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Details: Published: 09 November 2015

To check if the food is still fit for eating, Filipinos usually do it the traditional way: smell it. But though one’s nose has been trained to smell spoiled food, there is a more foolproof way of ascertaining the safety of food. This more precise way of determining food fit to eat is done through the science of genomics, more specifically through a process called DNA analysis.

DNA, or deoxyribonucleic acid, is the basic molecule that carries the genetic information of all living organisms. It is not affected by high temperature and its structure remains in all tissues of a person, animal, or plant, making it an excellent material to identify organisms, even in food products. By analyzing DNAs in a certain food product, foreign species, or those organisms present in spoiled food, can be easily detected.

Details: Published: 09 November 2015

Before the onset of the rainy season, the Department of Science and Technology (DOST) intensifies its dengue preventive measures by providing online information on dengue cases per community to serve as alert mechanism to concerned government offices and personnel.

In the pipeline is a dengue alert website that will enable public health practitioners to check out high-risk areas for dengue outbreaks and come up with early intervention measures.Developed by DOST through its sectoral council, the Philippine Council for Health Research and Development (PCHRD), the site is technically a “vector surveillance” tool containing data on population density and other information on Aedesaegyptimosquito which is the vector for dengue, or the organism that transmits the dengue virus to humans.