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 ...
A tip for today:
It helps if you imagine autocorrect as a tiny little elf in your phone who is trying so hard to be helpful but is in fact quite drunk.
Also, he doesn’t know Spanish.
Elves, being for the most part Irish, do not feel the need to learn any other language..
That’s not very sporting: people who speak Spanish are sometimes drunk, too.
I’m picturing a Spaniard and an Irish Elf who can only successfully communicate when they are both drunk.
I wonder if that is why my smortphome keyboard sometimes switches to the Spanish keyboard setting. Makes for some interesting texts.. ;-)
Hmm..
Maybe someone will write a story.. ;-)
Alcohol facilitates all sorts of social interactions.
O’Shaughnessy went into a local pub on the Upper East Side and asked for 3 pints of Guinness.
The next day he did the same.
And the next.
The bartender, also being an immigrant, struck up a conversation and eventually asked, “So, why do you come in here every day and order 3 pints?”
O’Shaughnessy said, “It’s for me tree brudders left back in the old country. When I left, we agreed that we’d share a pint every evening so we wouldn’t forget each other.”
“Ach, but that’s a fine tradition,” agreed the bartender.
And so it went.
But one day, O’Shaughnessy came in and only ordered two pints.
And again, the next day.
And the day after.
The bartender was a sensitive soul and didn’t want to create any pain for O’Shaughnessy but he was concerned. Finally he asked. “What’s wrong, O’Shaughnessy. For the past week or so ye’ve only been ordering two pints o’ the stout. I hope dere’s nuttin’ wrong with one o ye brudders.”
“Och, no.” O’Shaughnessy replied. “It’s nuttin’ like dat. It’s mine I haven’t been orderin’. Ye see, me doctor told me I had to give up drinkin’”
I don’t have a Huawei laptop. Or anything from them that I am aware of..
Just linked so you could read it.
Interesting that vendor plug ins can be subverted like that.
Bet there are others.
Sort of like Asimov’s Azazel?
He’s also a bit of a moody A-hole too, judging from what he does to my typing.
Communist conspiracy: China and Russia are working hard to steal America’s secrets, weaken her militarily and economically, and that explains why the vendor plug in are subverted. Don’t listen to anyone who says either country is benign. Both are building their military strength.
:sitting down and shutting up, now:
PS: Three words: New World Order. Soros’ pet project.
Scary thought: foreign actors discovered purposeful holes in vendor plugins and made their own version.
Companies that have had government contracts would be under suspicion.
If I had the ability, skill, and the tools I’d sandbox a machine and take some pokes at various drivers to see what happens.
Like: video driver.
Most video card makers have had a contract with the government at some point.
Lots if incentive for shenanigans there.
Well, that’s an encouraging thought.
Morning Floof says he wants food or he’ll get RAWR with everybody!!
Good morning. The shower has been had and next on the list is the morning steroid and making the bed, and not necessarily in that order.
At the moment, I don’t feel like getting the x-rays, but I don’t know how long the order is good for. And as for that sick whatever-it-was I had, that was CFIDS at its worst. Nothing else. No cold, no flu, just CFIDS.
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