Stronger Plants, Stronger Science, and Stronger Communication
Since I’m the resident entomologist on Biofortified, and because the main pests in almost all agricultural systems are insects it only makes sense for me to write something about pests and how they’re managed in agricultural situations. My role here on Biofortified is to write about the basic biology of pests, but I will be…
My post Details on the Dirty Dozen on EWG’s Shopper’s Guide to Pesticides™ led me to dive into the 2008 USDA data to see just how contaminated (or not) our produce really is. There’s so much information that it’s a little difficult to work with, but with perseverance and the right software (JMP is the best!*), I was…
In Polydnaviruses, Nature’s GMOs, I explained how polydnaviruses disabled host immune defenses through genetic modification. A post after that, I discussed how polydnaviruses use modified insect proteins to interfere with these systems. So if you’re a biologically-minded person, there’s one question you should be asking yourself. It’s a rather important question because it’s answer could…
Read More “Evolution of the Polydnavirus: How Wasps Began Using Viruses to Engineer Their Hosts” »
Written by Matt DiLeo I’ve been meaning to tell this story for some time. It’s a good example of how not all biotechnology is genetic engineering. Traditional Breeding In trad breeding, the breeder/gardener simply crosses two parents that show great (and complementary) traits, grows up the offspring, selects the best and repeats. It’s effective, slow,…
Bt, short for Bacillus thuringiensis, is a bacteria that produces a protein that kills certain types of insects. Different types of the gene that produces thais protein have been engineered into crops to make them resistant to those insects. The approach has been quite successful but the details can be confusing. If you’re looking for…
In the interests of making science-based information about biotechnology easily available to everyone, we’re working on a few resource pages that you can find in the header under “Resources”. One such page is a list of traits that have been developed with biotechnology. It’s incomplete at the moment, but I’d like to ask your help…
This image is an extreme closeup of a stomate (singular, the plural form is stomata). These two cells, called guard cells, control the plant’s respiration: how much carbon dioxide gets in and how much oxygen and water vapor gets out. The control isn’t very good, though. Most plants just have their stomata open all day…
…. or is it? In Proposed US law to mandate GMOs?, I posted the actual text of the The Global Food Security Act of 2009, S.384, introduced by Senators Richard Lugar (R-IN) and Robert Casey (D-PA), in response to authors of blog posts and petitions that didn’t quite seem to have read it before getting all…
Superman had the yellow sun of earth, spiderman had a radioactive spider-bite, but what about superweeds, where does their super power (surviving application of Round-up/glyphosate) come from?
To understand how superweeds survive, we first have to understand why normal weeds (the Jimmy Olsens and Lois Lanes of the plant world) die. <– last superhero reference of this post I promise.
