Monday, October 17, 2016

Cloud Computing for Next Generation Sequencing

DNA Sequencing refers different methods and technologies, which are used for determining the sequence or order of the nucleotide bases-adenine, guanine, cytosine, and thymine in a DNA molecule. The adverse use of advanced DNA sequencing i.e next generation sequencing has extremely accelerated biological research and discovery day by day.

DNA Sequencing was conducted through extensively laborious and rigorous methods before 1970, but the journey of advance DNA sequencing started with Maxam Gilbert Sequencing. The Chain-termination methods, Dye-terminator sequencing, High-throughput sequencing, Lynx Therapeutics' Massively Parallel Signature Sequencing (MPSS), Polony Sequencing have come into the limelight for developing the technology. 454 pyrosequencing, Illumina (Solexa) sequencing, SOLiD sequencing, DNA nanoball sequencing etc. have started the next generation sequencing using different types of innovative technology.

The advent of next generation Sequencers are contributing a huge amount of data for analysis. However, it has increased the complexities of genomic sequencing workflows but enriched biological discoveries to the greater extent. A tightly integrated, scalable, high-performance computing platform with intelligent data management systems and uncompromised security could make all the difference in advancing DNA Sequencing. Moreover, transparency of the huge data generated by the sequencers must be decoded by the trustworthy platform.


Today’s Bioinformatics moving towards technology advancement and leveraging cloud computing to answer the parallel processing of gamut of data securely. Cloud computing infrastructures expected to be more scalable and transparent to make usability more conducive to Bioinformatics data scientists.

Sunday, July 31, 2016

Next Generation Sequencing (NGS) in Modern Science

Deoxyribonucleic Acid (DNA) holds the genetic blueprint to life of an organism. DNA sequencing is the process of determining the order and arrangement of the four bases; ACGT - Adenine (A), Cytosine (C), Guanine (G), and Thymine (T) in a strand of a DNA molecule.

Various new technologies for DNA sequencing were developed by late 1990s. Nonetheless, they could be brought into commercial framework as DNA sequencers by the year 2000.

Lynx Therapeutics published and marketed “Massively Parallel Signature Sequencing”, or MPSS in 2000. This method introduced a “parallelized, adapter/ ligation-mediated, bead-based sequencing technology” and served as the first commercially available “next generation” sequencing method at that time.

In 2004, 454 Life Sciences incorporated and marketed a parallelized version of pyro-sequencing. The first version of their machine amazingly reduced sequencing costs 6-fold compared to automated Sanger sequencing. It was the second of the new generation of sequencing technologies, after MPSS.

New Generation Sequencing (NGS), also known as high-throughput sequencing, furnishes a number of different modern sequencing technologies. Different types of modern sequencers are doing the job perfectly. 
They are:
  1. Roche 454 DNA sequencer
  1. Illumina
  1. Life Technologies
  1. Pacific Biosciences (PacBio RS)
  1. Beckman Coulter
  1. Oxford Nanopore
These modern technologies provide us the opportunity to sequence DNA as well as RNA (Ribonucleic Acid) much more quickly, accurately and cheaply than the previously used Sanger sequencing.
NGS can be used to sequence whole genome or constrained to specific areas of interest including all 22000 coding genes or small numbers of specific genes of human. Now scientists are using NGS methods to sequence the whole genomes of different organisms frequently.



Wednesday, April 1, 2015

Doctor for Mobiles is Born!

Digital advancement trending towards time crunch for social meetings. Mobile phone has become very integral part of human life. One can manage without meal, but without mobile device! I doubt. Time neither waits for anything nor for anyone; and keeps transforming civilization from present to history.

It was royal messenger, who used to deliver information from one end to another; and only royal families did enjoy such status. Problem statement then was merely a communication gap, so it is even today; despite of all the technology advancement in information communication world. At the outset, the Royal Elegant telephone was invented, having 9 digits round dial pad - then information communication journey begun to reach present state of smart phones and all its future endeavors. Mobile phones evolved to address this very gap of instant communication. Ice was broken by Nokia in 1997 having games (Memory, Snake, Logic ) and some utilities (Calculator, clock and calendar, Currency converter) on mobile phones. Since then NOT only technology but interfaces have also evolved to shape new heights of present state of mobile devices, having equipped with high computing powers.

Irony is advancement of information interfaces have yet challenged the veracity of real information. Context to domain of information and subject matter, mobile apps taken space to address this very gap of information exchange. Smart phones and devices have been showered with features and functionalities to get top in the race. Information velocity has boosted to never imagined exchange rate, but quantum of available application (~ 2 million apps) and spread of mobile devices (~7 billion) have built the maze around the soar. Most mobile users may not be aware about all the features embedded into it until a messenger friend recommends it.

Unlike human and other living species, mobile devices too fall sick. Physicians do exist for human and pets. How about doctor for mobiles? Isn’t it serious NOTE to brainstorm? Millions of mobile devices are born and get extinct every now and then, but very few of them are blessed to live full life. Unlike human, mobiles do have autoimmune diseases - in the form of social apps, stretched across device reach and it’s getting epidemic.

I note, despite gamut range of options and technology progression – a messenger is still needed; Only difference I see is NOT having restricted to royal families. Thousands of smart phone models have surfaced into market place, so making a choice for right phone has become challenge. Selection criteria got restricted to RAM, Processor, Camera Px, Battery Life, HD Storage vs price.

An attempt to facilitate making right choice and efficient usage of these mobile devices, QAroid is born.

Guideline to Choose mobile right for you.
·         Single touch interface for all the instant utilities
·         Easy interface to learn your own device
·         Testing of features and functionalities (Hardware/ Software)
·         Managing Apps
·         Managing Device Performance
·         Back-up arrangement of your data on mobile device


QAroid, reliable android doctor will allow fixing mobile sickness within and beyond geography.

Thursday, July 24, 2014

BIG DATA – Reveal latent Information

We have been generating data, a lot of data since human saga; it wasn’t stored everlasting, so destroyed with age. Every human endeavor generates data; in-fact whatever we do in our daily life that generates data. Nevertheless, now we capture and store these data to access obvious information, but large set of data always remains unprocessed and information are concealed within latent sate of data.

Primitive engines were unable to store and process these humongous data to make it capable enough for business folks’ interpretation.

Civilization moving @ speed of thought, so flow of data. Advancement of information technology has definitely evolved countable mechanisms for data storage- humongous data and big data. So, we talk about big data today. Magnitude of data growing by leaps and bounds, so need of computing quantum has been accelerated in the similar scale.

Technological paradigm shift in the information age, has brought great apps to enable users speaking their mind and getting them excited to enter data. Mobile interfaces boomed the online interactions - These technologies are firing up people to generate data, big data, so accelerating data accumulation. Obvious information changing our character and our expectations too.

There are wide range of values in every cube of data. Today business is all about progression in data accumulation and processing on those data to derive information; business insight and prediction.  We only need communicable information that can solve business problems; rest are just a garbage. Analytics from only structured data may be disruptive, so data lied in unstructured state needs to be engineered for letting information to peep. Data scientists are classically trained to tow the information by coining data.

Until last decade, we were browbeaten to process big data using traditional computing techniques. Now technology advancement can manage velocity and volume of data being generated. Parallel processing of the humongous data is possible by means of algorithmic engines developed by present human race, so we are fostering talents on Big Data to capitalize market need.

Wednesday, April 24, 2013

32 and 64 Bit Computers

There are several elements of computer hardware; In general they don’t concern users until, there is greater objective to make optimum utilization of every resource in the machine. One of them is the 'data buss', which facilitates transportation of data among all the elements of computer system and also connects memory to the rest of the system, including the brain of computer called processor.

In a 32-bit computer, data buss size is 32-bits wide, wherein buss size gets doubled in a 64-bit computer, so 64 bit computer is capable of carrying twice the size of data around the system elements.

SECURITY:
  • 64-bit machines are having more advanced security features like Kernel Patch Protection
  • 64-bit device drivers are digitally signed to avoid random crashes.

PROCESS:

  • Context to web surfing it may not demonstrate significant difference but heavy graphics processing and scientific calculations will be more efficient in 64 bit computers.
  • Strongly recommended for graphics applications ie: photo, video, games, CAD, etc. 
  • A 64-bit OS allows you to run greater memory wherein 32-bit restricted to maximum of 4 GB RAM.

Wednesday, February 27, 2013

Diagnosing Health Diagnostic World

Only about 30% of population are blessed with proper healthcare in the present healthcare setting in India, and about 7% are fortunate to encounter right healthcare. Almost 70% populace are dependent on home based medication, quacks, RMPs, and God.

Diagnostic is the key element of health treatment process; Even experts need patients’ diagnostic done to identify disorder precisely. In the present scenario, abundance of labs doesn't guarantee precise diagnostic as all the samples might not under go testing as quickly as taken from patients, and tend to loose its veracity. Also, there are many chances for samples not reaching to diagnostic equipment in original form, so results can always be challenged.

There are many reasons for lack of precision in lab reports:-
Poor collections logistics and process.
Quality and advancement of technology usage.
Intention behind test recommendation.

More than 80% diagnostics ordered by physicians turn out with negative results! Isn’t it big surprise? My mind is trying to disentangle few questions-

1. Aren't Physicians qualified enough in triage process?
2. Is Physician’s intention restricted to precise diagnostic?
3. Does lab test charges includes Physicians’ commission as well?

Monday, November 26, 2012

Executive Dashboard – MITYUNG perspective

In the vista of information age, visuals triumph over texts almost every time. However in the light of quick and clear communication, text sprinkled on graphics makes communication greater.

Graphics registers faster than textual information, so dashboards speak an international language. Study after study, experiment after experiment has proven that information in visual forms have superior precision; even researchers claim- visual information quickly affects both cognitive and emotional system of a human.

Communication do exist since birth of human civilization. Information through representational elements like images and graphics are deciphered simultaneously by human brain while language is decoded in a linear and sequential fashion.

Context to decision making process, quick availability of actionable information is key for all the business enterprises. Performance Dashboards are designed specially for business executives to visualize business performance and make decision for next course.

Dashboards are highly effective business intelligence tools, nonetheless there are basic slip-ups made while designing a dashboard, which leads to unrewarding intelligence as well as ineffective practice.

Some points to keep in mind while designing a executive dashboards:-

1. Lets not clutter the information – Make sure it provides at-a-glance views of KPIs
2. Designers to wear executive shoes - Focus on information sequence.
3. Right chart for information precision– Its not Rangoli to be designed, so usage of charts to be objective.
4. Remember your car Dashboard– Limit overview in just a single page.

Every executive would like to see their business performance of each products & services on various time scales, and further drilldown to region, locations, entity level. They would also be interested to learn ROI on each specific product and service in entity level and data aggregation back to top.

Psychologist Albert Mehrabian demonstrated that 93% of communication is nonverbal so dashboards should have information synchrony and reciprocity between business and executives. Business performance dashboards should be made discrete using interactive maps drilling down to region, location, entity levels.

Dashboards should provide visibility to critical business activities and a complete overview business activities with easy-to-read interface along with historical trends of an business KPIs (key performance indicators) to enable instant and appropriate decisions at a glance.

Thursday, November 1, 2012

Human civilization by year 2080 - A technology perspective

Its 2012 today and we are enjoying technology advancement in both personal and professional arena in many ways. An imagination of human civilization by 2080 dashes me foolish.

I envision, by 2080 human would be able to move from one location to another within flip of seconds without conventional mode of transportations. I get intoxicated thinking -where would we dump present mode of transportations?:)

Human curiosity and intelligence have excelled human in interpreting multi-dimensional information to derive judgmental views. Technological advancements played an important role in leveraging fluid and crystallize intelligence.

Innovators like –
  • Pranav Mistry, a research fellow of MIT Media Lab, USA is working on integrating physical objects with digital objects - Gesture transmission into information by seamless integration with real world.
  • Weijun Li and Longyi Shao of University of Mining and Technology, China are working on transmission of electron (aerosol) particles from one location to another.
  • Telekommunisten is working on transformative power of digital communications to the physical sphere with a global sharing platform for the transmission of physical objects - packet dissemination through pneumatic tubes.
Cloning technologies have been around for much longer than information and digital technology- Makes an exact genetic copy of an organism. Blend of such technologies might mimic the natural process of cloning and defunct all traditional process of transports.

Many stories have been formulated, describing advancement of technology in the backdrop of human civilization - Existence of television and telepathy have been explained very lucid in some of the Indian epics but such capabilities were restricted to very specific people.

Historically, concept of television did exist for few thousand years in various human cultures and it was being used to view the activities of distant location by super humans and telepathy too did exist for them to communicate without any modern devices. However technology advancement in present era has made it available to every common man - Today people can see distant activities using television devices and can speak with anyone using mobile devices.

A thought is born to transmit human body through internet protocols without losing even a bit data in the process. Nonetheless, particle size and shape can dramatically alter the physical and therapeutic properties of a substance, so its very important to derive algorithm keeping veracity of data being transmitted. 

Incredible PARAMs:-
  1. Location Information (Geo-codes of Source & Destination)
  2. Body decompounding at source and compounding in destination
  3. Compression and Transmission of decompounded data
  4. Temporary storage of decompounded data
I might sound untamed and eerie - thinking human body decompounding, transmitting, and compounding but that’s how inventions do conceive.

Saturday, October 20, 2012

Big Data - Connecting Dots...

Advancement of information communication technology enabled us to generate almost 2.5 quintillion bytes of data everyday and more than 80% of available data so far were generated only in last two years. This data is being generated through various sources- social media posts, climate information sensors, GPS signals, surveillance, digital pictures, videos, commercial transaction records, and medical records to name a few. Isn’t it data big?

Yes! This is big data.

Big data is next wave to address the scalability of super human like intelligence to process data of any kind and any size. Big data promises & enables enterprises to pursue top opportunity and address top challenges. Big data isn’t restricted to enormous volume of data but also takes care in processing of higher velocity, greater variety and real veracity of data to drive crystallize intelligence – deriving valuable, actionable (insights) information. Big data is confluence of three fundamental technology trends to open tremendous opportunity - Big transaction data, big interaction data, and big processing data to drive better cost structure and new business avenues.

Structured data analytics is a traditional approach to manage data and derive business value out of them. Information out of structured data isn’t deriving business value in real sense as needed, because 80% of data in due course, isn’t structured. I've had the opportunity to meet some amazing people in my life those, who are capable of processing humongous amount of data (both structured and unstructured) with ultimate efficiency to derive information on runtime as needed. However such intelligence is individual centric and not scalable. Configuration of human brain - capability of storage and processing of data (historical and current) varies by and large globally.

Wave of cloud and mobile is changing the economics & role of computing and will define literal information sources available across the globe. Enterprises would like to quickly adapt the changing environment in advancement of globalization milieu. Business enterprises expect replication of super human intelligence within an automated system - so can add value of higher degree in business growth.

Social media has become main stream technology for business today, nevertheless social media is much more than facebook, tweeter, and google of the world. Social interaction driving higher volume and even greater variety of data. The value preposition of business computing is shifting from operational efficiency to organizational effectiveness. Relating social media and correlating device sensor data, big data expedites the processing of data in any form to make better decision with quality of information.

We have been dealing with relational data for last few decades, as they all were structured data and stored into massive databases, warehouses, data mart to process indexed information. But big data promises beyond just glass house to get market advantage. Big data will not operate in silos, so integration with traditional data warehouses be integral part of the game.

Let the data be stored in the size of Gigabyte, Terrabyte, Petabyte or even Yottabyte but information should not exceed even few kilobyte.

I sought to convey a simple message to the audience that integrity of information does not only depends on state of data available but rely on logical parsing of data to plot functions.

Business will get breath of fresh air through truthful information of consumer sentiments analysis and business relevance.

Thursday, March 1, 2012

‘Customs of Sea’ in the Corporate Land!

The idea of cannibalism has been featured in various social beliefs, mythologies, and historical stories. In the human history, cannibalism had been intermittently practiced as a last resort by people suffering from food crisis.  Historically, cannibalism by shipwrecked victims has been phrased as ‘Customs of Sea’ and by war soldiers as ‘Starving Time’. Explorers from various regions brought home many stories of cannibalism during shipwrecked periods and many instances was also recorded during war time when soldiers resorted to cannibalism. However it was sternly condemned in several wars - especially world war-II. But, allegations of cannibalism were used by the colonial powers to justify the habit of primitive populace amongst the tribal segments.

Anthropologists preview, cannibalism as the bounds of human civilization metamorphosis and cultural relativism to define acceptable human behavior. Neanderthals, an ancient human species, now they are extinct are believed to have practiced cannibalism but now it seems they have been eaten by modern humans.

Cannibalism has been noticed in the modern times too. A famous example is the ‘Andes flight disaster’ on October 13, 1972 (crash of Uruguayan Air Force Flight 571)- after which some survivors ate the bodies of dead passengers and extended their lives for another 72 days. Also, some mentally ill individuals possess about eating others and actually do so, such as ‘Nithari Kand’ on 2005 – Wherein Surender Koli was seized for murdering and eating human body parts at Moninder’s house in Nithari, NOIDA (India).  Some superstitious rituals of practicing cannibalism in the pursuit of immortality and supernatural powers were noticed even in modern age; like Aghoris in India do eat dead human in the belief that eating human flesh confer their spiritual and physical superiority over ordinary human. 

A related word, "cannibalize" (derived from “cannibalism”) is metaphorically referred in the business world. It is referred to reuse of salvageable parts in manufacturing settings and the loss of a product's market share to another product from the same company in marketing contexts.

On a serious note, expressing - corporate world practicing politics as office cannibalism will not be hyperbole. Office cannibalism has become customary regime in the so called competitive corporate milieu, where cutthroat strategies are being practiced to stand in the self-centric fixtures. Business owners and business managers always judge the business progress based on statistics available - most of them derive from quantitative assessments and expert judgments (all biased approach).

There are world of differences between human and animals in habit and character adoption. It has been researched that human is very agile in adopting habits context to circumstances however animals might take ages to reform their conducts. Having said this – human value chain is the trigger to philosophy of present office cannibalism in the corporate world, which can’t be ignored to avoid sticking out ones’ neck in the professional endeavor.

Survival is the basic human instinct, be it in physiological world or in corporate world – so continuation of cannibalism in all forms of human saga will exist till human do!

On a lighter note- Isn't office cannibalism to be a required subject in college course? It can be better framed in beautiful titles like "corporate attitude" or "real keys to corporate success" or so on... for effective POS!– Education evangelists to give it a thought!

Submissive Note - Lets not put label of ‘Explorer’ or ‘Soldier’ or ‘Aghori’ on ‘office cannibalism/ politics’ experts in corporate land :)