Technology in the times of Corona Virus Disease '19
Biology has been a field that mostly relates to living organisms, and as time progressed, the sciences collectively, paced up with each other, aiding each other.
There were scientific breakthroughs in physics that brought out breakthroughs in biology or chemistry and thus we grew as a community together.
Alas, the silly thought that one science can exist without the other is now thus a myth, for, in reality, the pure sciences and their varied evolved branches cannot exist independently, but codependently. Biochemistry and Molecular Biology are branches of chemistry and biology but need to work together for a better understanding of concepts.
Even astrophysicists need not only physics of the planets but mathematics to represent them in terms of constants, for example, orbital speed, mass, the density of a star, distance in light-years etc
What I find amusing is the fusion of two things I never imagined would be true: The mix of biology and mathematics... I always did believe that they could exist without each other, but reality had other plans I suppose, to not only prove me wrong but to take sciences to greater heights.
Physicists, Mathematicians and Biologists all over the world have studied how principles from other fields can aid humanity for the better or worse.
That's what I want to explore today, the 'marriage' of technology with life sciences, in terms of diagnostics.
Diagnostics has played a major role in our lives and even now plays a crucial role in determining the public from patients to potential carriers by diagnosing markers present in the blood, that would be found only had they been hosting the virulent pathogen.
At the current time of writing, ~4 Million cases worldwide have been reported and nearly 1.3 Million cures, so far. (source: https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/ )
And one pretty evident thing is that there is no sure shot vaccine for the virus, owing to it to their unstable, mutative genetic material, which in turn gives us varied strains of the pathogen.
A handful of countries have claimed to have found the secret to curing the disease through a vaccine, but one cannot say without clinical trials.
In this case, Technology has played a major role in aiding the control and cure of the disease.
High-end tech like Artificial Intelligence, Data Science, Data Analysis, and Machine Learning has improved the sustenance of our community despite these tough times. AI has been programmed to predict scenarios and aid create preventive measures, they also are used for the diagnosis of the pandemics' host.
Data Science and Data Analysis play a major role in the collection, organization, analysis and interpretation of data collected that gives everyone a clear outlook on the current situation of the pandemic.
Robots and Drones are nowadays being designed and created with high-end tech to self sterilize, serve and aid commoners with the delivery of general products, drugs and foodstuff.
This keeps the community going and how!
Not to forget how supercomputers and AI aid in formulating the vaccine with Bioinformatic tools and AI graphics, studying drug interaction, and leading to drug discovery.
Programmers are due a lot of credit for the advancements that have taken place by creating software for data scientists, data analysts and bioinformaticians. Studying the omics of proteins and genes are near impossible if they had not programmed the code for the related studies.
Also let's not forget how social media helps us stay together, from WhatsApp video calls to Snapchat stories, checking live news on Twitter with trending news to what's trending in your friends' lives via Instagram stories.
Social Media, although not 'Technology' perse, is nothing more than programme codes a team had written once, long ago - that connects the world; despite the Corona around, we have connected with everyone near and dear and have grown empathy and we use this opportunity to make the best use of our time.
So, how are you spending your quarantine?
Rajeshwari
