The Fascinating World of Jellyfish, A joy of Sampling

 Let me say something about a beautiful organism - the Jellyfish. A creature both fascinating and enigmatic, the Jellyfish is a curious, sometimes dangerous, boneless, brainless, heartless, eyeless, earless, noseless, tongue-less marine wonder that has thrived on Earth for hundreds of millions of years. Despite lacking many of the characteristics that define us as humans, Jellyfish remain an integral part of marine ecosystems, distributed worldwide. Join me on this journey as we explore the captivating world of Jellyfish from a researcher perspective.

Size and Diversity of the Resilient Survivors:

Water comprises more than 90 percent of the Jellyfish's body mass, making them exquisitely adapted to aquatic life. Their ability to survive even in low-oxygen conditions showcases their remarkable resilience. It is awe-inspiring to think that these creatures have persisted through countless millennia, witnessing the rise and fall of various species. Jellyfish exhibit an astounding size range, from millimeters to meters, showcasing remarkable species diversity. The diversity within the species is truly astounding. Each Jellyfish species holds its own unique beauty, adding to the wonder of marine biodiversity. This diversity necessitates caution and knowledge when dealing with them.

Challenges in Study and Collection:

The weird habituation of jelly fish with plastic pollution

Studying and collecting Jellyfish can be a little complicated compared to working with fish. In estuarine conditions, researchers often use scoop nets to gather Scyphozoan Jellyfish for research purposes. However, handling these delicate creatures requires explicit knowledge of their stinging property to avoid complications and health problems. Their delicate, undulating forms and vibrant colors make them a captivating sight. However, caution must be exercised, as some Jellyfish species are highly toxic and dangerous to humans. Wearing gloves while collecting unknown Jellyfish from the wild is essential to prevent accidental stings.Wearing gloves while collecting unknown Jellyfish from the wild is essential to prevent accidental stings.

Observations in the Estuary: Jellyfish in Kerala 

In Kerala, Jellyfish are commonly known as 'kadalchori', a term that directly refers to the itching sensation they can cause in humans. While Kerala is rich in marine resources, the culture, capture, and trade of Jellyfish are not as common as one might expect, despite their abundance. Kerala remains unexplored in terms of tapping into the potential export market for these fascinating creatures.In the estuary, Jellyfish often come close to the shore, making it relatively easy to collect them using scoop nets. 

They exhibit a slow swimming behavior, allowing for close observation. However, in deeper waters, the collection process becomes more complex as they swiftly retreat when sensing danger nearby.

Examining, Photographing, and Preserving:

After collection, the Jellyfish samples are meticulously examined, photographed, and preserved, with only a limited number of samples being designated as museum specimens in buffered formalin solution. Such measures ensure that their beauty and scientific value are preserved for generations to come.The world of Jellyfish is a captivating and mysterious one, full of astonishing diversity and survival stories. From their resilience in adverse conditions to their stunning beauty, there is much to appreciate and learn from these ancient marine organisms. While they can pose challenges and potential dangers, with proper safety measures and knowledge, we can interact with them responsibly, opening doors for further research and exploration of their fascinating world. As we continue to explore and understand Jellyfish, let us remember the importance of safeguarding our marine ecosystems and the wondrous creatures there inhabited.

I am a researcher in Jelly fishes, currently doing PhD at Cochin University of Science and Technology. My core interests are in marine ecology, scientific illustrations, light microscopy and Aquaculture. I am very much interests in field surveys, particularly on plankton samples. My current work is focused on distribution of jelly fishes over the Cochin estuary.

— Rithin Raj, CUSAT

Getting started with R

I hope you install the R and Rstudio successfully in your PC. Data manipulation in R is different from contemporary softwares for statistical - graphical analysis. Be in mind that R is not a software, rather it is a numerical computation program like MatLab or Octave. A detailed review on the capabilities of R were explained the post. Here we are going to start with basic data manipulation on R for extreme beginners. Let's start with

data( mtcars), which is usually an inbuilt dataset. To make you know how to import a data from your PC, just go to the link here.car<- mtcars
View(mtcars)


Browsing through columns
1) Dollar method

Browse through your columns by adding $ symbolcar$





2) Square bracket and number/name method

Other methods are by using [] square brackets, or by using the exact column names(if you know) or by tab <=> button. However the result will be the same. Like maths, in R you can solve the same problems in different ways. Use the codes according to your convenience, and your data structure. Inside the [] , the data is represented by rows and columns.The basic structure isdata[rows,columns]


so here it iscar[,]


You could select desired columns by using "tab" button, when the cursor is in the square bracket[ ]. Similarly, you can shift the cursor left to the coma for rows.







you can use numbers instead of names of columns. i e, for the first column use 1 and for the second column use 2.car[,1] # For first column
car[2,]# For second column


Get first four columns from the data[car], you have to select multiple columns by using the command "c".car[,c(1,2,3,4)] # first four columns by using no.s.
car[,c("mpg","cyl","disp","hp")] #first four columns by using names.


In the same way you can use rows too. Lets check the first 4 rows.car[c(1,2,3,4),] # first four rows by number
car[c("Mazda RX4","Mazda RX4 Wag","Datsun 710","Hornet 4 Drive"),]#first four rows by name


Everything in the R needs a name, as in real life scenario. Otherwise R will forgot, and won't seen on global environment. carpart<- car[,c(1,2,3,4)]





This way you can define the subsets, i e you made your own dataset from the previous one.

Point data manipulation

You can do point data editing in R, before you doing this you should have a better understanding on datasets you are dealing with. For this you have to specify both rows and columns.

just typecar[3,3] # 3rd row and 3rd column


check the output[1] 108





Suppose you could change the value from 108 to 50car[3,3]<- 50





Change row names and column names

Row names can be changed by function rownames(), lets the check the subset data "carpart" with rownames.




check resultrownames(carpart)
[1] "Mazda RX4" "Mazda RX4 Wag" "Datsun 710" "Hornet 4 Drive" "Hornet Sportabout"
[6] "Valiant" "Duster 360" "Merc 240D" "Merc 230" "Merc 280"
[11] "Merc 280C" "Merc 450SE" "Merc 450SL" "Merc 450SLC" "Cadillac Fleetwood"
[16] "Lincoln Continental" "Chrysler Imperial" "Fiat 128" "Honda Civic" "Toyota Corolla"
[21] "Toyota Corona" "Dodge Challenger" "AMC Javelin" "Camaro Z28" "Pontiac Firebird"
[26] "Fiat X1-9" "Porsche 914-2" "Lotus Europa" "Ford Pantera L" "Ferrari Dino"
[31] "Maserati Bora" "Volvo 142E"


If you want to know column names, you can use two commands> colnames(carpart) # colnames is a specific function
[1] "mpg" "cyl" "disp" "hp"
> names(carpart)# names only work work for dataframes
[1] "mpg" "cyl" "disp" "hp"


You can change the column names/row names by assign the new names in order, lets check the column names. > names(carpart)
[1] "mpg" "cyl" "disp" "hp"



Now assign with new name.names(carpart)<- c("miles/gal","cylinder","displacement","horsepower")
# or
colnames(carpart)<- c("miles/gal","cylinder","displacement","horsepower")


let's check the new column names




I hope this will you make you start the R program from scratch, More advanced topics are coming soon. Please follow the category R-spells.




Why AI can't takeover the world ?

 

We are living in a society, where people are fascinated on fiction, especially the science fiction. And you could see that  it might be mostly on AI(Artificial Intelligence), there are plenty of movies on this concept, in which robots or controlling systems that take over the world (terminator/skynet systems, I robot, .......... there are "n" number of names to fill this).The point of this post is to check, is there any reality or possible probability of a conscious non living system, that can takeover the world for his own needs???.

The thing is .... according to our current knowledge...it is a BIG NO.

Y?

Before we have to think about an artificial system with intelligence, think about the real bio-systems. What makes them so unique? Learning ability?, problem solving  or intelligence?. You might get visuals of robots in YouTube, who solves complex problems with ease, and many of them are smarter than humans, even imitate the expressions too. Then what is the difference?. . .In the simpler way  , one could tell, a robot itself doesn't have any self.

Yes!!

Robot doesn't have any self-knowledge, only living beings have the knowledge of self, which we  collectively called conscious. We could imitate intelligence, learning process etc. That's how we made the AI. AI could solve the problems effectively and logically. The term logically is important, this makes a machine do things by unbiased judgements, a very effective in decision-making. But the thing is, machines do things only by the program it sets, they have learning ability, but what for they learn?.

They always need a question to do things, and it end up when things are done.Suppose, if a robot was programmed to pluck an apple, it do as the algorithm directed, then what next?.. . .. .....program terminated. what we do on the same process? we need an apple to eat if it is a ripened one. If it is not a ripened we may not eat it, but it still depends on your hungry. The strange reason is we sometimes pluck an apple, when we don't have any hunger, it is a matter of curiosity. So you might think that intelligence develops in a system from the environments according to the needs of the system. At a particular extend this concept it is true. Because you need an apple, which is good for your health and your energy needs, so you want the apple. ok . . .Lets consider another setup, in this you and machine(robot) were exposed to two stuffs. 1) an apple and 2) a fatty ice cream.consider the robot is a cyborg, with same digestive system as humans but CPU runs on AI. From the previous instants, we develop a better AI on the robot like apple is good, healthy etc, and in the same way about ice creams too. However both are food stuffs, you get energy from what you eat. Robot might opt for apple, there is definitely no question on that, because an apple is healthier than ice cream. But your choice could be different unless you are sick or extreme health conscience. Your decision depends  on what you feels rather than how it favours. You eat junk foods, knowing that it harms you, but still you eat because of the feel you got. It is a matter of thing you need and you actually like. And most of the time you could never answer why you like it. From this point, a definite separation of intelligence and  conscious are evolve. when you question a robot, you will never get an answer without a reason. An AI system doesn't have any favorite colour, or can't enjoy the music, rather it analyse the sound waves. On the other hand, Life is a conscious system, with intelligence. From my point of view, conscious was the first , and it evolves with the aid of  intelligence. Natural selection and evolution are the  continuous process to  filter conscious systems, those have the intelligence to change. Even Though Intelligence and conscious are different, they syncs and evolved complimentary. Without intelligence, the conscious system(Life) will perish. Every living things have its own intelligence to change the morphometry and lifestyle through various adaptation strategies, which in turn effects on the long-term process of evolution.

AI works in a very different way, it simply learns from the environment, do things according to the data driven biased expressions for a particular task. By doing this It never gets a feeling or satisfaction(It is just a machine!!). Usually this is done by Artificial Neural Networks(ANN), which is claim to have an imitation of neural networks of brain. It comprises the complex functions and relations of trained data that can acquire from the environment, and according to the weights of information, appropriate networks created or degraded. Beyond the ANN, a variety of machine learning techniques were used for AI, which makes it capable of doing amazing tasks with least effort and time.

But in terms of humanity and justice, AI doesn't have any role as long as the algorithms of feelings and conscious are not developed. As the conscious system only follows what it satisfies, like a robot programmed for warfare, desired to write poetry. However If it was developed, the scenario is different too, it is like a paralysed human body moving with the aids of machines, and it blame their time for being a machine, as it needs love, attention and being unique. I think , that algorithm leads to self termination(suicide) of the AI system.So AI can't takeover the world at least for our grandson's generation. So be ....

stay calm, and do the work with your brain

until someone says "You work like a machine"

Why you became an amatuer researcher than professional?

“Never be afraid to try something new. Remember, amateurs built the Ark, professionals built the Titanic”- Anonymes.

  when I heard this quote I reckon my childhood  memories. I had a friend named "Azad". He was crazy on inventing amazing stuffs from totally garbage things. I have the same curiosity, even in my 30's. It encouraged me a lot as a researcher. Our school days are stuffed on out of syllabus quest of knowledge, primarily on inventing things. I can't imagine such a childhood could possible on now a days. We are lucky beings, who were lived on two millenniums(19's and 20's). Our circumstances made enormous situations to stay close with nature. The floods, the rain..and our curiosity drives to explore it without fear.

Fear and curiosity are two sides of a coin. Those who have the courage and intelligence/passion could tackle it efficiently. Like my childhood, everyone was born with curiosity, but they lost it eventually by time.i e, children  are born as creative minds. it is all by our fear of failure. This makes our quest of knowledge is usually end up on google/ready-made answers, rather than doing it their on way. This is a total disaster and the complete lost of new findings. There is an urging need to restore such passions, because amateurs had a golden history of innovation.

So .. let's have a  check , how differ they  from professional.

Amateur	Professional
100 % freedom	You have to fulfill funding agency's needs
No need for publishing, but it's an added quality	Publishing is must.
Mostly focused on things that works	Not a must choice, can be theoretical.
Artistic , you will be satisfied by the work itself	Satisfaction mostly centered on journal ratings

Everyone in this society need a professional badge to keep their earnings stable. When passion and profession are same, you will achieve greatness, otherwise you end up on stress. It is the hidden agenda of most of the governments, and all the corporate is to develop a knowledge polarized society. Then only corporate can make money and politicians got governing power.In this modern age most of the people want to be a specialist on something trendy or depends on the demand of the society they live. The choice of specialization are mostly different from their skills and interests which leads to grief. May they earn money but sorrows too.On another context modern society face several kinds of occupational disease due to this specialization.This is another way of pharmaceutical business, which is flourished enormously nowadays. Specialists mostly encounter severe struggle throughout their life when they met any accident or disability, Since they are only able to do their specialized work.Specialization is a bad thing and . . . . .

“ A specialist is a person one who know everything about something and Nothing about anything”

But some people are seemed to be interest in diverse topics.Usually called as ‘Multitalented’.But it doesn’t required any talent, it only needs interest.Interest makes everything and it is the way of being talented and better informed. Our brain is so vast to store every bit of information we usually encounter.It will eventually evolving when we do different things.So that Multiple Intelligence Quotient(MIQ) were most accepted than Intelligent Quotient(IQ).When we take the courage of doing things differently, we are seeking our own creativity too. For that we require freedom of knowledge and in this modern world we call it in another name "open source".