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 ...
Point. At least they didn’t bring their cookbook.
Ha-HAH! I knew it! LOL!
That could be true. But Aliens were here a very long time ago...
I want this one.
;>)
The Morning Floof has returned! And that means that T-c is back as well!
Good morning and welcome home! I hope you had a restful visit. It’s good to have you back, though. :o])
I’m back. I had a nice trip. We’re leaving for Columbia, SC, on a Cub Scouts trip about noon. I hope to have all our stuff loaded by ten, so I can sleep a couple of hours. We got up at 1:30 a.m. so I could get on the Orlando-Charlotte “originator” at 5:00 a.m.
Ohmygoodness! So good to see you here! Thank you for kitteh. Is everything OK? I thought you would be absent until tomorrow or Monday.
Safe journey with the Cubs!
I just unhooked the lame TDS equipment and boxed it up and will now attempt to get the Roku up and running. At least I feel well enough to attempt it! This has been a horrible week for me, but I believe things are improving.
Take care of you, and again, I’m glad you’re home!
I was home for a few hours, and now I’m in Columbia, SC. I’ll be home tomorrow afternoon again.
Good morning from Columbia. A cat just looked in the window where I’m lurking behind a 30-foot statue of a 10-year-old boy. You can climb through his organs! The cat ran away when I waved to it.
Wow. Bye, cat! Thirty-foot organs? Oh. Misread that. I need to go shower.
I’ll be back!
I’m home at last, with nowhere else to go except picking James and Vlad up at church at 5:30 p.m. Everything has gone very well the last two days, but I’m exhausted. Hopefully some coffee will keep me going until at least 6:00.
Yes, coffee. I highly recommend it - it's the only drug I do anymore..
6:15 and I’m still vertical. Kathleen crashed around 4:00 p.m., but she’d been to a Mexican girl’s birthday party, so she didn’t need supper. She’ll be fine in the morning.
What a sweet Morning Floof! The Muppet Birds agree. ;o]
Good morning. It’s good to see a morning kitteh again. And good to see your posts!
I think I’m almost over this whatever I’ve been fighting and will have one more cup of the teas before I head out for the laundry room.
Last night I only coughed a couple of times, so the exhaustion of spending previous nights coughing and making teas allowed me to sleep for five hours the first time and four the second, so I feel much better this morning.
I’m glad you’re feeling better! I was going to ask. Best wishes with the laundry. I distributed a load when I turned on the lights and told the young parties to Rise and Shine, which none of them has done yet.
The laundry is done for the most part and I’m getting frustrated with SlingTV because when I click on a program, I get taken back to my account page. They don’t open for another two hours.
UNNGH!
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