serious irreversible consequences in terms of mortality and morbidity.

The facility of safe water, sanitation and hygienic conditions is essential for protecting human health during all infectious disease eruptions, including Covid-19. Ensuring evidenced-based and consistently applied WASH and waste management practices in communities, homes, schools, marketplaces, and healthcare facilities help prevent human-to-human spread of Covid-19. However, potential transmission of viruses through wastewater is raising concerns amidst the science fraternity. Recent studies demonstrate that the SARS-CoV—2 virus is shed in feces from infected patients with severe symptoms, asymptomatic status, and treated patients with no further sign of the symptoms also reported the presence of the SARS-CoV—2 viral RNA in the urine samples of infected patients. Similarly, only the SARS-CoV—2 RNA was reported in the hospital sewage and community wastewater. Although the ability of the SARS-CoV—2 to persist in the water medium, including wastewater remains uncertain, the detection of the SARS-CoV—2 RNA in both untreated and treated wastewater and the isolation of the infectious SARS-CoV—2 from stool samples raise a concern of the risk of the potential spread through this medium. The SARS-CoV—2 RNA could enter the water systems through numerous pathways (Fig. 2), consequently causing the risk of potential transmission of Covid—19 in the water environment. These paths include wastewater discharged from hospitals and isolation and quarantine centers. The excreta-related contaminations are found to transmit through the contamination of water systems. Many water sources can, therefore, be potentially contaminated. The surface water (streams and lake) where wastewater is often discharged directly without proper treatment can also be a potential carrier for the SARS-CoV—2 through the water channels into various parts of the communities, where they rely on these water sources for their daily needs in low-income countries.

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Fig. 2. Sources and pathways of SARS-CoV-2 in water systems. [Science of the Total Environment 742 (2020) 140680]

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The transmission of SARS-Covid—19 through the virus contaminated water so far there is not reported. Nevertheless, other waterborne diseases contracted through the consumption of contaminated water such as diarrhea and gastroenteritis are far-reaching particularly in low-income countries. The majority of the population in low-income countries largely rely on the surface and groundwater resources to meet their daily water consumption. This might be a potential risk of spiraling of Covid—19 in the community. Therefore, a serious consideration for waste water treatment from the Covid-19 health care facilities is the need of the hour to prevent any possible snowballing transmission of Covid—19 through wastewater.                      

The Covid-19 crisis has shown us the essential nature of the waste management service. The daunting task for safe disposal and treatment of Covid—19 related biomedical waste and waste water treatment is soaring by the day. The Covid—19 outbreak has spawned an immediate requirement for innovation for disinfection technology. A Delhi-based market research company predicts that the Indian surface disinfectant market is expected to register high growth during 2020-2026 owing to the increased demand for the disinfection services amid the pandemic. At a time of unprecedented global health crisis, several entrepreneurs have been focusing on providing disinfection services, which have become the need of the hour, as the country opens up after observing an extended lockdown. Pune-based PadCare Labs is one such business which is helping people fight the infectious virus through its UV disinfection technology. Recently, the Office of the Principal Scientific Adviser to the Government of India has, in partnership with Invest India under the ‘Waste to Wealth Mission’ recently announced the Covid—19 Biomedical Waste Treatment Innovation Challenge.

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#PositiveCorona: The positive effect of COVID-19 on social media advertising

When Mark Zuckerberg started Facebook from the Harvard University campus back in 2004, the platform was merely used for inter-campus communication among the students, and their ware very few who guessed about the magnanimity of the platform to this scale. Similar to Facebook, other social media platforms started taking their first step from early 2000 as the internet became cheaper and widely available, and the cost of owning a smartphone also gone done and came within the reach of the common people, the usage of social media also rose to a significant level. There were rejections of the medium at some level but eventually, the popularity of social media beat all the odds and tightened its clutches among the different layers of the society. What made the social media even more useful is when the marketers started seeing a pool of opportunities to reach out to their target market easily through the social media and began using this medium as a centre of communication and promotion for their brands. Gradually, over the decade, the medium became one of the most potent ways of commercial communication for the advertisers which allowed them to reach out to their potential group of consumers with multiple hit points. The interactive nature of the medium allowed its users to be glued to this medium for a longer period, given the advantages to the advertisers to push their message in between the entrainment. The e-commerce sites have gone to a step ahead and link their sites and apps to the social media sites while flashing the recent search items, provoking and reminding consumers to take the final purchase decision. While most of the advertising platforms require monetary investment to slip the message into the platter, social media allows to advertise free of cost but obviously, the investment will take the message to a much wider range of audiences while aiming to a desired and a targeted pool of audiences.

According to the “Diffusion of Innovation” theory developed by E. M Rogers in 1962, an idea, behavior, or product while launched in a society, passes through different layers of acceptance before getting widely accepted among the people. The adapters are ranged from the ‘Innovators’ to ‘early adopters’ to ‘early majority’ to ‘late majority’ to ‘laggards’. As the product reaches the laggards at the end of the acceptance channel, the advertiser tries to encourage its enlisted and loyal consumers to purchase another product from its line of offerings. The theory is well accepted and applicable for a social structure while social media gives an ultimate social stratification to apply the theory while launching a product through social media. There is always a small group of ‘innovators’ who wish to try out newly launched products and also influence ‘early adopters’ by sharing their experiences. For advertisers, social media platforms can be an appealing option to lure the innovators out of their lair to experience the band while capturing the attention of a larger pool of prospective consumers by sharing their pictures, videos, comments, and experiences on social media. Because of the flexibility and broader reach of the medium, the advertisers are prone to use social mediums as an extensive part of their promotional strategies where they can also keep a tab on the progress ambiguously. The omnipotent nature of social media enables the marketers to approach the consumers located across the world while the platform algorithm allows them to set the advertisements in different time frames focused on a diverse pool of consumers.

Usage of social media platforms comes to a pick during the global pandemic of COVID-19 when people around the world are stranded behind their doors and barred from physical interaction to stop spreading the deadly virus. The pandemic left no other ways of interactive interactions among the people leaving the social medium as the only way to keep the communication alive among the friends allowing them to share pictures, videos, adios, and even video calling facilities. This also showed the advertisers a way of survival when other modes of advertisements were not an option and allow them to promote their brands with minimal investments. This also provides the flexibility to approach a large group of audience who are primarily concentrating on social media with a relatively low investment. The pandemic also forced many bands to take the shelter of social media promotion who earlier used to believe in the traditional mode of promotions since the diversion and proliferation are lesser due to the global pandemic that barred people to go outside. The circumstances also worked in favor of social media where the production of the advertisements does not always need the involvement of the physical location while the placement of the advertisements is done virtually. The social media was among the few options that kept people connected during the severe situation and also helped the brand not to lose out the communication with their valuable consumers. Now, when the virus spreads are being controlled and life is getting back to its usual accord, social media still helping the society to get back on to its feet. Interestingly, both the government and private organizations have taken the help of this wonderful medium to propagate their message while some of them were meant human welfare and some were to achieve the commercial accomplishments while the medium remains stoic with unparalleled benefits.

Global Economic Crisis and Role of Chemical Sciences for Its Revival

Initial Set back: The chemical industry has had an enduring presence across the globe, providing inputs into manufacturing sectors that help uplifting the living standards worldwide, while also contributing to address a variety of global sustainability challenges. However, the outbreak of SARS Covid—19 pandemic has exposed oil, gas and chemical industries to two major challenges. One is oil price war and another one is contagious pandemic imposed lockdown in almost every country in the planet. The disagreement between Russia and OPEC+ to cut the oil production resulted in sharp decline in oil price during spring, 2020. The imbalance between demand and supply of crude oil on world economy is further aggravated due to travel restrictions and industrial slow down during lockdown. According to the order issued by the Ministry of Home Affairs, India on 24th March, chemicals were not categorized as ‘essential commodities’; by road transportation of chemicals were prohibited across the country. Leading chemical manufacturers are still cutting both capital and operational expenditure. Manufacturing expenditure has been cut down to 40%—60 % capacity due to workforce shortages and disruptions in the supply of raw materials. During the month of February, 2020, Asia-pacific region has witnessed a declination of chemical production by 3.9%, while it was by 2.4%, in the world. It seems that opportunities in chemical and oil sectors are squeezed. However scenario is not that colourless; in fact some chemical sectors are brighter than pre-covid period. After initial set back, chemical sectors has begun to be reinforced. Chemists are directly or indirectly contributing for the recovery of whole world from pandemic crisis which in turn will leave further impact for prolonged future (https://www.rsc.org/news-events/articles/2020/apr/chemistry-against-covid-19/).

Scope for teachers in chemistry: With the boom of online teaching-leaning trend, chemists became learning support for both students and hiring institutions. Using latest technologies, faculty members are working hard to attract students towards chemistry, make them inspired and innovative. Job opportunities have been squeezed due to economic recession as a result of lockdown; passing out students are facing severe challenges due to unemployment. One already opened opportunity for them is to pursue higher education. Deep knowledge and skills will reinforce their resume to find better job and also will play crucial role to overcome prolonged impact of health and economic crisis.

Scope for the researcher and technicians: During past 5 months chemistry has been established as essential cutting edge tool to battle against covid-19 virus. Chemistry based research and development sectors of all sizes are refocusing their interests and funding for further exploration about the virus, diagnostic tools and finally creating vaccines. Death of 12 persons in gas leakage of LG polymer plant in Vishakhapatnam on May 07, 2020 has pointed out the need of maintenance of different units in chemical plants and proper precautions during restart. Technicians with in depth knowledge of chemistry can further have job openings to run tests, maintenance of equipments and manage laboratory safety and supplies.

Green signals for chemical sectors: We use chemicals at each minutes of the day life e.g.; toothpaste, food, oil, medicine, plastics, fabrics, cosmetics, paints, gases, fertilizers, pesticides, ceramics and the list is never ending. Chemicals and oil products are essential raw materials required to produce safety equipments or medicines to survive against corona virus. Due to disruptions in the supply of Chinese chemicals, Indian companies witnessed inflows of orders from global players, which is credit positive for our country. The prices of many petrochemicals were reduced for Indian manufacturer improving their profit level. Another sector is Indian agrochemical industry, which is largely dependent on China for raw materials. With the ease of lock down, Chinese government is offering export rebates to pesticide manufacturer. There will be no shortage of raw materials for the agrochemical players in current kharif seasons, which enhanced production level to reach 70% of normal. We can expect the revival of Indian chemical sectors to some extent with the relaxation of norms of lockdown across the country. This is one crucial moment when global players are scrambling for alternative of Chinese supply, which was disrupted for short time being. As a result Indian players have huge potential to grab the market of Chinese players.

Sharp increase of production and packaging of sanitizers: Covid-19 pandemic has increased public consciousness to maintain hygiene in private and public spaces in India. Covid-19 pandemic has accelerated the demand for disinfectants, antiseptics, food packaging and medicines. Oil and chemical industries also need to produce large amount raw materials required to prevent contamination of food, personal care and medical products. Start-ups like Aqoza technologies and PerSapien have developed chemical formulations for disinfecting public spaces. Airlens minus Corona from PerSapien dispenses water droplets to oxidize the viral protein. (https://www.financialexpress.com/opinion/beyond-indias-coronavirus-unlock-1-0-an-age-of-innovation/1982951/). The spread of COVID-2 has triggered a sharp rise in the demand of isopropyl alcohol, which is a key ingredient. Chemical sector has decided to produce isopropyl level to maximum plant capacity. Sugar mills in northern India have started supplying ethanol/ethyl alcohol/extra neutral alcohol (ENA) to the companies producing hand sanitiser across the country. Meanwhile, many sugar mills have applied for license from the Central Drug Standard Control Organization (CDSCO) to produce hand sanitizers, but not the license for packaging. Simultaneously, there has been opening for the plastic industries to provide raw materials to different players packaging sanitizers for the markets.

New avenues in/for pharmaceutical chemistry: Immediately after the outbreak of covid-19, pharmaceuticals companies jumped in the race to invent vaccines and medicines. Country’s oldest pharmaceuticals company, Bengal Chemicals & Pharmaceuticals Ltd, was suddenly under spot light due to sudden worldwide demand for hydroxychloroquine (HCQ), which is the most sought-after drug in the treatment of Covid-19. Demands of different immunity boosting medicines shoot across the country. Indian pharmaceutical giant Dr. Reddy’s Laboratories (Dr Reddy’s) in collaboration with global companies are going to manufacture flavivir, a potential drug against covid-19. Biotechnology major Biocon is going to launch biologic drug Itolizumab for the treatment of moderate to severe covid-19 patients. Hence, chemists are on high demand in pharmaceutical companies. Chemists play important role in pharmaceutical sectors; hike of medicinal demands creats jobs for chemists.

Raised demand of waste water treatment: As per recommendation of WHO, hygiene is extremely important issue to prevent the spread of virus. Frequent washing of hands with frothing soaps is most efficient and effective way to avoid the transmission of the virus. However, the access of large amount of fresh and safe water is one biggest challenge to India, especially rural India where facility of medical sanitizers may not be available. The threat of covid 19 virus has reinstated the demand of waste water management. One purifies water using chemicals. Widely used components include to purify water is chlorine, ultraviolet ray, ozonisation, ion exchangers, which can be employed by chemists. In this sectors chemists will be on high demand to test water, and to construct water purification systems.

In the period of turbulence, chemical society is ready to face the new structural transformations in micro economy, technology, regulations, and consumer preferences in both developed and emerging markets.

Porous Coordination Polymers: The Promising Candidates for Molecular Transformation

Introduction:

Many important chemical transformations would not seem to be encountered in our world without suitable catalysts. That at least, not in a way which has some practical application. Catalysts are indispensable in the living systems. For obvious reasons it has become essential in a wide range of industrial application too. However, the study of these systems can offer much more: it can change our understanding of fundamental chemical concepts and at times compelled us to rethink the rules of the chemical world. Research in this area moving very fast: many catalytic reactions now appeared to be easier to the chemists that were remained unachievable a decade ago. More over millions of organic molecules now have their real existences. Many new antibiotic and antiviral drugs have been possible to synthesize to save the world from many pandemic diseases. Metals, especially transition metals play important roles in catalysis. Metals can be found in enzyme as well as in the industrial catalysts. Studies on metal incorporated micro/meso-porous solids in order to use them as heterogeneous catalysts, have received immense attention in last few decades. Porous coordination polymers, i.e., metal organic/inorganic/hybrid framework solids (MOFs or MIFs or MOIFs) being porous have potential to be used in the same manner as in the case of zeolites or aluminosilicate-based catalysts. Heterogeneous catalysis is a major field of interest in material science [1].

Homogeneous to heterogeneous:

Traditionally there are several approaches to heterogenise a homogeneous system supporting over a solid support. In the literature numerous number of homogeneous complexes have been found that are efficiently bound with the support matrix through several pathway like, (i) covalent binding, (ii) electrostatic interaction, (iii) adsorption (iv) encapsulation, and (v) hydrogen bonding, based on the interaction between the catalyst and the solid support matrix.  There may be several advantages and disadvantages regarding the stapling of the homogeneous complexes on any support. But the important question is still asked, is it true heterogeneous? That’s why the modern chemistry tries to construct such a system that can be directly used and the question of true heterogeneity will be solved. Using porous coordination polymer as the catalyst is a good option. Although the field is not so seasoned but several approaches have been established fruitfully and the outstanding properties of porous frameworks (PCPs) have studied recently [1]. The structural porosity of PCP materials places them at the frontier between zeolites and surface metal–organic/inorganic catalysts. PCPs, therefore, appear to be excellent entities for catalysis, with the understanding that their potential still largely in its infancy. Crystalline Porous Polymers (PCPs), especially those exhibiting zeolite-like properties such as high internal surface area and microporosity, comprise a promising emerging class of functional materials. The notion is that MOF-based catalysts may be able to replicate some of the key features of zeolitic catalysts (e.g. single-site reactivity, pore-defined substrate size and shape selectivity, easy catalyst separation and recovery, and catalyst recyclability) while incorporating reactivity and properties unique to molecular catalysts. One important property of many molecular catalysts that has yet to be demonstrated with purely zeolitic catalysts is enantioselectivity.

Synthetic Method of PCPs:

Diverse procedures are available for synthesis of PCPs which are extremely convenient to prepare. Mostly it is prepared through sol-gel process, where the metal salt and ligand solutions are prepared separately and mixed together. Solvent that is used depends on several factors like solubility, redox potential etc., but other methods like solid phase, CVDs, Electrochemical or diffusion methods are also well known. The simple way to design can be depicted as given in the figure 1 and 2.[vc_row][vc_column][vc_single_image image=”7772″ img_size=”full” alignment=”center”][vc_column_text]

Figure 1. Preparation of different kinds of PCPs.

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Figure 2. Simple overview for the development of porous coordination polymers.

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Transition metals are chosen to design redox catalyst. Mainly metals from first transition series, e.g. manganese, copper, iron, vanadium etc. are selected for preparing redox catalysts. Metal having Lewis acidic property are for preparing catalysts that are intended to be used in acid catalysis reactions. Linkers act as bridge between metal centers in PCPs. Heavy metals are introduced within the PCPs for different types of coupling and other tandem catalysis.

Importance:

Open-structure PCPs bear prospects for designing of new heterogeneous catalysts that are spatially accessible for directing the reactions to the site-isolated and structurally well-defined active centers like enzymatic catalysts. Heterogeneous catalysts have potential in commercial uses due to easy recovery and recycling of catalysts as well as minimizing the undesired and/or toxic side products. Catalysts can be designed through various approaches. One of the new approaches is to incorporate redox metal centers into the frameworks porous solid. The active center can be metal ions or metal containing entity such as complex with designed ligands. Site-isolation is of paramount importance in achieving maximum catalytic efficiency. Often such types of molecular assemblies with porous structure have potential in the application of various heterogeneous catalysis through the small molecule activation and conversion. A rapid growth in the study of these materials has arisen from the realization that these frameworks synthesis offers considerable flexibility and control over structure and properties, thereby offering wide pathways to rational materials design. By designing the MOFs or porous coordination polymer it has been possible to separate and isolate the closely similar small organic molecules and to convert them to the desired products [2]. It is now well established that large cavities are catalytically important for several reasons. Large cavities allowing for more complex functional groups are to be added to the pores, similar to catalytically active hybrid materials consisting of functional complexes tethered to metal oxide surfaces [3]. It is well reported that bifunctional dicarboxylates served to bridge various metal ions producing a lot of highly porous and catalytically active frameworks [4], Yaghi group has developed a family of compounds based on one structural arrangement in which the pore size may be tuned over a wide range. By using longer or shorter organic molecules of similar geometry, Yaghi et al. have now prepared 16 variations on the MOF-5 structure, with pores varying from 3.8 to 28.8 Å in diameter [5]. So, by tuning the porous channel one can rationalize the activation of organic molecules within the pore for catalysis. In this case the effective heterogeneous conversion of small molecules is the most extensively employed processes for prevailing desired organic materials in industry and the laboratory. PCPs which include metallosilicates or phosphates (ALPO, SAPO, VAPO etc.) are rather more well studied as regards the catalytic study [6], however, reports on heterogeneous catalytic reactions over PCPs are scanty in the literature. Fujita reported the shape selective cyanosilylation reaction over Cd-based MOF [7]. Horcajada et. al. employed hydrothermally synthesized iron(III) carboxylate zeotype metal-organic framework in Friedel-Crafts benzylation catalysis [8]. Metalloporphyrin encapsulated into zeolite-like three-dimensional metal-organic frameworks efficiently catalyze oxidation of cyclohexane with tert-BuOOH [9]. Cd containing MOF catalyzes the Knoevengel condensation in heterogeneous medium [10]. Notably this catalytic system shows size selectivity of the reactants. So, the flexibility of the frameworks originates the enormous structural and chemical diversities afforded by molecular systems, features that are less prevalent in many other branches of materials chemistry.  The innovation of a new porous compound with desired properties based on pore and surface functionalities is extremely important in this advanced scientific era. Hence, in the present project, thrust will be given to study more on catalytic reactions besides the preparation and characterization of the catalysts. As environmental protection laws in all over the world are becoming more stringent the chemical companies are searching for processes that will be less hazardous than the processes being followed in the industry at present.

Future Scope:

These types of catalytic systems are promising in this count. These materials show promise for applications in heterogeneous catalysis. The area of advanced materials research has very broad scope and potential applications. Advanced materials outperform conventional materials with superior properties showing particular predetermined features. In this regard, the capability of incorporating a variety of organic single molecules into the nano cavity makes PCPs superior candidates as nanosized reactors, which strongly compete the traditional zeolites or other porous metal-oxide materials. And remarkably the simple modification over the interior cavities of the PCPs allows us the selective reactions in the channels. So, by systematic functionalization of the pore surface we can easily control the desired reactions this methodology can afford new vistas for the designing of new functional PCPs by which not only they can maintain the catalytic reactions but also, they can meet the preinstalled specific information. This field has a quite good future for industrial applications. 

Reference:

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