Category Archives: Education

Bharathiar University launches herbal ointment

Business & Economy, Education, Nature, Science & Technologies

G. James Pitchai, Vice-Chancellor of Bharathiar University (left) releasing the herbal product of the Department of Botany, 'RuBHeal', at the university in Coimbatore on Thursday. P.V.L. Rao, Director, DRDO-BU-CLS, is in the picture.

G. James Pitchai, Vice-Chancellor of Bharathiar University (left) releasing the herbal product of the Department of Botany, ‘RuBHeal’, at the university in Coimbatore on Thursday. P.V.L. Rao, Director, DRDO-BU-CLS, is in the picture. / The Hindu

The Department of Botany of Bharathiar University launched a herbal ointment ‘RuBHeal’ here on Thursday. The research product is said to have resulted from the use of medicinal wealth found in the Western Ghats. A patent has been filed for it.

Launching the ointment at a national conference on “Phytomedicine” at the university, its Vice-Chancellor G. James Pitchai urged scientists not to restrict research to academics, but extend it to the welfare of society.

“Universities are fertile fields of research. Research should be technologically practical, economically feasible and environmentally safe,” he said.

P.V. Rao, Director of the Defence Research and Development Centre-Bharathiar University-CLS, said economic value of traditional knowledge was often identified as a reason of conserving and documenting cultural practices.

“To rationalise the use of natural resources in the modern healthcare system, it is necessary to explore these systems with scientific approaches,” he said.

M.J. Nanjan, director, TIFAC, JSS College of Pharmacy, Udhagamandalam, said there were many challenges in quality control and standardisation of herbal drugs / traditional medicine. Quality criteria for herbal drugs were based on a clear scientific definition of raw materials.

source: http://www.TheHindu.com / Home> National> TamilNadu / by Staff Reporter / Coimbatore, October 06th, 2012

Nobel laureate studies shrimp to map immune system

Education, Science & Technologies, World Opinion

Chennai:

French Nobel laureate  Jules A Hoffmann is pushing for a collaboration with Annamalai University to study viral infections in shrimp to understand the human immune system.

Professor Hoffmann of Strasbourg University in France, whose decades-long work on the fruit fly revolutionised the study of the human immune system, has evinced keen interest in studying viral infections in shrimp and identified it as an important research area for joint Indo-France collaboration.

“There are a lot of parallels between the study being undertaken by Annamalai University and the research we did on fruit flies. Since we have experience in this area, we can jointly work with the University to identify constituents of other organisms and gain insights into how the human immune system works,” said Hoffman.

Hoffman, along with Professor Bruce A Beutler, was awarded the Nobel prize in physiology or medicine in 2011 for the discovery of the key principles for the activation of the immune system. The duo discovered receptor proteins that can recognise microorganisms and activate innate immunity which can destroy invading micro organisms. This discovery has made possible the development of new methods for preventing and treating diseases.

The Nobel laureate, who was in the city to participate in the 25 years of celebration of Indo-French Centre for Promotion of Advanced Research (IFCPAR), on Thursday delivered a lecture on ‘Antimicrobial Defence of Drosophila: A Paradigm for Innate Immunity From Flies to Humans’ at Anna University.

Hoffmann also stressed on the need to study infectious diseases and expressed the hope that there would be cures for all kinds of diseases, including HIV and cancer, in the next 10 years.

“When I began my research we lacked enough resources and infrastructure which frequently impeded our study. With advancement in technology over the last decade, we should be able to find cures for all kinds of infectious diseases in the next 10 years or so,” he said.

Praising the progress India had made in the scientific sector, Prof Hoffman said future collaborations with the country could not be ruled out.

source: http://www.timesofindia.indiatimes.com / Home> City> Chennai / TNN / October 12th, 2012

3 Chennai professors among 9 selected for National Science awards, 2012

Education, Resources of Free Materials, Science & Technologies

Chennai:

Three academics from the city are among the nine awardees selected for the Indian National Science Academy Awards, 2012. The INSA Teachers Awards was instituted to value consistent and high levels of teaching in colleges, universities and other higher educational institutions.

Professor of Chemistry department of the Indian Institute of Technology-Madras Dhamdodharan Ragavachari, professor A Subbiah Pandi of Presidency College and professor P Gautam of Anna University have been selected for the award. Professor Dhamodharan, who completed his PhD in UMASS at Amherst in the US, is also a senior Fulbright Research Fellow.

The other awardees are professors Aniruddha Bhalchandra Pandit of the Institute of Chemical Technology, Mumbai; Achuthsankar S Nair of the University of Kerala, Thiruvananthapuram; Anil J Elias of IIT-Delhi; Pratap Kumar Pati of   Guru Nanak Dev University, Amritsar; Raja Ram Yadav of the University of Allahabad; and Shibnath Mazumder of the University of Delhi.

Nominees come from all disciplines of science and technology. The awardees will receive a scroll, a cash award of 50,000 and a one-time book grant of 20,000.

source: http://www.timesofindia.indiatimes.com / Home> City> Chennai / TNN, October 09th, 2012

Quest12 held at SRM University

Education

School of management, SRM university Ramapuram, conducted a national-level management meet, QUEST’12 on September 27.

Yogesh G.Nair, head, talent development, L&T infra Ltd., Chennai, delivered the inaugural address and released ‘SRM RMP Journal of Advanced Management Research’.

He spoke of his own perceptions, experience and learning which enriched the gathering on good decision making skills. Different events such as Best Manager, Business Plan, Business Premier League, AD-Zap and Corporate Walk were conducted to showcase the entrepreneurial and managerial skills of youth. Around 500 Students from more than 150 colleges participated and won prizes.

R.Narayanasamy, director, delivered the special address and was felicitated by K Abdul Ghani, Dean and l Antony Micheal Raj, vice principal, SRM university.

source: http://www.ibnlive.in.com / Home> Latest News / The New Indian Express,  Express News Service / Chennai, October 03rd, 2012

Axe falls on Tamil Thaatha’s house

Arts, Culture & Entertainment, Education, Historical Links, Pre-Independence, Records, All

ERASING HISTORY: Demolition work in progress at U.V. Swaminatha Iyer’s house at Triplicane in Chennai on Saturday. / Photo R. Ravindran / The Hindu

It was here that Rabindranath Tagore called on Swaminatha Iyer in 1926

Thyagaraja Vilas, the house of the grand old man of Tamil literature (Tamil Thaatha), U.V. Swaminatha Iyer, and one of the city’s landmarks, will soon disappear.

The descendants of Iyer have reportedly sold the property at Thiruvatteeswaranpet and the buyer is demolishing the house. The inner walls have been brought down. Nameboards bearing the titles ‘Thyagaraja Vilas’ and ‘U.Ve. Swaminatha Iyer Illam’ have been removed.

The man overseeing the demolition said that he worked for the buyer.

“It is really sad because it is from this house he edited and published many ancient literary works such as Silapathikaram, Patthupaatu and Ettuthogai after collecting palmleaf manuscripts from every nook and corner of the country. Even a university cannot match his efforts,” says writer Indira Parthasarathy.

When Rabindranath Tagore visited Chennai in 1926, he called on Iyer at this house and even penned a poem in praise of Iyer’s contribution.

Iyer came to this house as a tenant in 1904 following his appointment as a Tamil teacher of the Presidency College in 1903. The monthly rent was Rs. 20. Subsequently, he bought the house and named it after Thyagaraja Chettiayar, who was instrumental in getting him the post of Tamil teacher of the Kumbakonam Arts College in the wake of his retirement in 1880.

Parthasarathy, an alumnus of the Kumbakonam College, says the demolition will not only remove the memories of Iyer but also those of Thyagaraja Chettiyar, an eminent scholar, after whom the house was named.

“Chettiyar’s contribution to Tamil is explained by the fact that the principal of the Kumbakonam College, an English man, had his image engraved on one of the pillars of the college,” says Prof. Parthasarathy.

Iyer had explained why he named the house after Chettiyar. “It is a gesture to express my gratitude; even atonement, as I had failed to acknowledge Chettiyar’s name in my edition of the ‘Seevaka Chinthamani,’ one of the five great epics in Tamil,” he stated in his biography of Thyagaraja Chettiyar.

Ki. Va. Jagannathan, one of the students of Iyer, had recalled in his book ‘Yenathu Aasiriyarpiran’ that the owner of the house happily sold the house to Iyer though he had taken advance from another person.

Swaminatha Iyer worked in Presidency College till 1919. Later, he was the principal of the Meenakshi Tamil College from 1924 to 1927. He left the house only in 1942 along with many Chennai residents, fearing aerial bombardment during the Second World War.

As the former ‘asthana vidwan’ of the Thiruvavaduthurai Mutt, he was allowed to stay in a house of the Mutt at Thirukazhukundram. He died there on April 28, 1942 following a brief illness.

“The government should intervene and secure the house of Swaminatha Iyer as it did in the case of the house where Subramania Bharati resided. Iyer, Bharathi and Pudumaipithan form the Trinity of the Tamil language and cultural awakening. We cannot afford to ignore the fact,” says Prof. Parthasarathy.

source: http://www.TheHindu.com / Home> News> States> TamilNadu / by B. Kolappan / Chennai, September 16th, 2012

Board queen keen to conquer the world

Education, Inspiration/ Positive News and Features, Records, All, Sports

M. Mahalakshmi.

It is an unlikely setting in which to find a chess champion. An asbestos-sheeted single-room house in a slum at Erukkancheri with the family struggling to make ends meet.

However, the tough conditions have made M. Mahalakshmi, who is the world under-12 girls’ chess bronze medallist, more determined to win the forthcoming world under-14 girls’ chess championship.

“I want to become the world champion. It is my goal in life. My immediate goal is to win gold at the world youth championship that begins in Solvenia on November 7,” the teenage girl from Chennai told Deccan Chronicle.

The Class 9 student of Velammal Matriculation School has so far won two bronze medals (under-8 and under-12) at world level tournaments.

At the Asian level, she has bagged gold in the under-10 category in 2008, silver in the under-14 meet in 2010 and a bronze in the same under-14 event in 2011.

The fourth daughter of an electrician, Mahalakshmi picked up chess from her third sister M. Jagadambal.

Put under the tutelage of prominent coach M.J. Ismail, she quickly rose to prominence at the national level when she bagged the under-7 title in 2005.

However, her family troubles have ensured that she has to fight greater odds to keep ruling the chess board. Mahalakshmi now trains under R.B. Ramesh and misses out on the individual attention.

“Earlier we used to arrange for individual training for her. At that time, I was running a PVC pipe company and was living in a decent flat.

Now we are struggling to make ends meet and so have stopped professional coaching for her,” said her dejected father P. Mukunthakumar, adding that she missed participating in a open tournament at Orissa recently because of lack of funds.

The little champ is, however, not worried about coaching or losing valuable tournament practice. “I train for at least eight hours a day at home.

My school is very considerate and sponsors me when I travel abroad,” said Mahalakshmi. To motivate this young chess champion call 98400-33294.

source:  http:/www.DeccanChronicle.com / Home> Channels> Cities> Chennai / by S. Sujatha / DC, Chennai / September 17th, 2012

Neutrino project on right track, say scientists

Education, Science & Technologies

Madurai:

Pre-project work on the India-based Neutrino Observatory (INO) will be completed by this year, say scientists working on INO.

A group of scientists working on INO in the West Bodi Hills in Theni district who were in Madurai to participate in a seminar at The American College said a nodal centre would soon be established for INO near Madurai Kamaraj University in Madurai.

The Rs-1,356 crore underground Neutrino Observatory is one of the world’s biggest pure science research projects coming up in Bodi Hills, about 110 km west of Madurai.

Speaking to TOI on the sidelines of the workshop titled “Pathway to  Higgs Boson”, M V N Murthy of the Institute of Mathematical Sciences in Chennai said the neutrino project, one of the big initiatives of the country in pure science, was on the right track. “The team of scientists is working on pre-project works now, which will be completed by 2012-end. Environment and pollution control board clearances have been obtained for 40 acres in Pottipuram village where the project is coming up,” he said. Excavation of a two-km tunnel in the hills for establishment of the observatory would commence after that.

Murthy further said a nodal centre was being established near Madurai for INO. “Work is in progress to obtain another 30 acres in Vadapalanji village near Madurai Kamaraj University where the nodal centre for the observatory will be constructed.

G Rajasekaran, scientific steering committee member of INO, said the pre-project works included setting up of necessary basic infrastructure in Pottipuram village like fencing the land, creating drinking water facilities and access roads. “The scientists team is working on creating a magnetic detector which will be placed inside the cavern in a two km tunnel which will be excavated in the mountain,” he said.

source: http://www.timesofindia.indiatimes.com / Home> City> Madurai / August 29th, 2012

From IIT-M, nano-scale device to detect big explosives

Amazing Feats, Education, Records, All, Science & Technologies

Researchers at the Indian Institute of Technology, Madras, (IIT-M) have developed a novel device that can visually detect even a single molecule of TNT used in the making of powerful explosives. Apart from national security, this ultra-sensitive and highly selective detection method will have applications in early identification of diseases and in radiation prevention, the IIT researchers claim.

IIT-M creates nano-scale device to detect explosions

Chemistry professor Thalappil Pradeep and his students Ammu Mathew and P.R. Sajanlal reporated the principle behind this device in the online issue of the leading chemistry journal Angewandte Chemie on Aug 22.

They are now building the device that may be put to practical use soon. The science behind this explosive detector is rather involved and difficult to explain. In simple terms, the detector works somewhat like an alert traffic cop who spots a violator by simply looking at the traffic signal. In other words, if the suspected sample being tested is clean, the detector gives off a red glow on being irradiated with light of a particular wavelength. But if the sample contains the explosive TNT (trinitrotoluene), the signal changes to with a fluorescence microscope has been demonstrated by the IIT team to take place in the presence of even just one molecule of TNT — a lower limit that has not been achieved by any detector so far.

Pradeep heads IIT’s nanoscience centre and naturally the TNT sensor that his team has developed uses a combination of gold and silver nano-particles, which are particles of extremely small dimensions.

The entire detector system is just four millionths of a metre in size and its distinct star shape is of particular advantage because it is easy to unmistakably identify the colour change under the microscope, says Pradeep. According to the scientists, their novel approach “can be considered a single-particle, single-molecule detection technique which is probably the ultimate in ultra-trace sensitivity“.

The researchers have demonstrated that they can also detect extremely low levels of mercury – an environmental contaminant — using the same sensor strategy. They say the concept could also be used for the detection of very low concentration of other substances by incorporating appropriate molecules called “ligands’ on their sensor thereby opening up applications in catalysis, bio-imaging and other areas.

IANS

source: http://www.tech2.in.com / Home> News> Science & Technology / August 28th, 2012

NABARD sanctions Rs 129.82 cr for govt schools in Tamil Nadu

Business & Economy, Education

The funds were sanctioned for creation of additional infrastructure in 131 government higher secondary schools in these districts

The National Bank for Agricultural and Rural Development (NABARD) has sanctioned Rs 129.82 crore to Tamil Nadu for creating additional infrastructure in schools in all 31 districts, a senior official said today.

The funds were sanctioned for creation of additional infrastructure in 131 government higher secondary schools in these districts.

“The project envisages construction of 1,508 classrooms, 112 laboratories, staff rooms, hostel blocks, drinking water facility and toilet blocks,” NABARD Chief General Manager Lalitha Venkatesan said in a statement.

Over one lakh students are expected to benefit from the exercise, she said.

Including this amount, NABARD has so far sanctioned Rs 822 crore under the Rural Infrastructure Development Fund (RIDF-XVIII) for 2012-13, she said.

Some of the other infrastructure development support by NABARD during the current year includes irrigation, laying of roads in rural and setting up of fish farms, she added.

source: http://www.Business-Standard.com / Home> Economy & Policy / by Press Trust of India / Chennai, August 28th, 2012

Web research and cloud computing’

Education, Science & Technologies, World Opinion

Hari Vasu tells Sangeeta Yadav that there is a lot on offer to the students under the collaboration between Yahoo India R&D and IIT Madras

What is the main agenda behind this collaboration?

Supporting the academic community is a top priority at Yahoo. And we achieve this through scientific leadership, new research, business collaborations, online products and employment opportunities. Our collaboration with IIT – Madras is an example of Yahoo’s global commitment to leveraging industry-academia relationships to deliver breakthrough technology and innovations. We have been working closely for the last three years and our collaboration has now reached a milestone in the form of the Yahoo! grid computing lab launch which aims to spur research in big data problems in areas such as search, personalisation and digital advertising.

What is Yahoo! Grid Computing Lab all about?

Under this partnership, IIT-Madras researchers will have access to web-scale data and conduct research in the area of distributed computing, cloud computing, machine learning and big data. The grid computing infrastructure consists of 30 high end servers and is already operational. Unlike many other Hadoop clusters donated earlier by Yahoo to IITs, which were used to do problems on top of Hadoop, this is a first of its kind experimentation cluster by Yahoo which will allow research on core systems and help discover some new paradigms in the area of large scale distributed computing.

How will this benefit the students of IIT?

This cluster of high-end servers at the lab will allow students and researchers to access web-scale data and conduct research on big data and cloud computing systems. The partnership will support researchers at IIT-Madras to process and analyse huge volumes of structured and unstructured data which, to date, has been limited due to significant cost barriers in getting large computing systems operational. We will supplement this with invaluable data access and promote awareness of hard technical challenges through ‘tech talks’ by some of the best minds at Yahoo. Our hope is to catalyse and align research agenda at these premier institutes by providing a level playing field to co-invent next generation web technologies.

Is there any fee or eligibility required to enroll under this programme?

The lab is absolutely free and any student or researcher interested in pursuing research on Grid Computing at the IIT-Madras can access the lab.

What are the other projects Yahoo India has launched to facilitate cloud computing?

We previously established a Hadoop Cluster lab at the IIT Bombay campus. The lab is helping students, researchers and faculty in the domain of Web-scale data research including web search, text mining, data management and natural language processing. With this facility, students, faculty and researchers are getting exposure to cloud computing environment and are supporting research study of advance searching and ranking techniques.

How does this open up a new arena of exciting opportunities for the students?

Yahoo’s collaboration with premier institutes like the IITs will provide some of the brightest minds in India and the world to access raw computing power, web-scale software technology and rich data sets. It’s a win-win situation for all of us. For the students it is now easy to play around with web scale data and get exposure to some real world scientific challenges. For Yahoo, the research that goes in academic institutions like IIT Bombay directly benefits Yahoo who depends on such critical innovation and cannot do everything by itself.

source: http://www.dailypioneer.com / Home> Avenues / Pioneer / Thursday, August 14th, 2012