Farmers don't need a new superstar toxin to fight bugs
...isn't required to increase crop protection against bugs as long as the right genes are strategically placed to take their shots at destructive insects, researchers report. Plants modified with protectant genes designed to kill resistant insects can extend the usefulness of currently used pest-control meth...Researchers discover defense mechanisms in some plants believed bred out by humans
...had a built-in defense system to protect them from bugs and injuries, but some plants that were cultivated to serve humans' needs lost the ability to defend themselves. So costly pesticides that are sometimes harmful to the environment now defend the plants from the same things they used to be able to fig...Researchers reconstruct parts of the genome of a common mammalian ancestor
...veraged about 98 percent. "We looked carefully for bugs in our program to see why the accuracy was so high, but we couldn't find any," said Blanchette. Comparisons using DNA from additional species, not used in the reconstruction itself, confirmed the high accuracy. The tec...NSF funds Panikov's Alaskan Tundra Microbial Observatory project
... calculated that expected generation time of these bugs should be up to 10 years at -20C and probably could be reduced to several months just below zero. We plan to find the preferential substrate for these bacteria, and then label their ribosomal and mRNAs with following separation of labeled product fro...Urban ecology study witnessing the birth of a 'designer ecosystem'
... on numerous fronts. From air quality to birds and bugs and plants to water quality and usage, to landscap...ns out, functions very much like an ecosystem with bugs and birds and plants -- but in different sets of relationships, with much different abundances," sai...Why do insects stop 'breathing'? To avoid damage from too much oxygen, say researchers
...utterflies, some types of fruit flies, beetles and bugs close off their respiratory systems periodically to keep out excess oxygen, thus preventing damage to their tissues. Timothy Bradley, professor of ecology and evolutionary biology at UCI, and Stefan Hetz, assistant professor of physiology at Humbold...Bugs, even 'bad' ones, can be educationally beneficial, new book says
...ad bugs. "The least creative way to get rid of bad bugs is by using insecticides," Waldbauer said. Biological control, a practice in which natural predators are introduced, is a more creative and effective way to control pests, he said. In the book, Waldbauer explains many historic and recent examples of ...Scripps scientists describe protein used by bacteria and cancer cells to resist drugs
...ted with alternative antibiotics. Now some super bugs -- multiple drug-resistant bacteria -- are emerging as an even greater threat. Multiple drug-resistant TB is no longer susceptible to broad categories of antibiotics, such as rifampicin, isoniazid, and streptomycin. Some strains of the common hospita...To stop evolution: New way of fighting antibiotic resistance demonstrated by Scripps scientists
...ally toxic drugs. Now some super bugs -- multiple drug-resistant bacteria -- are emerging as an even greater threat. Multiple drug-resistant TB is no longer susceptible to broad categories of antibiotics, such as rifampicin, isoniazid, and streptomycin. Some strains of the common hospita...The evolutionary triumph of flower power
...on the scene to attract potential pollinators like bugs and birds, it is their appeal to humans that accou... selected by humans that nature's pollinators the bugs and birds no longer find them attractive. So the job of propagating the species depends mainly on u...Leprosy microbes lead scientists to immune discovery
... how the body develops protective immunity against bugs that invade our cells--or fails to. Now we know the players, and we would love to look at them in other diseases such as tuberculosis in the lungs and juvenile diabetes." Harvard School of Public Health is dedicated to advancing the public's health t...A radical solution for environmental pollution
..., University of Michigan researchers show how some bugs manage to do that: by harnessing other potentially harmful chemicals known as free radicals to degrade the toxins they live on. Such insights could lead to new ways of engineering bacteria to clean up environmental messes, said associate professor o...Stolen gene allows insect virus to enter cells
...k the evolutionary leap needed to become the nasty bugs they are today. In the study, reported in the July 1 issue of the Journal of Virology, BTI researchers Gary Blissard and Oliver Lung investigated whether a fruit fly gene, called an f gene, had originally moved from an insect to a virus or the......here especially to study the inner-workings of the bugs that cause malaria, African sleeping sickness, schistosomiasis, and leishmaniasis. Parasitology is a serious business at the MBL, and it should be. In 1999, the World Health Organization listed infectious and parasitic diseases as a leading cause of...Field Museum book profiles Illinois insects
...o interesting and special. Hundreds of different bugs are illustrated, from cicadas to bees and beetles ...es. Readers will learn about Illinois' most common bugs as well as its most endangered ones. They will take away a better appreciation of the insect world, ...Using computers and DNA to count bacteria
...is week's Science Magazine with a new way to count bugs in dirt. Bacteria, that is, in the highly complex world beneath our feet. "Computational Improvements Reveal Great Bacterial Diversity and High Metal Toxicity in Soil," by Jason Gans, Murray Wolinsky and John Dunbar, of Los Alamos' Bioscience Divisio...UF researchers kill resistant bugs one bandage at a time
... the American public, such as antibiotic-resistant bugs occurring in hospitals across the world," said Christopher Batich, Ph.D., a UF professor of biomedical engineering and one of the coating's inventors. "This has the potential to be used widely." The coating also does what it was created to do - aids ......." Dennehy added, "These soft toxins plus the good bugs acting together have driven pesticide use to historic low levels ... this is a wonderful success of integrated pest management." Since widespread adoption of Bt cotton in 1997, insecticide use on Arizona's cotton crops is down 60 percent, said Tabash...DNA size a crucial factor in genetic mutations, study finds
...ang are now exploring ''the funny finding that the bugs prefer DNA that's larger than natural DNA'' by making larger nucleotides. ''Size and shape are related issues, so we're interested now in keeping the size constant and changing the shape,'' Kool adds....'Creationism is not science' making the case for Darwin at UCL
...needed in the 1940s. The simple reason is that the bugs you are fighting have evolved." Commenting on whether this turn towards the Intelligent Design world view could hit the UK too, Professor Ruse (whose book The Evolution-Creation Struggle was published in June by Harvard University Press) said: "Well ...