Absract Archive July - 06 Stem Cell Research and Banking in India- IPR and other issues Abstract Stem cells have emerged as a powerful tool in the battle against disease. In fact, stem cell research that is still in its infancy is already creating a significant impact globally owing to the exceptional potential that it offers to treat various ailments. The present article discusses several important issues pertaining to stem cell technology, including intellectual property rights issues, regulatory aspects and also complex social issues such as ethical, moral and legal. The article also describes present status of stem cell banking in India and its potential in Biotechnology business. Introduction Authors :Roopesh Kumar, Saurabh Suhas Mittal, Parikshit Bansal Bt Cotton and Farmers - A War Between Nature and Technology Cotton has been a premier agricultural crop of India playing a pivotal role in the natural economy in both rural and urban sector. It contributes about 65 per cent of the raw material for textile industry and also one-third of total foreign exchange earnings of India amounting to nearly $ 11.00 billion. Cotton sustains huge employment in the rural and urban area and plays a key role in economic and trade activities within the country. Being a cash crop, farmers were highly sensitive to pest incidence and resorted to indiscriminate and excessive application of recommended and non-recommended pesticides, which in turn led to the elimination of beneficial parasites and predators. Indiscriminate use of synthetic pyrethroids led to whitefly resurgence in many parts of the country. In southern part of Andhra Pradesh, many cotton farmers committed suicide due to crop failure and losses. Author:S. Murugan Protein Structure Prediction of PINK1 In Parkinson's Disease Abstract Parkinsons Disease [PD] a neurodegenerative disorder is a disturbance of motor function. Chiefly slowing and enfeeblement of emotional and voluntary movement, muscular rigidity and tremor characterize it. Parkinsonism may be produced by a number of different pathological states and is usually ascribed to lesions involving Corpus Striatum or the Substantia niagra. The defect in PINK1 (PTEN induced Putative Kinase1) plays an important role for the etiology of Parkinson's disease. The gene coding for PINK1 protein is in chromosome1 and PINK1 protein is localized in mitochondria. Any mutation in the gene leads to mitochondrial damage, which in turn leads to the destruction of neurons. The PINK1 protein is a protein kinase and is involved in signal transduction. The present study is aimed at predicting the 3-dimensional structure of the PINK1 protein present in the mitochondria through Homology Modelling. PINK1 shows a high degree of homology to the Serine / Threonine Kinases of the Ca2+ / Calmodulin family. Keywords: Parkinsonism, PINK1, homology modeling. Author:R.Suhanya Wheat Genome Sequencing: facts and future Grasses originated 55-75 million years ago and now dominate 20% of the land area. Wheat was the first domesticated crop and is the youngest polyploid species among the agricultural crops. Together with rice and maize, wheat provides >60% of the calories and proteins for our daily life. Wheat is best adapted to temperate regions, unlike rice and maize, which prefer tropical environments. Wheat occupied major crop area in 2003 (210 million hectares vs. 153 million for rice and 142 million for maize). Humans and wheat share a remarkably parallel evolutionary history. About 3 million years ago, humans diverged from apes, and diploid A, B, and D progenitor species of wheat diverged from a common ancestor. About 2,00,000 years ago, at nearly the same time that modern humans originated in Africa, two diploid grass species hybridized to form polyploid wheat in the Middle East. The cultivated bread wheat (Figure 1b) became quite distinct as compared to its diploid progenitor (Figure 1a). Comparative genetic and genomic studies during the last 10 years revealed extensive synteny among major cereals, and the concept of grasses as a single genetic system emerged. Genetic maps and DNA sequence comparisons along with other phylogenetic studies have also suggested that various grass genomes originated from a common ancestor. This is evident from the fact that majority of wheat, barley and rice protein sequences are 98% similar. It is, however, unknown how monophyletic origin of the grasses resulted in as much as 35-fold difference in genome size. Rice, maize, and wheat co-evolved from a common ancestor, but differ greatly in genome size. Among agricultural crops, common bread or hexaploid wheat (Triticum aestivum L., 2n = 6x = 42, AABBDD) has the largest genome at 16,000 Mb, ~8-fold larger than that of maize and 40-fold larger than that of rice. Authors:Priyamvada, Santosh Kumar, Sonia, Yogesh Kumar, Umesh Goutam, Jag Shoran, B. Mishra, Ratan Tiwari Biotech hub in India Introduction Biotechnology is described as any technique that uses living organisms to make or modify products, to improve plants or animals or to develop microorganisms for specific uses. It has also been defined as the industrial exploitation of biological systems or processes. These definitions while, no doubts accurate, nevertheless, fail to capture the excitement associated with biotechnology. Across the world, some of the most dramatic and exciting developments are taking place in this field. Authors:J. Poongothai, N.R.Sakthivel