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DOST Region 9 Director Brenda Nazareth-Manzano (left, holding microphone) poses a question to ITDI Director Nuna E. Almanzor (right) about the status of OL trap distribution during the Dengue Summit held at the DOST Executive Lounge. Also in picture are DOST Region 11 Director Anthony Sales (center) and STII Director Raymund E. Liboro (center right). The Dengue Summit seeks to bring the agencies under the Department of Science and Technology toward a common course of action to fight and reduce the incidence of this mosquito-borne disease, now a national public health issue. (Alan Taule, S&T Media Service)

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Clay can easily bind together the red tide organisms suspended on the water surface and settle them at the sea bottom where said organisms become inactive. This is what experts from the Department of Science and Technology’s Philippine Council for Aquatic and Marine Research and Development (DOST-PCAMRD) and the University of the Philippines’ Marine Science Institute (UP-MSI) found out in their study on mitigating Harmful Algal Blooms (HABs), commonly known as red tide.

“Algal cells die when they stick to clay particles,” according to Dr. Rhodora V. Azanza, program leader of PhilHABS and co-project leader for the ball clay technology. “Clay minerals further entrail the algal cells as they settle at the sea floor.”

The PhilHABS, a UP-led program supported by DOST-PCAMRD, focuses on the Ecology and Oceanography of Harmful Algal Blooms in the Philippines.

“Clays that are used to mitigate these algal blooms are purely natural,” Azanza added.

In actual Pyrodinium bloom in Masinloc Bay, Zambales earlier this year, the efficiency of ball clay application was put to test. A prototype clay dispersal unit formed the clay balls which were applied on algal blooms. The unit mixes ball clay particles with seawater drawn from the area. Mixing ball clay with seawater will improve the efficiency of ball clay to collide and eventually aggregate with algal cells, according to Azanza.

Azana’s team found that the cells of Pyrodinium at the surface and bottom of the sea were not present after clay application. The study also showed no negative effects on other marine organisms such as green mussels and milkfish, among others.

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Aside from encouraging Eastern Visayan inventors to get creative through inventions and innovations, the Department of Science and Technology (DOST) Region 8 underscored the importance of protecting their creations through intellectual property rights.

“Protect your products first before you sell them,” advised Dr. Edgar Garcia, DOST’s Technology Application and Promotion Institute director, to inventors and student researchers who participated in the first ever Regional Invention Contest and Exhibits (RICE) at the Robinson’s Place in Tacloban City August 22-25.

Protecting inventions, said Garcia, means applying for patent or intellectual property right of an inventor’s creation or product. Securing a patent protects the inventor from duplication of the product and entitles him or her royalties when the product is sold or commercialized.

The RICE 8 has the theme “Imbensyon at Inobasyon: Kabalikat sa Pag-unlad.” Twenty-two entries from local inventors and students vie it out for the Outstanding Invention or Tuklas Award; Outstanding Utility Model or Likha Award; and Outstanding Student Creative Research or Sibol Award for high school and college students. Prototypes and researches, open for viewing at the venue, will be presented formally by their respective inventors on Aug. 24 at the Stefanie Smokehouse (across Robinson’s Place). Awarding ceremonies will be on Aug. 25 at Robinson’s Place.

To further encourage students to develop their creativity and ingenuity, DOST 8 will also hold a Patent Drafting Training-Workshop Aug. 23-25 at the EVSU Graduate School Function Room.

“Inventions and innovations are marks of a country’s competitiveness,” Garcia said. “This can be gauged through the number of patent applications filed.”

A high level of competitiveness beckons investment and development, driving a country towards progress.

“If you find a market for your product, DOST-TAPI will support you,” Garcia said, encouraging the participating inventors and students to apply for patent through TAPI.

Dir. Edgar Garcia of DOST-Technology Application and Promotion Institute with Ms. Bernardita Valenzuela, representative of Tacloban City Councilor Cristina Gonzales Romualdez, cut the ceremonial ribbon to open the exhibit at the DOST’s Regional Invention Contest and Exhibit at the Robinson’s Place in Tacloban City August 22-25. With them are DOST Region 8 Director Edgar Esperancilla (rightmost) and Intellectual Property Office Director General Allan Gepty (leftmost). (Framelia V. Anonas, S&T Media Service)

 

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In an intensified campaign to fight dengue, the Department of Science and Technology, with the Department of Education (DepEd), will provide mosquito traps to all classrooms of both public and private schools in areas with high dengue cases in the metro.

“The DOST and DepEd partnership to stop dengue among our schoolchildren will start at the National Capital Region and will proceed to the regions most affected with the disease,” DOST Sec. Mario Montejo announced. “Our priorities will be schools in hotspot areas, communities around the schools, and hotspot barangays.”

Some 34,910 OL trap kits will be distributed to 17,454 classrooms in public and private elementary and secondary schools in Caloocan, Quezon City, Pasay, Valenzuela, Manila, Muntinlupa, and Pasig.

Within the month, DOST and DepEd will extend distribution to schools in Ilocos Sur, Benguet, La Union, and Pangasinan provinces where about 46, 500 OL Trap kits will be distributed in these areas for free.

Meanwhile, DepEd Undersecretary Rizalino Rivera, in a memorandum, instructed NCR school division superintendents to distribute the OL Traps to all schools in their respective divisions and assign students to monitor the traps.

The DOST-developed OL Trap has three important parts: a black container, a small strip of wood (lawanit) for mosquitoes to lay their eggs on, and a larvicide solution. The scent of the larvicide solution attracts female mosquitoes and encourages them to lay eggs on the immersed lawanit strip. Once exposed to the solution, the eggs and hatched larvae will die. The OL Trap prevents the next generation of mosquitoes from reaching adulthood and curbs the Aedes Aegypti mosquito population.

The OL Trap is one of the government’s strategies in its multi-pronged approach to fight the dengue menace.