Once used exclusively to 'identify'
products to ease business transactions and back-end operations, Barcodes have
come a long way and have forayed into every consumer sector - be it health,
hospitality, auto-mobile, retail or non-retail platforms.
But wherever it is, barcode's primary
function as 'identity provider' has not changed. Seeing its vast advantage and
potential, scientists are using barcodes for various purposes. While hospitals
use barcodes on test tubes and patients to prevent mix-ups at labs and
operation theatres, biologists found extensive use of barcodes in DNA labeling'.
Every single species, whether plants or
animals, can be classified and coded for future references through an innovative
identification technology known as DNA barcoding.
Recently zoology department of Calcutta University has joined hands with
the International Barcode of Life (iBOL) project, which has 25 nations in its
fold, to form a digital database of DNA signatures, which can identify any organism,
plant or animal on earth in a jiffy. Undoubtedly, the University department
would be eastern India's hub for iBOL.
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