Assisted reproductive techniques ethical and legal issues.

The rapid advancements in sciences have revolutionized modern medicine in a number of ways; genetic engineering, Assisted Reproductive Technologies (ART), human cloning, stem cells etc. has opened up the unimagined and promise unquestionable and undreamed benefits to mankind. At the same time, they raise many questions of law and ethical issues relating to public interest, social and religious sentiments and family concern. Although ethical judgments may indeed express personal preferences and may be connected in complicated ways with cultural conventions, ethics itself is a form of rational inquiry that concerns how we should live and what we should do. Some ethical issues are matters of debate. The Delhi Government has promulgated legislation in this regard which is cited as “The Delhi artificial insemination (Human) Bill 1995. The Indian Council for Medical Research has laid down certain guidelines for clinics practicing of assisted reproductive techniques and handling of surrogates in India. There is a certain element of risk associated with all assisted reproductive procedures. It is, therefore, necessary to ascertain the therapeutic and research value of the AR procedure in each case.

Foreign objects in genitalia: Homicide with destruction of identity –A case report.

Sadistic homicides are probably more common than would be expected from reading the literature, where only a few cases are mentioned. In the present case an unclothed dead body of 25 year old female was found in the forest area by the police. On postmortem examination, we found crushed head by heavy hard blunt force (a heavy stone with blood stains recovered near body). After killing her, assailants tried to destroy her identity by burning the face and disfiguring the head. In this case beside common findings of homicide as usually seen in sexual murder cases; there was unique finding of a wine bottle introduced into vagina probably out of frustration. Body also had postmortem abrasions over different parts of the body. Postmortem fractures of multiple ribs were present on both sides of the chest. The death was due to crushed injuries to head caused by hard blunt force, which was sufficient to cause death in ordinary course of nature. We also discuss the possible scenario of psycho-pathology of accused in such cases.

Allelopathic effects of Lantana camara Linn. on spore germination of Asterella angusta Steph.--a liverwort.

Extract from root, stem and leaf of L. camara proved inhibitory for germination of the spores of A. angusta. Leaf extract was found to exhibit maximum allelopathic potentiality followed by stem and root extract and may be interpreted to be the result of phytotoxic substances which are possibly synthesized in the leaf and translocated to other organs.