Category Archives: Environment
Biodiversity and its conservation
BIODIVERSITY AND ITS CONSERVATION By Dr. Ashok Kumar Panigrahi.IntroductionThe word ‘biodiversity’ is a contraction of the term, ‘natural biological diversity’. Biodiversity refers to the range of variations or differentiations among same set of living entities. The term biodiversity is commonly used to describe the numbers, variety and variability of living organisms at the species level. Actually it is synonym of ‘Life on Earth’. It is estimated that there are about 50 million species of plants, animals and microorganisms with 35 thousand plants having medicinal properties, great bulk of it forming food of one another, species differing in physical & chemical characteristics. Plant diversity: is important to animals, herbivores and man, because, it meets the metabolic necessity of the trophic levels with the nutritional values of its fruits and seeds through dietary phytochemicals, primary and secondary.Primary phyto chemicals such as carbohydrates, proteins and fats are necessary for energy production in the predators/ grazers/browsersSecondary phyto chemicals have 2 pronged actions- either as deterrents or as stimulants.Deterrents- toxic at high dose, prevent over predation/grazing/browsing, a sort of defense chemicals for their very survival;- may be either allomones or keiromones; some seeds may have 3 or more such chemicals in them acting as protease inhibitors as Lecithin, alkaloids, uncommon amino acids, glycosides and polyphenols.Stimulants- are volatiles, as terpenoids, fatty acid derivatives-those induce pollination.Microbial diversity is just a subset of biodiversity involving bacteria, fungi, actinomycetes, micro algae, protozoans and other monerans.A total of 16, 04,000 species of Monera, Protista, Fungi, Plantae and Animalia have been described globally (Whittfield, 2002) though it is likely to be 17,980,000 species i.e. about 11 times more than the presently known species. (Khoshoo, 1995).India is rich in microbial biodiversity and there are about 850 (0.67%) Moneran species, 2577 (2.04%) Protistan
Taking the Temperature of Global Climate Change
The daily observation from the Solar & Heliospheric Observatory (SOHO) clearly highlights a potential global problem. In 2008, nearly every day of each of the first four months of the year has recorded an observation of sunspot activity that is equal to zero. In fact, there have been only two days in the last four months when there has been any sunspot activity at all and each small event disappeared very quickly.The importance of sunspot inactivity is the continued confirmation that Sunspot Cycle 24 will be very weak or even delayed. The most recent solar minimum was in March of last year. The new cycle, No.24, was supposed to start soon after that, with a predicted gradual build-up in sunspot numbers. It has not yet happened. History would suggest that the longer the delay in cycle activity, the weaker this sunspot cycle will be.Consider that the future implications of this lack of sunspot activity may be enormous. Sunspots can be historically correlated with temperature change on Earth. Weak sunspot activity correlates to colder temperatures on earth. In fact, low sunspot activity in the past has led to decades of extremely cold worldwide temperatures. Indeed, a lack of sunspot activity may already correlate to the global cooling of the planet seen in the last twelve months. Therefore, current sunspot inactivity may predict even more cooling of the Earth’s climate in the years to come.Last year, a dramatic cooling of the planet was measured by all four agencies that track Earth’s temperature (the Hadley Climate Research Unit in Britain, the NASA Goddard Institute for Space Studies in New York, the Christy group at the University of Alabama, and Remote Sensing Systems Inc in California). It is now estimated that the Earth cooled by about
Agriculture Crop Management and Production Improved by Satellite Remote Sensing Technology and Geographic Information Systems (gis)
Scientists for many years have been using satellite remote sensing technology, utilizing low and medium resolution sensors to improve water balance and farming yield assessment on large geographical scales around the world. With the availability of high resolution satellite sensors such as IKONOS, QuickBird and soon GeoEye-1, the current remote sensing NDVI algorithms utilized have become more accurate and reliable, providing detailed crop information for agriculture management to improve production and crop health.FAO (Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations) data indicate that annually 2500 km3 of freshwater is used for agricultural production, which amounts to 70% of the water resources that the world population consumes in a year. China is now consuming more than twice as much as what its ecosystems can supply sustainably, having doubled its needs since the 1960s, as indicated in a new WWF report. With the global population continuing to grow at a high pace, it is essential to optimize the use of water resources and to increase agricultural production in view of the prospect of having to feed 8 billion humans by 2030.Agriculture resources are among the most important renewable, dynamic natural resources. Comprehensive, reliable and timely information on agricultural resources is very much necessary for countries whose main source of the economy is agriculture. Agriculture surveys are conducted through the nation in order to gather information and statistics on crops, rangeland, livestock and other related agricultural resources. This data is most important for the implementation of effective management decisions.Satellite images can show variations in organic matter and drainage patterns. Soils higher in organic matter can be differentiated from lighter sandier soil that has a lower organic matter content. “Satellite image data have the potential to provide real-time analysis for large areas of attributes of