Wednesday, September 16, 2015

It’s airborne! City’s air is filled with microbes making us sick

Four types of bacteria in Bengaluru's air have become hyperactive and are triggering respiratory tract disorders among its residents; IISc wages war on dreaded dengue

Why are people falling sick in Bengaluru often these days? Have the immunity levels of Bengalureans dropped drastically? Are pollutants getting more dangerous by the day? Are new strains of virus or bacteria fast multiplying in the city? These are the questions that are being asked by medical experts and researchers in recent times.


While the brainstorming continues, a city-based environmental scientist has come up with a worrisome finding: Four types of bacteria (Streptococcus, Staphylococcus, Enterococcus and Salmonella typomerium) have become hyperactive in the city's air and are triggering fever and respiratory tract disorders among residents. The scientist Sivasakthivel S has set out to record the bacteria and fungi (bioaerosol) levels in the city. He submitted his findings to Bangalore University as part of his doctoral thesis titled—'Microbial diversity in ambient air associated with seasonal meteorological parameters' for which he was awarded a PhD last week.


Sivasakthivel told Bangalore Mirror that his objective was to study what kind of pathogenic bacteria and fungi are present in Bengaluru's air. "The bioaerosol level was compared with seasonal aspects like temperature and relative humidity to assess how these climatic aspects foster the growth of bioaerosols in air," he said.


Sivasakthivel's research spanning four years from 2009 to 2013 was conducted under the guidance of Prof N Nandini, chairperson, Environment Science department of Bangalore University.


Read more here.