Posted on 10/06/2018 2:02:35 PM PDT by BenLurkin
Pentagon research project called "Insect Allies." Funded by the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA), the project involves using gene-editing techniques like CRISPR to infect insects with modified viruses that could help make America's crops more resilient. If a cornfield were hit by an unexpected drought or suddenly exposed to a pathogen, for example, Insect Allies might deploy an army of aphids carrying a genetically modified virus to slow the corn plant's growth rate.
According to the DARPA website, these "targeted therapies" could take effect in a single growing season, potentially protecting the American crop system from food security threats like disease, flooding, frost and even "threats introduced by state or non-state actors.
… Insect Allies, is less concerned. "Anytime you're developing a new and revolutionary technology, there is that potential for [both offensive and defensive] capability," Bextine told The Washington Post. "But that is not what we are doing. We are delivering positive traits to plants… We want to make sure we ensure food security, because food security is national security in our eyes."
Insect Allies is still in the early stages of development, and at least four U.S. colleges (Boyce Thompson Institute, Penn State University, The Ohio State University and the University of Texas at Austin)have received funding to carry out research. Bextine told The Washington Post that the project recently achieved its first milestone — testing whether an aphid could infect a stalk of corn with a designer virus that caused fluorescence. According to the Washington Post, "the corn glowed."
(Excerpt) Read more at livescience.com ...
Why don’t you ask Chuck about what tv channel has the shows you like? If he doesn’t know, he can probably find out.
I think the problem is the very long hill I have to climb before the road descends into “town.” I’m still in the “gotta get up this hill!” mode by the time I see the speed limit sign and the flashing “your speed” followed by the strobe! I’ll get used to it, I’m sure!
The Dollar Tree is just at the crest of the hill, so I could always pretend I’m going to pull into the parking lot and shift into a lower gear.... My poor everything! The Dollar Tree doesn’t open until 0900. :o| And this Walmart will soon close between midnight and 0600, too. :o[
This morning, I just barely got the way cleared to move the bookcases and the recliner and rocker when Aaron and all his equipment came to the door. He was very polite and very personable, and he did a good job. His perplexity was cured when I asked if the surge protector was on... ;o]
Chuck is here on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays from 1100 to 1300, which explains why I had such a hard time getting in touch with him. But I’ll call and leave a message, because he wants to buy some of the storage tubs. I also need to get permission for TDS to drill through the bedroom wall in order to hook up the TV in the bedroom.
I need to get organized and get my file sorter in here so I can do all the things I did before I pulled out the stopper on Friday last week!
Tomorrow, I’ll get after that bathtub drain, and see how many boxes of books I can unpack. Yippy! The young man hooked up DVD player, so now, I can watch movies! YAY!
That makes a lot of sense. It’s too bad more things aren’t open 24/7. I don’t like waiting until 9!
I spent so many years in a 24-hour town that knowing stores are open “normal” hours is almost too much to assimilate!
How can people function when everyone is a “late bird?”
Ohwell. I’m off for the night. I’ll take my pills and get some yogurt and call it a day. I just turned on the mattress pad, so by the time I get situated, the bed will be warm.
See ya tomorry!
Aw now wait a minute!
Here I've been lurvin' recently on Tomorrow being the only day that doesn't end in "Y" and now you/ve gone and rurnt it!
Pound for pound, we humans seem pretty puny in terms of physical capability.
That is so. Our fur is pretty pathetic, too. But we have opposable thumbs.
Yes, thumbs are good.
Cats meow out of angst:
“Thumbs! If only we had thumbs!
We could break so much!”
.
My cat has thumbs, strong ones with sharp claws!
When I pick him up and hold him, he grabs my thumb and holds it like a gear shift lever, and he can make it hurt.
Good point ... but they can’t pick things up with their thumbs.
.
Depends on the shape and size.
Obviously his hand span is small, so the object has to be 3/4 inch or slightly smaller and preferably round.
He can climb oak trees like a squirrel
Ninja the Cat had thumbs but they weren’t functional. Didn’t matter—he broke things and spilled glasses of liquid very efficiently anyway. Priscilla the Dog didn’t have thumbs but she managed to detach one of the pedals on the exercycle. Never did figure out how she did it.
The climbing is a claw (plus modest mass) issue, not a thumb issue. I have excellent thumbs - I can embroider and do calligraphy; I can use a screwdriver - but I’m not much of a tree-climber.
Pets surprise us. I’m at a loss on the pedal, though. Could it have been your husband?
.
I mean the small branches that most cats would fall off of.
He can follow the squirrels out to where the branches hang down from his weight.
There are a few squirrels that the cats play with frequently. They sort of play tag and run.
No. He left for work before I did and came home after. We figured out it was Priscilla because she liked puzzles. The other three dogs couldn’t care less. I have a bad habit of hanging things on other things (drives husband nuts), and she’d follow me unhooking the stuff I hung up and dropping it on the floor. (E.g., I’d hang the extension cord on the situp board’s base so it’d be handy the next time I wanted to vacuum—with four big, furry black dogs, you vacuum every day.) She also enjoyed dropping her toys into the pool.
We get squirrels on our bird feeders, but our cats haven’t figured it out or won’t make the effort. However, a strange cat, “Bird-Snatcher Cat,” leapt up onto the seed catcher, grabbed a finch, and hustled off to eat it.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.
