Breakthrough for CSMCRI scientists in seaweed research

Vijaysinh Parmar TNN Bhavnagar: A process breakthrough of extracting world-class Agarose a gelatinous substance from Gracilaria dura,a seaweed mostly found on Gujarat coast has burst the global myth that Indian seaweeds are poor in quality and productivity.And,yet again it is the scientists at central salt and marine chemicals research institute (CSMCRI) here who have achieved the feat.According to Dr PK Ghosh,director,CSMCRI,it was a myth among scientists world over that Indian seaweeds are poor in quality and production.However,our scientists,over past eight years,did research in producing worldclass agarose from Gracilaria Dura and achieved the breakthrough, he said.One of the primary uses of agarose is for agarose gel electrophoresis,which is a method used in biochemistry and molecular biology to separate a mixed population of DNA and RNA fragments by length.To test the grade of the agarose developed at CSMCRI,the national-level laboratory sent it to Centre for Cellular and Molecular Biology (CCMB),Hyderabada premier institute of the world in field of cellular and molecular biology and one the constituent national laboratories for testing of molecular biology grade from Indian seaweed.CCMB reported to us that they could make 0.8% gel and electrophoreses human genomic DNA and PCR products respectively.Upon gel preparation and electrophoresis,it was observed that the separation of DNA molecules in the gel was at par with molecular biology grade agarose,which is used routinely at CCMB lab.Good separation of high molecular weight DNA was observed in CSMCRIs agarose gel, Ghosh told TOI.According to AK Siddhanta,deputy director and group leader -natural products group,marine biotechnology and ecology discipline,CSMCRI,the new process reduces substantial time to prepare agarose from seaweed almost one-third of the time is reduced in the new process.Importantly,it is an Indian plant and we have mapped its gene sequence.The quality was found to be at par with agarose available in the market and it would be cheaper once the cultivation is scaled up.The other applications of agarose are in the field of molecular biology,electrophoresis,cell culture works in R&D labs,pharma and biotech industries world over, Sidhhanta said.The patent on the process breakthrough has been filed in India.Moreover,efforts are underway to cultivate this algae in fields using raft method.