" Eye Sight In Old Age"- Article:5/ part-1

In our life, the value of eye is immense and it gives us the opportunity to keep all such eventful images of life around us in our memory, as captured by our eye all the time. The quality of life solely depends on the quality of our vision and without it all colors of life goes. So we should have some basic idea about our eyes i.e.(i) its structure & basic functions, (ii) eye related problems & its available treatments etc. 

Eye is a very complicated optical organ of our body and it consists of three main types of tissues i.e.      i) Refractive tissues, that collectively focus lights onto the light sensitive tissues and the "Cornea, Anterior chamber, Iris, Pupil, Lens" etc. are mainly known as refractive tissues.  

ii) Light sensitive tissues, that detects the light & converting it into electrical impulse, sends to brain through optic nerve for further processing to produce image and these contain "retina, Macula & the optic nerve.            

iii) Supporting tissues, that provide necessary assistance to all functional tissues in order to maintain the structural & functional stability, as well as retains metabolic requirements of eye, too and this include "Sclera, Ciliary muscle, Conjunctiva, Choriod, Aqueous humor, Vetreous humor, Uvea" etc.

As I have stated above, it is mostly the basic structural information of eyes and all the constituent parts in the structure collectively perform their functions in systematic manner under ideal conditions. 

But we can not expect ideal conditions all the time throughout our life, rather in todays complicated world,we have to come accross many such situations as is not favourable to our eyes, reulting in various eye problems some of which are as mentioned below.        

                

              i) Age-Related Macular Degeneration

             ii) Amblyopia

            iii) Cataract

            iv) Diabatic Ratinopathy

             v) Glaucoma

            vi) Refractive Errors

           vii) Strabismus.

Amongst eye problems mentioned above, cataract is the most dangerous complication of human eyes today which may make an individual completely blind if it is kept untreated for long. Specially, those who are diabetic patient, they mostly become the victim of this silent killer and offently, loss their eyes unknowingly. In addition to the above, "Age-related Macular Degeneration" is another matter of concern for diabetic elderly people, especially those who are already suffering from cataract. 

If we look at the status of optical dissorders worldwide during last 14yrs, we will find around 32million blind in the year 2010 and surprisingly, one in three blind people found suffered from cataract. Additionally, in consideration to the cosistant progress of the said disease, world health organization (WHO) predicted that figure of blindness to reach around 90 million throughout the world by the year 2010 onwoards and this situation will remain unaltered. 

Actually today this deases of cataract can't be treated by any other means except the surgery which requires an appropriate infrastructure and also it is very costly. Besides, our world, is not so symmetrical at all in economycal & developemental perspective, as it looks like, rather the dissparity amongst developed, developing or under developed countries are clearly seen which affects  the life of common people. Consequently, most of the progresses in medical science, can't reach to the people of every countries in equal proportion throghout the world and that's why,  large number of cataract effected common people remain incapable to take the benefits of costly advanced surgical treatment which ultimately, leads them to blindness.  

Therfore in this article, I will try to concentrate myself basically on the subject of cataract effected elderly people and to findout the available possibilities of medicinal treatments of cataract instead of ongoing surgery.   

Knowledge In True Sense - Article : 4

 Today, I would like to present an important discussion before my readers, on such a subject as is commonly known as "Knowledge". In social life, it is very rare to find a person in public domain, who has never ever uttered regarding self knowledge once, during bilateral or multilateral discussion and this instinct, very clearly exposes the influence of knowledge in public life.The knowledge never die, rather it continues to exist in the conscious mind of human being for further expansion & advancement and which gets activated through contemplation in due course. Because of this, in Hindu philosophy knowledge is assumed to be an only valuable jewel which everyone can carry with them even after death in their conscious nondual entity. So the matter of this knowledge should be understood very distinctly, so that we can properly define it, classify it and above all, find its exact source.

Now, let us see what is knowledge? To me, knowledge is nothing but a self acquired package of various informations obtained either from intrinsic or from extrinsic sources, which includes text documents, audio-visual documents, our experiential documents & further more. There are different kinds of information we face in reality which mainly provides us three core classes of knowledge i.e. "Explicit knowledge" for documented informations,  "Implicit knowledge" for applicational informations , & "Tacit knowledge" for understood informations.

But, as we all know that our brain is the main centre for the development of all kinds of knowledge which, we gather & store in memory, through successive processing of informations received from different sources around us. As a matter of fact, brain itself is a very important constituent part of central nervous system (CNS) and only because of this reason, it play a vital role to process all incoming informations collectively, in co-ordination with peripheral nervous system (PNS), which actually brain executes as per the nature of input informations, specially through any one of the two ways at a time, either in "Reflective" way or "Reactive/Reflexive" way. Thus, while, input informations in reflective way are processed successively by logical, methodical & analytical manner, just as on the other hand, in reactive way the same inputs are processed by considering emotions, habits, or intuitions etc. 

Now, one thing has become crystal clear to all of us, that, this unique autonomy of our brain not only helps to control all worldly voluntary activities or in-voluntary bodily activities but also opens the door of innumerable knowledges, through constructive and purposeful thinking. Till today, we have had plenty of opportunity to acquire various kinds of knowledge and history has witnessed the same. If we compare past from our present age, it will obviously interpret the power of knowledge for these qualitative changes in the world. But in this context, we should not forget that among many good purposeful achievements, we also acquired many ugly experiences too  and that's why in addition to the qualitative advancement of mankind, history of human civilization had to witness consistent conflicts amongst people to people, only to establish their own vested interest of racial, religious, or sometimes imperialistic supremacy.  

Therefore, today it is not difficult to understand that the role of knowledge in the rise & fall of human civilization is immense. But, the deliberation of this knowledge didn’t begin so easily, as we would think today, rather curious human always went on thinking in their conscious mind to overcome various obstruckles of survival in this world which consequently, began to originate many new innovative experiences one after another, and thus unknowingly, they started understanding the language of knowledge bit by bit. As a result, gradually the standard of living of human society began to improve by the active influence of knowledge and in course of time, human started to understand the power of knowledge. After that, a long period passed away and by that time, we unfolded many secrets of nature which, helped us to develop many new tools / machineries etc. to upgrade our life style and in this way, one day the study of knowledge became an important established resources and then for its rapid propagation in the society, it was gradually systemized to continue in the form of institutions. 

Today, those institutions have come under an education system, and decentralized amongst schools, colleges, universities etc. Besides, the institutions presently conduct various courses, with various syllabuses and also provide different levels of certificates accordingly. But as a matter of fact, the education system of which we are so proud, is nothing but the outcome of those incessant efforts put in mostly by our ancient self taught or in today's language, so-called ignorant predecessors.  

Therefore, despite all kinds of systems one cannot prohibit the free access of acquiring knowledge simply in the bindings of courses and syllabuses. Rather, we should remember those eminent personalities who time to time, have dedicated themselves in various fields of knowledge i.e. arts, science, philosophy etc. in spite of no appropriate certificates or degrees with them in those fields and in this context, if we look towards our past history, many names of versatile genius will come before our memory and amongst those many, we can at least remember few of them i.e. Galileo Galilee, Leonardo Da Vinci, Charles Darwin, Gregarious Mendel, Michael Faraday, George Buli, Thomas Alva Edison, Max Muller, David Hume, Charles Dickens, Karl Marx, Rabindra Natth Tegore, etc.  

So, the present day education systems obviously may give us the opportunity to choose our fields as per our need & aspiration, so that we can prove ourselves in further higher educations or in various commercial fields & service sectors as well, but on the other side, to expedite further propagation of knowledges, human's heridetical talent, their skills & innovative thinking, should be encouraged too, instead of imposing conventional eligibility barier of school certificates or university degrees on them. Rather our education system as well as our society should be more flexible to those uneducated or little learned people who sincerely prefers to contribute their innovative ideas, skills and intelligence.

In conclusion, I can say that only, right thinking of common people at right time can bring this world under an umbrella of realistic knowledge in true sense and, in this way more people will be able to participate in the freelance study of knowledge without hindrance. So, let us open such a door of fearless, peaceful & joyful world, where the fresh breeze of knowledge can bring a new era of effective consciousness by destroying all evils around us.

 

   

 

   

Mirobes, Immunity & Health Care System - Article : 3

Now it is clear, that our life is a gift of "Nature" and have emerged from a tiny primordial cell of our common ancestor, " Bacterium". Therefore, our relationship with microbes are not new at all, rather from the day of our birth on earth, we always used to feel their existence around us. So, we should have had a brief idea about them and their types as well. Now let us have a look on microbes and their family.

In true sense, microbes by name stands for microscopic identity or organisms of unicellular or multicellular type, basically invisible to the nicked eye and being very diverse, they generally include bacteria, fungi, algae, protozoa etc. Now one may ask about "Viruses" that why they are missing in microbe family? Actually, viruses are a microscopic non-living incomplete cellular identity or parasites, consisting of a small piece of genetic materials (RNA or DNA) packaged with a protein coat  & sometimes, a layer of lipid envelope too and they can not reproduce, replicate, & cultivate energy for their survival without the active support of host cell of a living organism. Most of the microbes known to us are beneficial to living organism as well as to our environment. But a few of them (i.e. 1% of them approximately around 1400) are harmful to us & are called pathogens or germs. In this germ category, virus includes along with microbe family. Although, some scientists consider viruses in microbe family too, as they also play the same role similar to other living parasitic character of microbe family, indirectly by infecting host cells despite of their incomplete non-living cell identity. 

So, as a whole it looks very amazing that both bacteria and virus exists parallelly in nature and surprisingly play a similar role too, but in different manner. Besides, viruses are very selective in their choice of host cells i.e. viruses those infect plants never infect animals or those infect animal species other than human, normally never infect humans but they can jump and infect human under suitable conditions when human knowingly or un-knowingly comes in direct or indirect contacts with other infected animals. Now, let us know how our body actively fights against those dreadful pathogenic attacks, to save our life in time. The mechanism which protects us from pathogenic infections is called immunity. There are three types immunity i.e. (i) Innate immunity (Non-specific type) (ii) Adaptive immunity (Specific type) and Passive immunity. 

Eventually, we all used to get some level of general non-specific immunity to invaders by birth and is called innate immunity which includes the external barriers of our body as a first line of defense against pathogens, such as our skins, mucous membranes of our throat, nose, and gut etc. Now if the pathogen somehow manages to dodge the attacks of innate immunity, adaptive immunity starts functioning immediately to produce specific antibody against the antigen of specific invaders and bind them to kill in due course as well as makes a copy of antibodies against different pathogens in the immunological memory for protecting us from those pathogens in future. On the other hand, passive immunity comes from different sources other than our body such as i) immunity of newborn baby through breast milk of mother ii) vaccination against highly infectious diseases etc. 

In this context, the role of blood is very significant. As you all know that our blood comprises of two major constituent parts i.e. RBC (Erythrocyte) & WBC (Leukocytes). In this, leukocytes are responsible for i) detecting & identifying foreign invaders or pathogens throughout the body, ii) making 'B' cell to produce specific antibody against a particular pathogens for binding the same, iii) making 'T' cell for killing the pathogens or eliminating dead cells of our body as well as remembering the same pathogens for future protection purpose. Therefore, the entire immune system solely depends on the performance of WBC whereas, our blood groups (i.e. A, B, AB, & O) determines the compatibility factor between consecutive blood groups during blood transfusion process and also  works as an indicative tools of possible susceptibility to various infections or diseases. In addition to that, there are some other factors also, which directly or indirectly influences our immunity system, such as i) Food habits, ii) Quality of food,  iii) Standard of living, iv) Customs & manners, v) Economical conditions, & vi) Geographic locations & Environmental differences etc. 

However, it's true that in last few decades, we have seen an unprecedented progress in science & technology which attributes to many discoveries & inventions in medical field to make human life more safe and secure. But it is not the end, rather there may be some more things to learn such as the behavioral differences of human immunity from people to people and how rapidly our immunity recognizes the unknown pathogens for making specific antibody and also, how long this immunity lasts at all. Because, we are still looking uncertain to combat against deadly viruses like "Corona" in present day pandemic, despite of considerably advanced medical facilities available with us. It seems that we might have failed to understand the deadly characteristics of "Coronavirus" in time and thus it has resulted spreading in electrifying speed, from China to 225 countries around the world, affecting more than 3.8 billion population by covid-19 and caused more than 5.7 million death throughout the world.  

On the other hand, we have seen lack of coordination as well as uncertainty amongst medical professionals & scientists throughout the world while combating this deadly viruses and thus, various kinds of misinformation have started propagating in the public domain to create world wide panics & confusions. Though, WHO time to time has issued advisories to the common people mainly for maintaining social distances,  wearing masks, & cleaning hands etc.

But the basic problem to the common people, is their ignorance on general health & hygiene and that is the main reason why they are always remain unaware of their own power of immunity which combats against most of the diseases caused by internal & external factors. In this respect the role of "Doctors & Scientists" are very important as they not only, can find out the reason of diseases but also can make people aware of importance of good health in connection to their fight against various diseases, in right time and in right manner so that none of them becomes a victim of panics due to fake publicities of few agencies to fulfill their vested interests (if any).

Moreover, I think that our medical science should be flexible enough to check & accept the possibility of other concept of treatments very seriously at least in terms of its application and methodology, so that the diagnostic outcome of any disease, can be treated in a new approach where a selective & collective concept of both conventional as well as non-conventional way of treatment altogether, will be adapted with the application of both non-herbal or herbal medicinal elements which in due course may prove to be effective for curing the disease and also may reduce the chance of any harm to the human health during the course of treatment and post treatment period. 

Origin Of Life On Earth - Article: 2

 

Before shedding light on how life originated on Earth, it is important to know exactly, how ancient humans viewed nature. If we think a little deeper, we will see that the human beings at that time used to look at any worldly phenomenon with extreme amazement and what seems to be a common natural phenomenon to us today, that time, it seemed to be an uncommon miracle. That is, the tendency to believe in miracles or super-naturalism has been ingrained in human nature since ancient times. As a result, over centuries, the issue of the origin of first life on earth has never become a major question ​for a larger section of human society.

Then, as it turned out, that we lost a lot of valuable time and finally, began to start thinking about the emergence of the first life on earth between the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, but there also,  had to face a great deal of opposition from most powerful group of theists, due to their specific belief of supernatural creator &  vitalism etc.

Not that, no one at that time thought of anything new, but rather, some wonderful theories or hypotheses, and inventions, inspiring people to search for the source of life, to replace the alternative perspectives of conventional supernatural thinking. So, in the interval of that time, we saw the simultaneous discovery of the first microscope in the seventeenth century, as well as the discovery of animal cells, which, of course, had to wait until the nineteenth century to be recognized. Then at the same time, one by one, scientists discovered the presence of urea in the urine of human body, and Shortly afterwards, in 1828, the scientist Frederick Wohler synthesized urea of human urine, using common inorganic substance found in nature, which, unfolded the actual truth, before us, that, common inorganic elements in nature are the only main source of all the essential organic compounds suitable for the creation of life.

Thus, one thing became clear like water, that the first life on earth was not created miraculously by a supernatural creator, rather, it could be termed as a strange natural process cycle, which, being, started on earth at about 3.5 billion years ago, through several mutual chemical reactions amongst ordinary inorganic elements, in an extraordinary environment of nature.

By that period, in 1859 Charles Darwin’s Evolution theory “On the origin of species”, presented a new concept, that, how after origination of first life on earth from last primordial common ancestor, the species evolved themseleves through the principle of natural selection, by reproducing grdually from generation to generation, and afterwards in 1865, Gregor Johann Mendel also made an another brekthrough in biology, by presenting his famous principle of inheritance. Thus in due course, it became a big subject of inspiration to other rationalists also.

Within a short period of time, a tremendous conceptual flow propagated throughout the whole world and since, entire 19th to 20th century, we saw one by one, Halden & Operin's hypothesis, about how first cell took birth in primordial soup, concept of genetic materials inside tiny cell , DNA, RNA & its replication procedure and so on.

Finally, till the year 2016, all research results altogether gave authentic logical evidence through laboratory verification and ultimately, we at least came to know that, life on earth descended out of one primordial organism cell and they were our last universal common ancestor, bacterium.

In my above discussion, I basically explained the innumerable struggle of scientists against most powerful orthodox theists of those days, only to establish their findings about the origin of life on earth. However, at last we have seen the victory of rationalism and discovered the almighty nature in a new perspective, of a source of all creations throughout entire universe.

In the next page, I will try to focus on little bit idea of microbes, blood cells, our immunity etc. and their direct as well as indirect role in human health.