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 ...
In other news, Mr. Sg fractured three ribs. No pneumothorax, thanks to God.
Pneumothorax used to be a death sentence. If you watch MASH, or some other medical shows where a device is used to pump air into the lungs, that was the invention that startted saving lives in the event of pneumothorax.
Basically, it means there's a path for air getting into the lung cavity without going down the throat. A puncture on the side of the chest will do that, whether it comes from the inside or the outside.
Suggest you go a little easier on him next time he leaves his towel in a heap on the floor. ;)
Prayers for his quick recovery!
Darn! I hope he makes a quick and full recovery!
Ouch.
He has my sympathy on that.
Sleeping gets interesting, really quickly.
Looks like it will be another hour before they get here, and it will be 2100 before we get to Mesa/Gilbert. Unngh.
I hate waiting on other people. This means I’ll have to wait a couple more hours before I take my evening pills. *sigh*
Why are you going to Melissa Gilbert.
Oh, Doy, I see.
The niece who is going to put up most of the peeps I’m traveling with lives in Gilbert.
I want to stop in Mesa, for the duration, but the first night I think I should stay in Gilbert.
That is, if the peeps that are driving ever get here. And now, the main road out here has been blocked off for some “re-tarring.” Of all days and times. :o[
Well..
The beast lives.
Revisiting the saga of the dead machine. I opted for the ‘while you’re in there update it’ approach. So a new mother board, processor, and solid state drive are now operational.
I also reluctantly took the step to Win10, not so much because I like it (I find it usable but extremely annoying) but because in another 8 months I won’t have much of a choice when M$ kills off Win7.
Now I’m engaged in the task of getting stuff back where it belongs and deciding whether to update some of the main programs or keep the versions I have (which of course were obsolete the day I installed them as is everything in the computing realm.)
I also still need to ‘recover’ the remainder of my files - they’re not lost, just on the wrong hard drive now. Once I get everything off the old hard drive I’ll wipe it and keep it in the machine as storage. That will allow me to replace the ‘small’ drive that WinDoze is using for its system restore/backup storage (it’s full) and repurpose it into the Linux box. ;-)
Also need to retrieve (from the safe place that I will remember where they are - but probably won’t) the install disks for things like WordPerfect, Adobe Acrobat, MS Orifice, and PaintShop Pro. Don’t need then so much for the install - most of the stuff is downloadable - as for that minor item called ‘key code’ on the DVD package which allows me to prove I am a legitimate ‘owner’ and bypass the ‘trial’ period.
Thus, until I have everything crammed into the right location in the box, it will reside lying on its side on my project table.
And we are having a thunderous storm. It appears to have a wind component accompanying it as there are raindrops on both the nominal north and nominal south windows. A wet cat wants to bless my lap.
I refused him access and told him to go talk to his mother (AKA Beautiful Daughter) because she knows how to apply The Towel..
Good luck. And more good luck. I hate waiting, too.
We’ve had a storm, too. I kept hearing rumbling, but it was clear blue skies out the front (south) windows, so I thought it was the Upnorth People banging around with their trash bin. Then I went to the back of the house and saw everything completely black to the north.
It didn’t rain much.
It rained enough to be ugly.
Then it went further east and left us with sunshine. The cats still don’t want to go back out though.
And the temperature dropped 15 degrees.
It’s warm here. The air conditioner came on, and I don’t know how to shut it off. It’s computerized.
Word Perfect? Srsly?
Dude, I even got my father-in-law off that dinosaur and onto Open Office.
But, good luck finding the little frisbees.
And ... it’s Wednesday.
Happy Hump Day, all.
Speaking of retro.
https://www.etsy.com/listing/678950516/retro-floppy-notebook?ref=hp_rv
My daughter is checking to see if there’s a market. The one on my desk gets a lot of attention, but I don’t know if she’s had any buyers.
Happy Wednesday. ‘Face says Hey from Arizona, where her relatives aren’t up yet.
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.