4. Biology Education and Sustainable Development
Sustainable development can be conceived within the concept of growth, advancement, conservation and preservation of the gains of development for the benefit of the present and future. Olorode considered sustainable development as development that meets the needs and aspiration of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs. Nnabuo and Asodike [16]; Olorode stated that, sustainable development is an approach that combines the developmental needs and aspiration of the present without compromising the ability of the future while also maintaining ecological integrity. Three aspects of sustainable development has been in recognition i.e economic, social and environmental. In this paper the role of biology education in attaining the sustainable development will be discuss under the aforementioned aspects.
4.1. Bio-Fermentation
Is a process whereby food and organic products are produced through fermentation in a bioreactor by organisms including yeast, fungi and algae. This process involves the selection of a suitable microbial culture that has the metabolic potential to produce the desired products. The medium in which the culture is fermented is carefully chosen. Production by bio fermentation has been deemed advantageous as fermentation utilizes renewable feedstocks instead of petrochemicals in which some of the renewable feedstocks are agricultural waste.
4.2. Biofuels
The rise in biofuels production is as a result of increasing demand of fuels globally. It is a gaseous, liquid or solid fuel that contains an energy content derived from a biological sources. The organic matter that makes up living organisms provides a potential source of trapped energy that is beginning to be exploited to supply the ever-increasing energy demand around the world. Examples are rapeseed methyl ester, biogas, gasohol and others. Yahaya explained that, Nigeria as a developing country may be considered a top destination for biofuel production in terms of cost effectiveness production.
4.3. Bioinformatics
Is the collection, storage and analysis of DNA and proteinsequence data using computerized systems. In this situation much of the data generated by genome sequencing projects and protein studies is held in various databanks and made available to researchers throughout the world via the internet. There are many computer programs developed to analyze sequence data which enable the user to identify similarities between newly sequenced materials and existing sequences. This allows predictions the structure and function of a protein from its amino acid sequence data or from the nucleotide sequence of its gene.
4.4. Bioremediation
Environmental contamination due to rapid increase in population, industrialization and urbanization is one of the most popular challenges nowadays. Bioremediation is a technology that focuses on removing the contaminants from the environment. Sharma sees bioremediation as a process whereby contaminants or organic wastes are biologically degraded under controlled conditions to an innocuous state, or to levels below concentration limits established by regulatory authorities. Bioremediation techniques are typically more economical than traditional methods such as incineration and others. Some of the microorganisms use in this techniques includes; Nitrosomonas, Mycoccus, Xanthofacter, Norcardia, Pennicillium, actinobacter, Rhizoctomia, Mycobacterium as well as others Singh et al.. The process of bioremediation involves biotransformation and biodegradation by converting the contaminants to non-hazardous or to less hazardous substances Singh et al.. This techniques is less cost, effective and efficient as well as environmentally friendly.
5. Conclusion
The importance of biology and biology education for sustainable national development cannot be overemphasized as it finds its way into agriculture, pharmacy, ethnobotany, medicine, biotechnology, and other related fields. Many factors are responsible for the failure of effective teaching and learning the subject in Nigerian secondary and tertiary schools, and can be reduced to a maximum point of consideration.