Looking Back at 2019 By Katherine Lightwood

Looking Back at 2019

By Katherine Lightwood

We usually start our new year with brand new resolutions which we don't follow, but that's the part of it. It's not about following, it's about the spirit, about taking the initiative of starting something new in life. Letting go of the memories associated with guilt, shame, and pain and a brand new plan to start something or starting over a task again. Letting go of the pessimism that has always crushed our spirit of achieving something great and accepting the new optimism that this new year has brought us.

Looking back at 2019 is hard. There were many painful and heartbreaking memories but there were definitely some groundbreaking things that happened throughout the year. In this blog, I will be sharing five amazing things that happened during 2019 throughout the world (not my personal journey).

1. Breakthrough in the treatment for cystic fibrosis.

I was always keen on the study of medicine, so this news was really special for me. A discovery was made in the field of medicine related to the incurable disease of Cystic Fibrosis, which ignited hope for the patients who are suffering from this disorder. Cystic Fibrosis is a progressive disease that causes the building of mucus in the lungs leading to a chronic lung infection and ultimately death of the patient. A drug has been developed by Vertex Pharmacuticalof Boston which is targeting the genetic root cause of the disease.

Here is the link of the editorial if you are interested to check this out: Editorial.

2. A triumph of Public Health: Development of Ebola Vaccination

The Ebola Virus has wreaked havoc in the past which lead to the death of thousands of people in Congo and West Africa. A major milestone has been achieved by many pharmaceutical companies supported by the WHO (World Health Organization). They created a vaccine for protecting people for Ebola Virus. Licensed doses of this vaccine will be available from mid-2020.

Here's an editorial related to the Ebola Vaccine: rVSV-ZEBOV-GP vaccine.

3. The first-ever image of the black hole has been taken

My joy knew no bound when I hard the news of scientists capturing an image of a real black hole. People were always skeptical of the Black Hole not being real. It was considered the most mysterious object in the cosmology. Although it was mathematically proven, it was never ever captured by the camera. There was no real-life evidence. But finally, an international network of the telescope also called the Event Horizon Telescope (EHT) captured the first-ever image of a black hole. It is a supermassive black hole that lies in the center of an elliptical galaxy called Messier 87 (M87). The size of the black hole is 6.5 billion times that of the sun. And the image was magnificent as expected. 

Well, I can go on and on in this topic but if you are more interested in this topic then check out this editorial by NASA: Editorial.   

4. A spark of Regenerative Agriculture

According to some estimates, our soil can only take 60 more years of traditional farming before it gets completely depleted. Therefore, some companies are initiating the practice of Regenerative Agriculture which restores the soil quality by mimicking the processes of nature and extracts carbon dioxide from the atmosphere. in 2019, a US-based company named Applegate has released a new line of sausages that were regeneratively made. 

Here's the article link of how it has all been done: Editorial. 

5. Women won the most Prestigious award in Mathematics

Women were taking the world by storm. Here's the proof. For the first time ever a woman (Karen Uhlenbeck) was awarded the most prestigious award in Mathematics, the Abel's Prize. This prize is awarded by the King of Norway to the mathematicians. The prize was given for her impressive work on partial differential equations. 

Here's is the link of the editorial if you are interested in knowing more about her: Editorial.

For more blogs follow us on Facebook