Cleaner technologies to combat heavy metal toxicity.

Heavy metals frequently occur as silent poisons present in our daily diet, the environment we live and the products we use, leaving us victims to various associated drastic health and ecological bad effects even in meagre quantities. The prevalence of heavy metals can be traced from children's toys, electronic goods, industrial effluents, pesticide preparation, and even in drinking water in some instances; necessitating methods to remediate them. The current review discusses the various physicochemical and biological methods employed to tackle the problem of heavy metal pollution. Apart from the conventional methods following the principles of adsorption, precipitation, coagulation, and various separation techniques, the advancements made in the directions of biological heavy metal detoxification using microbes, plants, algae have been critically analyzed to identify the specific utility of different agents for specific heavy metal removal. The review paper is a nutshell of different heavy metal remediation strategies, their merits, demerits, and modifications done to alleviate process of heavy metal pollution.

Role of gut inhabitants on vectorial capacity of mosquitoes.

Mosquito-borne diseases are spreading at an alarming rate. Globally millions of deaths occur due to the diseases transmitted by mosquitoes, next to AIDS and tuberculosis. Several methods have been used to control these vectors and the diseases caused by them. Earlier studies have shown the potential role of mosquito gut inhabitants on disease transmission. Their findings can be used as an innovative approach for devising strategies to modify the survival of mosquitoes by reducing their lifespan, reproduction and disease transmission abilities. In this study, microbiome of the three genera of mosquitoes, namely Aedes, Anopheles, and Culex along with their vectorial capacity have been reviewed for assessing their role in mosquito control and transmission. Relevant articles were accessed using different databases, including LILACS, Embase, Science Direct and PubMed from inception to June 2017. The search keywords included "Aedes", "Anopheles", "Culex", "gut inhabitants", "vectors", and "mosquito". The titles, abstract, and keywords of the retrieved articles were screened, and eligible research articles were sorted. The review indicates that paratransgenesis may be considered as a versatile and effective strategy to eradicate the spurt of mosquito transmitting diseases. Enterobacter species is the most common type of gram-negative bacteria associated with the gut of all the three genera of mosquitoes. It was found to have a beneficial effect on humans as it helps in destroying dreadful disease-transmitting vectors. These symbiotic qualities of the microbes need to be thoroughly investigated further to reveal their antipathogenic effect on the vector.