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 ...
I have several boxes of baking soda on hand and just put a new one in the fridge. I keep forgetting to put one in the fridge’s freezer, but I’ma do it. Its cheap enough that I can buy quite a few boxes at a time. I should have washed the fridge out with the stuff before I put anything in it, but I wanted to save as much food as I could, and it had all been in coolers and insulated carriers since 0700 that morning. It was 1700 before we finally got here and I got that stuff out of the BB SUV in into the apartment. I didn’t have to toss anything and that was a big help.
On one of these cold days, you could put your perishables out on the doorstep for a little while and give your fridge a cleaning.
I’ve been going through those 13-gallon trash bags like water through a sieve since I moved here and I can’t figure it out.
And of course, the more the place looks like home, the more stuff I have to donate. Maybe that’s where the bags are going! LOL!
Now I have to make the bed. BRB.
Well, there’s a thought! Thanks! If I get today’s projects underway/finished, I’ll think about doing that tomorrow morning, but I’ll have to put them out the back door in containers so the stray critters don’t mess with them.
When I went to get into the truck yesterday, the doors were stuck and the windows needed a little encouragement to be rolled down, and all because of the rain on Sunday and Monday, followed by below-freezing weather. This is such a “new” experience for me. I think the last time I experienced winter was in Missouri.
Thank you and g’orning, y’all!
Morning, all!
I think today is “closet purge” day. I’ve put it off long enough...
Grand to see you here, Mr. moose!
Does Mrs. ArGee have any leg warmers you can borrow? I’ve heard that silk long underwear keeps people warm.
Must check out Mayo Clinic website.
I can’t purge my closets until I can unpack the summer clothes that have been in storage tubs since October. I plan on putting the clothes in Space Bags, and stacking them on the closet shelf.
I need to do the same to the assorted throws and lap robes I have, too. Moving is so much fun!
Will I ever get “moved in?”
Hey! We can work together! What fun! ;o]
Good morning.
There is a bluff/mesa to the east of us that effectively blocks the sun until about 0900, so it seems as if the dawn twilight lasts forever. So most mornings, I say the greeting hoping it truly is morning, and that the sun will show itself, eventually!
Are you doing the piriform stretches?
Sounds like that gives you the opportunity to grab a few more zzz’s.
If only! I’m usually up by 0200 and at the latest 0330. It seems to be the best sleep schedule and when I get up that early, I usually get an awful lot of stuff done.
Getting up later seems to dull my brain. If that makes any sense!
My problem is I just can’t let go of things. I might wear it... someday... and just to prove the point I deliberately wear it the next day to justify my decision to keep it.
I think once I retire it will be easier. I still need grownup clothes for when I have to fly back to DC and mingle with my coworkers. Once I’m retired I can box most of it up and give it to a women’s’ shelter.
No, I’m mostly just doing dishes and laundry and driving people around, only with pain. I suppose I could try stretching!
Back from the gas station and Walmart. It’s raining today, but not cold, which made the trip out at 6:45 less miserable.
The remaining children keep asking me what they’re going to do today, as if they hadn’t been told 800 times that, “Math!” is always the default answer.
Ah, yes. Kindred spirits.
Have you been in touch with Libre ou Mort since your move? I believe she’s still in the Valley of the Sun.
I’ve been updating my journal, but I need to get busy and get that first piece of bathroom furniture put together so I can get it up and put it into use.
But first, I treated me to a cuppa. I realized this morning that I no longer want a sweet, flavored creamer so I’m going to go back to canned milk, if I can find the small cans, and half-and-half if I can’t. I wonder why it took me so long to figure that out? I used to drink it black.
Walmart sells 8 oz. cans of condensed milk, sweetened and un-.
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