Plants Can Produce Species Without Sex

How plants can produce species without sex
IANS | London June 13, 2014 Last Updated at 12:54 IST

Read more on: How Plants Can Produce Species Without Sex
Related News
GM tobacco plants can produce bio-fuels
Learn how plants have sex
100-million-years old flowering plants provide oldest evidence of sex
R-Patz spills the beans on car sex scene sex with Julianne Moore
Meet conducted to bridge gap for sex wokers and transgenders


Plants can transfer their entire genetic material to a partner in an asexual manner, research reveals.

German scientists at the Max Planck Institute of Molecular Plant Physiology have shown for the first time that new species can be generated in an asexual manner as well.

It was generally believed that a combination of desired traits can be obtained by grafting, but there is no exchange or recombination of genetic material - so-called horizontal gene transfer - between the grafted plants.

"In our previous work, we were able to prove that, contrary to the generally accepted dogma, there is horizontal gene transfer of chloroplast genes at the contact zone between grafted plants," said lead researcher Ralph Bock.

Now we wanted to investigate if there is a transfer of genetic information between the nuclei as well, Bock added.

The researchers introduced resistance genes against two different antibiotics into nuclear genomes of the tobacco species Nicotiana tabacum and Nicotiana glauca, which usually cannot be crossed.

Afterwards, Nicotiana glauca was grafted onto Nicotiana tabacum or the other way round.

After fusion had occurred, scientists excised tissue at the contact zone and cultivated it on a growth medium containing both antibiotics, so that only cells containing both resistance genes and thus, DNA from both species, should survive.

The scientists succeeded in growing up numerous doubly resistant plantlets.

"We managed to produce allopolyploid plants (having two or more complete sets of chromosomes derived from different species) without sexual reproduction", said Sandra Stegemann, joint first author of the study.

When the scientists grew their new plants in the greenhouse, it became obvious that they combined characteristics of both progenitor species.

Also, the new plants grew remarkably faster than their parents.

"Grafting two species and selecting for horizontal genome transfer could become an interesting method for breeders who could use this approach to create new crop plants with higher yields and improved properties," researchers concluded.

inherent power to deal with many illnesses.

‘Medical Council of India is a source of corruption’
DC | Teena Thacker | June 11, 2014, 06.06 am IST

Union health minister Harsh Vardhan (Photo: Deccan Chronicle)

An ENT surgeon by profession, Union health minister Harsh Vardhan, who is fondly called ‘Doctor Saab’, has never lost an election, be it the Lok Sabha or state Assembly. He spoke to Teena Thacker on the ‘health for all’ policy and how he intends to improve deteriorating health services in the country.

To fulfil Narendra Modi government’s “health for all” agenda, how have you chalked out your priorities?
In a subject like health one cannot have priorities. Everything has to be your priority and you have to work accordingly.

For instance, in a body, brain is a priority, but you cannot ignore the heart or any limb for that matter.

I feel that all issues are equally important and that’s how I have started working. I am reviewing everything, trying to monitor, trying to push things, trying to convert ideas into future plans.

What is your main focus for the first 100 days?
There is nothing called an “agenda for 100 days”. I don’t know from where this term has come.

I have never said anything about “100 days” nor has the Prime Minister announced anything. Our job is to deliver within 60 months, that’s the five-year period.

If there is an agenda for 100 days, for me it’s to put everything in order. My target would be to at least monitor everything in health in 100 days, give my ideas, plan out for everything.

Even if you think of opening a dispensary you cannot do it in 100 days. So, for me, 100 days is basically the time to review everything, strengthen everything and make a humble beginning.

What can be done to tackle the problem of shortage of doctors, specially in rural areas?
You cannot tackle this problem from one angle. Doctors also have their problems, as does the system.

There are many doctors who are ready to go and serve in rural areas, but they do not have adequate facilities there for their children and family. We have to find a way out.

In the next couple of years we want to convert many district hospitals into medical colleges. This entails improving facilities, getting more manpower. I also feel that doctors of Ayush (homeopathy) are underutilised.

They have to be given some sort of training so that they can be utilised at the healthcare centres. They have to play a bigger role in the system.

I am all for promoting Ayush in a big way which has not been done in the past. Despite the fact that I am a doctor of modern medicine, I feel that Unani, yoga, naturopathy and ayurveda have an inherent power to deal with many illnesses.

These indigenous, traditional systems are complete systems. If I look at the history of the Indian system of medicine, it was rich in knowledge.

So much so that the Khalifa of Baghdad got this knowledge translated into Arabic. Even the modern system of medicine has evolved out of that knowledge. This is precious and we need to use it in a big way.

We have to try and get rid of the bottlenecks so that there is an integration of all the system of medicine because no single system is capable of treating all illnesses.

Former health ministers tried to introduce compulsory rural posting and even proposed new courses for doctors which would qualify them to work in primary health centres. However, the schemes could never be started because of resistance from doctors and medical associations. How do you plan to improve the doctor-patient ratio?
I would not consider a programme less than an MBBS. I would not like to compromise on the quality of medical education, but I would certainly like to encourage doctors of Ayush.

They are qualified, have done four-and-a-half year long courses. We just have to train them a little bit.

I too feel that doctors must spend some time in rural areas. Normally this is a part of their internship, but to solve the problem of shortage of doctors, both doctors and medical institutes have to take a broader approach.

Of course they have their own problems, and those need to be resolved, but they have to pay back to the society. I will soon have the modalities worked out.

My approach is different — rather than forcing, if you deliberate and brainstorm, you can achieve things.

I will build consensus before I introduce anything. I will convince medical associations to further convince the medical fraternity to serve in rural areas.

Even places like All-India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS) have a lot of vacancies. What is the core problem?
It is true that there is a problem in the selection process. They are quite cumbersome.

These procedures will have to looked at again, and this requires a multi-centric approach.

To have more manpower we are working on three-four things: We plan to convert district hospitals into medical colleges; we are going to have more AIIMS like institutes, plus 50 cancer institutes.

Even in these institutes I have directed that public health institutes should be within the campus. I have said that all the institutions should have mechanisms to introduce public health specialists.

What do you think about medical education in our country? What changes need to be brought in to improve the quality of medical education?
Medical education has been neglected. For a long time the Medical Council of India (MCI) has been a big source of corruption.

I am in favour of everything which is positive. There are many good things that have been ignored, like the common medical entrance.

The novel idea to have a single test was the most ideal thing. However, many states resisted and went to the court.

I shall relook at the proposal and see what can be done to introduce it again. I strongly feel that it is the most ideal thing, for a very simple reason that private medical education is very expensive.

Will you restructure the existing Medical Council of India? Do you think the health minister should have the authority to remove MCI officials, including the president and vice-president?
I will go to the depth of this issue. It’s a big Pandora’s box and I don’t want to get stuck in the beginning.

I do not want to encroach upon the autonomy of MCI but I will also not allow them to be unprofessional.

We will have to develop a mechanism to ensure “no corruption”. Autonomy does not mean that one is free.

I am right now focusing on National Health Missions. Once my basic work is done there, I will get the bottom of other issues.

our health minister

May 28 2014 : The Times of India (Delhi)
HEALTH New doc in town promises health insurance for all Durgesh Nandan Jha
New Delhi:
TNN

Health insurance for all would be the top priority of the Modi government, said Dr Harsh Vardhan, who took charge as Union health minister on Tuesday. He met senior offi cials in the ministry and briefed them about the priorities of the new dispensation and sought suggestions to implement them.

Vardhan, who was sworn in on Monday, said he was not in favour of tax
payers' money being used to push a one-size-fits-all health policy . He hinted at involving both public and private sectors for optimum utilization of government schemes.

“The Rashtriya Swastha Bima Yojana of the labour ministry is working fine in some states but its reach is limited to the BPL families.
I plan to rope in all economic groups,“ he said.

Over the next few weeks, Vardhan, 59, is expected to hold a series of meetings with secretaries and senior officials of the various departments of the ministry to know the status of ongoing programmes and chart out future course of action.
He said he would push for e-governance systems in all government-to-citizens (G2C) and government to business (G2B) interfaces to weed out corruption.

“Accountability standards will be fi xed at the highest level and corruption will be checked at source with transparent systems,” he added.

The BJP leader blamed poor funding for the failure of the Reproductive and Child Health Project to reduce maternal mortality rate to 103 per 100,000 live births as envisaged under the Millennium Development Goal.

“Even Bangladesh is doing better than India,” Vardhan said. He added that National TB Control Programme and National Disease Control Programme too were under-funded.

Steps will be taken to revitalise these programmes, he said.

Vardhan, who trained as an ENT surgeon, has sought the views of public health professionals to set the agenda for the health ministry. “From this morning, I have started contacting public health practitioners to know their mind on what should be the road ahead,” he said. Vardhan requested the public to visit his website, drharshvardhan.com, to connect with him.

BJP’s choice for the chief minister’s offi ce in the last Delhi assembly election, Vardhan has been health minister in Delhi government. He pioneered the legislation to curb smoking by conceiving the Delhi Prohibition of Smoking and Non-Smoker’s Health Protection Bill and pioneered India’s Pulse Polio Programme in Delhi when he held the offi ce of the health minister during 1993-1998.

Clinical Establishments Act can lead to corporatization of healthcare

Clinical Establishments Act can lead to corporatization of healthcare system in India: MLAG
Our Bureau, Chennai
Friday, April 25, 2014, 08:00 Hrs [IST]  by PHARMABIZ.COM

The Chandigarh based ‘Medicos Legal Action Group’ (MLAG), a registered trust of allopathic doctors, has alleged that the Clinical Establishment (Registration and Regulation) Act, 2010 and the Clinical Establishments (Central Government) Rules, 2012 notified by the government of India are sponsored by corporate lobbies to promote corporatisation of the entire healthcare management system in the country.

The very impact of these corporate friendly laws will be forcible closure of all small hospitals that provide reasonable and low cost treatment and surgery to the common people, said Dr Neeraj Nagpal, convener of MLAG.

While speaking to Pharmabiz over telephone from Chandigarh, he said the ministry of health and family welfare has invited comments from healthcare institutions and public on the minimum standards required for the establishments before April 30. MLAG will demand the removal of hospitals with less than 25 beds from the purview of CEA. According to him, 70 per cent of the total healthcare managements in India are carried out by small hospitals/clinics owned by single doctor or doctor couples and most of the centres are with less than 25 beds.

Dr Neeraj said the government should bring in laws to help the small and medium clinical establishments in the country rather than helping and promoting corporate establishments. Likewise, the government should encourage small healthcare institutions for getting NABH certification and give incentives in the form of tax exemptions, soft loans etc.

Requirement of stringent enforcement of safety regulations and quality control is acknowledged to be needed in large hospitals dealing with large number of patients. But if it is enforced on small scale medical establishments which are not financially viable, they will be forced to close down. In the small establishments the doctor himself is the administrator, quality control officer, fire safety officer, pharmacist and sometimes driver of the ambulance, he commented.

The Dr.Neeraj says that the act is totally confusing, it should segregate Ayush institutions from allopathic establishments and stringent punishment should be imposed on those Ayush doctors who practice allopathy. In the minimum standards, the definition of level 1 and level 2 hospitals says that Ayush doctors can work in these hospitals. It has not been mentioned later in human resources requirement and it is against several judgments of the national consumer disputes redressal commission (NCDRC) and the Supreme Court.

“Unani, ayurvedic and other Ayush doctors cannot use allopathic drugs as per law. For Unani hospitals the list of emergency drugs includes adrenaline, dobutamine, nitroglycerine, amiodarone, magnesium sulphate, mannitol etc. What is not clear is, are the Unani doctors supposed to use these allopathic drugs in emergency? There is no post for allopathic doctors in these hospitals. If Unani doctors use these drugs, they are contravening the Supreme Court verdicts of Poonam Verma vs Ashwin Patel as well as Mukhtiar Chand vs State of Punjab judgments”, he said.

DMMS course in place of BRMS

Govt should revive erstwhile DMMS course in place of BRMS: Dr MC Gupta
Peethaambaran Kunnathoor, Chennai
Monday, April 21, 2014, 08:00 Hrs [IST]  (phamabiz.com)

In place of the controversial Bachelor of Rural Medicine and Surgery (BRMS), a short-term rural medical course being introduced by the government to tide over the shortage of doctors in the rural areas, the government should revive the erstwhile short term medical course, Diploma in Modern Medicine and Surgery (DMMS) which was started by government of Orissa and recognised by Medical Council of India (MCI) in the past, opined Dr M C Gupta, medico-legal consultant and a member of the Delhi Bar Council.

It can be a supplement to the proposed health agenda of the Indian Medical Association (IMA), he said and added that in the recent past the union health ministry had also proposed the same course in lieu of the BRMS.

Similarly, a cadre of nurse practitioners should be started in place of the B Sc (community health). A new pattern of training for nurse practitioners must be designed in association with medical colleges and nursing schools. He said admission to all the health related para-medical courses including B Pharm should be made through a common entrance examination.

Dr Gupta, who will submit his proposals to the new health minister in the next government, said that on the lines of IAS, IPS and IFS, a provision should be made for creation of Indian Medical Services (IMS) for the administration of health services in the country. He said a civil service cadre of that kind had existed in India at the time of British rule when the Indian medical services were heavily manned by the British.

Disagreeing with the demand of IMA that the country needs more medical colleges in urban areas, Dr Gupta suggested that each district must have one medical college and no need of more number medical colleges in urban areas. The district medical college, along with other colleges or schools of para-medical sciences, should involve in the training of professionals in the respective areas.

His health agenda suggests that government should increase the health budget to five per cent of the GDP. India’s health budget is one of the lowest. The country falls under countries that spend the lowest on healthcare in the world. In 2011, the government spent a paltry one per cent of its GDP on healthcare. Primary health care should be declared as a fundamental right, and necessary legal and budgetary provisions should be made for the same.

Dr Gupta further suggests that the Clinical Establishments Act, 2010 should be amended in order to provide in section 12(2) that the state would reimburse private clinical establishments for providing emergency services as per the mechanism suggested in Law Commission’s report number 201. A cap should be provided for compensation payable for medical negligence under Consumer Protection Act (CPA) 1986. Special medico-legal benches with necessary expertise should be established in the consumer courts to deal with medical negligence cases.

He remarked that PNDT act should be radically amended or replaced by another act with the basic concept that rather than criminalise pre-natal sex identification, there should be a mechanism that once the sex so determined must be immediately reported to the appropriate authority. Thereafter, it should be the responsibility of the authority to track the continuance and safe delivery of the female baby and to punish those who perform abortion of the female fetus.

Dr Gupta also proposes that the D&C Act should be strictly enforced with special reference to enforcing the ban on sale of drugs without prescription and also ban on sale of allopathic drugs against prescription issued by Ayush doctors.

Clinics under Clinical Establishment Act

Minimum standards drafted for clinics under Clinical Establishment Act
Joseph Alexander, New Delhi (pharmabiz)
Wednesday, April 16, 2014, 08:00 Hrs [IST]

In a bid to effectively implement the Clinical Establishments (Registration and Regulation) Act 2010, the Union health ministry has announced draft minimum standards for various categories of clinical establishments, both in the allopathic and Indian streams of medicine.

Once approved, the registered establishments in the States where the Act is at present applicable should follow the minimum standards laid down separately for different kinds of clinics. The National Council for Clinical Establishments, the apex body under the chairmanship of Director General of Health Services, has held a series of consultations with the stakeholders including the Quality Council of India and Indian Medical Council to prepare the draft standards.

At present, States like Himachal Pradesh and Jharkhand, apart from the Union Territories of Andaman, Diu and Daman and Chandigarh have implemented the Act and over 4600 establishments had been registered. States like Uttar Pradesh, Mizoram, Sikkim, Rajasthan and Arunachal Pradesh have also adopted the Act, but yet to implement them in the absence of rules, while the Centre is still trying to impress upon other States to adopt the same.

“The comments, suggestions, objections, including deletions/additions if required in the draft documents are invited from public at large, including the stakeholders like hospitals and other clinical establishments, consumer groups etc,” according to a notification by the Council.

The Indian Public Health Standards (IPHS) for sub-centre, PHC, CHC, sub-district/sub-divisional hospital and district hospitals have already approved documents. The draft is hence only for those in the private sector.

Separate standards have been prepared for allied health executive, behavioural health integrated counseling centres, dental centres, dental hospitals, dietetics, hospitals in primary, secondary and tertiary levels, labs, collection centres, mobile clinics, dialysis centres, physiotherapy centres, polyclinics with diagnostic support, polyclinic with dispensary, polyclinic with observation, radiology and imaging centres and stem cell laboratories, in the allopathy sector.

Likewise, the detailed standard parameters have also been prepared in consultation with the Ayush department for establishments of Ayurveda, Naturopathy, Siddha, Sowa-rigpa, Unani and Yoga.

Ayush dept terminates 134 Ayurveda

Kerala Ayush dept terminates 134 Ayurveda therapists; absorbs 51 doctors in NRHM
Peethaambaran Kunnathoor, Chennai, Wednesday, April 09, 2014, 08:00 Hrs [IST]

The Ayush department in Kerala has given termination orders to 134 contractual therapists working in 104 Ayurveda hospitals in the state due to discontinuation of funding from central Ayush department. The health workers have been working in various hospitals for the last five years under a scheme of central Ayush department.
Meanwhile, 51 Ayurveda doctors and 22 homoeopaths who were appointed along with these therapists have been absorbed by NRHM and posted in various hospitals and dispensaries under it.
According to M Mithun Krishna, a terminated therapist from government Ayurveda hospital at Paravoor in Kollam, the hospital management committees (HMCs) functioning in the hospitals have recruited 203 qualified therapists on the advice of state NRHM (National Rural Health Mission) and appointed them for a period of five years in all the 119 Ayurveda hospitals in Kerala. They were appointed on a monthly salary of Rs.9140, but the payment was halted in the middle due to lack of fund from Ayush department. All the persons appointed were qualified the course of Ayurveda therapy (AT) from leading Ayurveda colleges.
The staff including doctors and therapists were selected in 2009 when the project was started. The list included 102 doctors and 203 therapists who were given jobs in the 104 hospitals. According to sources, though there are 119 Ayurveda hospitals in Kerala, therapists are posted only in 15 hospitals. Remaining 104 hospitals have no therapists whose services are an indispensable part of the punchakarma therapy. The terminated health workers have contacted the health minister and submitted a memorandum.
When contacted, state programme manager of NRHM Dr P Haridas said NRHM has not sanctioned a post of Therapist in ISM hospitals and these people were appointed by the respective HMCs. The amount for salaries to the employees were allotted by central Ayush department, and not by NRHM. He said the therapists were employed on contractual services under a five year scheme funded by Ayush department for the purpose of upgradation of hospitals and dispensaries.
“Now the funding has been stopped, so we had to inform the Ayush department that the term of contract would be expired on March 31. The therapists were appointed by hospital management committees”, he added.
Regarding absorption of doctors, he said they were selected after written test and interview by NRHM and for fulfilling the project of Ayush, they were deputed to state Ayush hospitals for five years. The doctors were posted from the rank list prepared by NRHM. But, he said, NRHM has no sanctioned post of therapist, so it cannot absorb the contract-expired people.
Meanwhile, Ayurveda Medical Association of India (AMAI) has come down heavily on the state government for not furnishing the utilisation certificate of the project and held that it was the reason for the stoppage of funds from the centre. Dr Rejith Anand, secretary of AMAI said he would write a letter to the centre seeking government intervention into the matter.