Not only is there the potential for smallpox (or at the very least, something very similar) to resurge, but unbeknownst to most, the very origins of this revolutionary vaccine are in question. For decades, scientists have thought the legend of cowpox as the savior—first, of James Phipps, then, of the world—may very well be wrong. That cryptic crack in medical history could leave humanity vulnerable to a future outbreak—however unlikely it may be.
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[W]hen [physician Edward] Jenner’s “vaccine” (really just [cow] pus teeming with virus) hit the scene, it literally went viral. By 1813, it was widely accessible in Europe, Asia and the Americas.
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[However when researcher Allan] Downie compared the viral contents of a smallpox vaccine, still known to this day as a lineage called “vaccinia virus,” to a sample of cowpox isolated directly from cattle, he was surprised to find that they were different.
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The two samples were divergent enough that it seemed highly improbable that vaccinia, the current smallpox vaccine, was descended from cowpox. This left Downie and his colleagues with an unsettling question: What on earth had they been injecting into the arms of millions of people for the past 150 years?
Sleuthing through historical records led some scientists to speculate that another virus called horsepox, known to infect both horses and cows, may have been vaccinia virus’ ancestor.
In the next 30 years, virtually all net population growth will occur in urban regions of developing countries. At the same time, worldwide food production will become increasingly limited by the availability of land, water, and energy.
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Combined, these trends could have catastrophic economic and political consequences. A new path forward for urban food ecosystems needs to be found. But what is that path?
New technologies, coupled with new business models and supportive government policies, can create more resilient urban food ecosystems in the coming decades. These tech-enabled systems can sustainably link rural, peri-urban (areas just outside cities), and urban producers and consumers, increase overall food production….
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A technology-linked urban food ecosystem would create unprecedented opportunities …. with the creation of vertical farms and other controlled-environment agricultural systems as well as production of plant-based and 3D printed foods and cultured meat. Uberized facilitation of production and distribution of food will reduce bottlenecks and provide new business opportunities and jobs. Off-the-shelf precision agriculture technology will increasingly be the new norm, from smallholders to larger producers.
Wouldn’t that be great if we had an abundance of different types of food at our fingertips? Unfortunately …. The average person eats 1,400 pounds of food per year, so we can’t grow it all ourselves, but there are times though when it’s possible — and important — to buy local.
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Building relationships between farmers and consumers is important. You learn exactly who produced your food, how, and why and the service is often better. How were the animals raised? How were the crops grown? Why are things done the way they are and what makes that product so unique and tasty?
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What can be better than seeing how your food is grown? When, why, where, by who, and how? We sometimes take for granted all the amazing abundance our grocery stores have to offer, but when you see all the hard work that goes into making it, you may think twice about food waste and have a better appreciation for it all.
Study participants nearly always want their own results. But few get them.
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The ethical concern with giving an individual his or her results has been driven largely by a traditional doctor-centered model of health: results that can’t be tied directly to a medical recommendation or diagnosis are seen as not useful and might cause too much stress.
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Last month [August], an expert committee of the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine (NASEM) reviewed the pros and cons of sharing individual results with study participants and concluded that the old restrictions don’t make sense anymore. Research has become more collaborative, with study participants treated as partners rather than as “subjects,” and their ability to benefit from their own research results often extends beyond medical care.
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To support this shift in thinking, the NASEM committee recommended giving study participants the right to decide for themselves whether to receive their results.
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Critics of reporting back individual research results argue that it will cause extreme worry among participants, or that people might misunderstand their results and take actions that are unnecessary, or even counterproductive. Our research has shown just the opposite: sharing individual results with study participants improves science literacy and health literacy, and is an effective tool for translating research into better public health.
Genetically modified salmon firm AquaBounty has found “very enthusiastic” buyers in Canada, according to president and CEO Ronald Stotish.
The first sale of the Maynard, Massachusetts, U.S.A.-based firm’s AquAdvantage salmon was made last June, when unnamed buyers in Canada bought five metric tons at the going rate of traditional farmed Atlantic salmon, according to the company. Since then, AquaBounty has sold 10 additional metric tons of its AquAdvantage salmon to buyers in Canada
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Meanwhile, Stotish revealed that AquAdvantage will be sold in the U.S. through established distributors.
“Once [AquaBounty salmon] is established in the market, the option for branding as a ‘sustainably produced’ food item can be considered,” he told investors.
Since only three percent of Atlantic salmon is produced in the U.S., and 300,000 metric tons of the fish were imported in 2017, the total U.S. market opportunity is USD 3.1 billion (EUR 2.7 billion), Stotish said.
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In addition to the U.S. and Canada, AquaBounty is focusing on several international markets, he added. The supplier has submitted an application to run a field trial in China, and it is conducting a field trial to support its application for approval in Brazil.
A recent research review suggests that white noise, the soothing, fuzzy soundtrack so many of us rely on to sleep or block out distractions, could actually be dangerous. It argues that exposure to the random, unstructured sounds that make up white noise can alter the brain’s neural connections that help us perceive sound, leaving us at risk of conditions such as tinnitus and even dementia. But there’s reason to be skeptical of some of the authors’ claims.
The review, published [August 30] in JAMA Otolaryngology, mainly looks at the academic literature surrounding tinnitus.
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[The authors] argue that white noise’s lack of structure can worsen tinnitus symptoms. They even go so far as to claim that, much like tinnitus, white noise could possibly “accelerate the aging of the brain.”
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But while it’s true there’s growing evidence that chronic non-traumatic noise (around 80 decibels) can impair our hearing over time, even the authors admit there’s only mixed evidence these same noises can affect someone’s risk or progression of tinnitus.
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[T]here are plenty of sufferers who find no real benefit from using white noise to help mask their symptoms. But the authors’ claims that white noise will actively harm their lives seems way too speculative right now, as is the suggestion that white noise could put a person at a higher risk of dementia.
“Why are we so passionate about messenger RNA?” Moderna President Stephen Hoge asked the attentive audience. “It starts with the question of life,” he explained. “… In our language, mRNA is the software of life.”
Cells use mRNA to translate the static genes of DNA into dynamic proteins, involved in every bodily function, Hoge explained. Biotech companies make some of these proteins as drugs in large vats of genetically engineered cells. It’s a time-consuming and costly process.
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In theory, it could prompt proteins to be made in your body. It would put the drug factory inside you.
The idea Hoge was selling is straightforward, but its implementation is not. When mRNA is injected into the body, it triggers virus-detecting immune sensors. That event causes cells to shut down protein production, thus foiling the therapy. And even if the molecule makes it into the cell—another challenge that has long vexed drug delivery experts—the mRNA might not make enough protein to actually be useful.
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It’s all part of CEO Stéphane Bancel’s long-term vision to transform the drug industry the same way that the first biotech companies, like Amgen, Biogen, and Genentech, did when they began developing protein therapies called biologics in the eighties. Biologics are now the fastest-growing segment of the drug industry, and in theory, mRNA could replace them all.
Since the first genetically modified tomato hit the U.S. market in 1994, consumers have been suspicious of scientific tinkering with their food. Back then, genetically modified animals seemed particularly ominous, with images like fishy tomatoes …. But real life examples of genetically engineered animals aren’t so cartoonish. They include mosquitoes genetically engineered to prevent the spread of disease and fast-growing salmon.
…. In a survey from the Pew Research Center reported August 16, researchers asked 2,537 U.S. adults whether they rejected or supported five different examples of genetically engineered animals …. 70% of respondents favor the use of biotechnology for engineering mosquitoes to prevent the spread of disease …. On the other hand, 55% of U.S. adults reject using genetic engineering to boost the nutritional content of meat ….
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Could animal welfare-improving applications like the hornless cow persuade consumers to accept animal biotech? Perhaps. In a paper ….entitled Genetically Modifying Livestock for Improved Welfare: A Path Forward, researchers found that if the example used was the hornless cow, a majority of participants were willing to accept the use of the technology …. Adam Shriver, one of the authors of the paper, feels it’s a mistake to treat animal welfare as an “afterthought ” …. “ [I]f they see that [the] technology is being used to improve animal welfare, it seems…people feel a little bit more comfortable with it.”
On 25 July 2018, the Court of Justice of the European Union ruled that plants bred via recent mutagenesis techniques would fall under the suffocating 2001 GMO regulatory regime. The pre-designed hurdles this legislation intentionally imposes on researchers (data, time, money) will lower the likelihood of approving any seed breeding innovation in the EU to, well, zero.
This is a confused, scientifically illiterate decision in a European court that highlights failure on many levels:
A failure for science and science-based decision-making;
A failure of the European legal system to recognise how this case is part of a larger activist issue exploited by opportunistic zealots;
A failure for farmers and consumers who are becoming more dependent on technological advances to deliver healthy, safe, affordable food;
A failure for researchers in developing countries whose vital solutions to local problems will be stymied by regulatory copy-paste;
And most importantly, this is a failure of the European Commission’s incapacity to regulate, further demonstrating the total weakness of the Juncker Commission as it lurches pathetically to the end of its dreadful mandate.
As a starting point, we need to consider what mutagenesis is and what all the fuss is about.
What is mutagenesis?
Mutagenesis is the editing or transformation of genetic information through some form of mutation. This mutation can be done naturally and often quite randomly as genes evolve over millennia. Evolution can be accelerated by health researchers and plant biologists through various techniques like radiation or chemical interventions. These research techniques have been around for more than 70 years and have brought us enormous benefits in the field of seed development and agritech (as well as healthcare, home-care and industrial processes). One of the early success stories was when Italian researchers in the 1960s radiated durum wheat to help it resist fungal outbreaks – the high-quality Italian pasta known across the world today is thanks to this “genetic modification”.
The early technology was quite crude and hit-and-miss (defined as a type of “roll of the dice” often “zapping” rows of seeds to see what happens) but continues to benefit plant breeders in developing countries providing local solutions to local crop problems. While the activists and ideologues would want you to believe this is all being done by evil corporations (“Big Seed”), most innovations are coming out of research labs in developing countries. The new breeding techniques developed in the last decade (like CRISPR-Cas9) are more precise (isolating or targeting the genes needing to be edited rather than randomly zapping the whole lot).
A few points to keep in mind. What troubles many vulnerable people about GMOs is when a gene is taken from a foreign substance and inserted into a target organism (giving irresponsible fear-mongers the possibility to concoct all sorts of lucrative scare stories). Mutagenesis does not introduce any non-native DNA but merely edits or mutates the sequence, mimicking what often happens in nature. In many cases, the edited organisms are indistinguishable (except for its better performance, taste or resistance). And this is what drives the activists crazy: how can you blow the whistle on technology when you can’t tell the difference.
The Ruby Red grapefruit was developed through mutagenesis.
The ghost of glyphosate
I have argued that organic farmers could equally benefit from these new plant breeding techniques but the organic industry lobby, fearing a backlash from its radical left, chose to reject a beneficial technology that would greatly reduce the need for pesticides. Why?
Gu-gu-gu-glyphosate!
One of the developments of modern, targeted mutagenesis is that genes could be edited to resist herbicides, thus making it harder for organic farmers to compete with the more soil sustainable conservation agriculture approach. This case would not have been brought to the European Court of Justice if researchers had not cracked the herbicide-tolerance nut. I hazard to project that many seed breeding techniques would be accepted by organic seed researchers were it not for this glyphobic weed witchcraft!
The applicants were all French pro-organic farming lobby groups: Confédération paysanne, Réseau Semences Paysannes, Les Amis de la Terre France, Collectif vigilance OGM etPesticides 16, Vigilance OG2M, CSFV 49, OGM: dangers, Vigilance OGM 33, Fédération Nature et Progrès (who funds all of these groups of little militants???). The short press release by the European Court of Justice spent an inordinate amount of space dealing with the potential environmental-health risks of mutagenised herbicide-resistant seeds.
In the first paragraph of the press release, the European Court of Justice seems to think mutagenesis has only one main objective:
“Unlike transgenesis, mutagenesis is a set of techniques which make it possible to alter the genome of a living species without the insertion of foreign DNA. Mutagenesis techniques have made it possible to develop seed varieties which are resistant to selective herbicides.”
The case the organic lobby brought to the court about the new breeding techniques shows their obsession on herbicides (one that threatens to expose the activists intellectual and scientific ignorance). The third paragraph of the press release reveals the true context of the decision:
“Subsequently, technical progress has led to the emergence of in vitro mutagenesis techniques which make it possible to target the mutations in order to obtain an organism resistant to certain herbicides. Confédération paysanne and the other associations take the view that the use of herbicide-resistant seed varieties carries a risk of significant harm to the environment and to human and animal health, in the same way as GMOs obtained by transgenesis.”
The only reason this case was brought forward, the only reason all mutagenesis seed-breeding techniques have been effectively banned in Europe and in developing countries that export to Europe, is because a rag-tag band of French organic farming militants are afraid it will encourage the use of herbicides in Europe. How do you spell “Stupid”???
So the decision of the European Court of Justice was not about mutagenesis, but rather, about the potential to have herbicide-resistant seeds in Europe. It was also not about science or the benefits of the research.
Not a science-based decision
The Court of Justice of the European Union had received a lengthy technical advice in January, 2018 from the Advocate General that stated that mutagenesis techniques do not fall under the EU definition of GMO. The Court ignored the advice.
But in their politicised judgement, the court then got into a bit of a contradictory pickle. If they were to banish all mutagenesis technologies to the 2001 GMO regulatory wasteland, what would happen to the wonderful food-chain solutions mutagenesis have brought us over the last 70 years? Would we have to ban Italian pasta? Would we have to label all foods as GMO? Even the scientifically illiterate Court of Justice recognised that might be problematic.
So the Court offered a quick fix. Only the new technologies (with the targeted, precise methods of gene editing) would fall under the GMO regime (and be effectively banned). The older, random technologies … well, they were fine and could continue to be consumed by Europeans without the GMO curse. Why? Because they have a “long safety record”.
… OK, Einstein, define a “long safety record”.
The court, wisely, decided not to get pulled into a numbers game, but suggested that those innovations developed before the 2001 GMO regulation would be considered as “conventional” mutagenesis. Those developed after 2001, well, we just don’t have a long enough safety record, and so they get to play the precaution pinwheel. Adios scientific solutions!
In a supposedly evidence-driven European Union, this is not how a decision-process should be conducted.
The European Court of Justice is not a scientific body – it interprets existing laws even if the evidence supporting cases is ridiculous. They recently ruled in favour of anti-vaxxers, allowing them to sue pharmaceutical companies even if there is no evidence between a vaccine and a negative effect. The NGOs have spotted this sweet-spot, have lawyered up and are piling in on all sorts of cases to overturn EU evidence-based decisions, just yesterday appealing the EU re-authorisation of glyphosate.
This begs one obvious question.
Why the hell was a scientifically illiterate judicial body examining a case brought forward by activist groups with no respect for science, to reach a judgement that would handcuff European researchers for generations? Where was the European Commission?
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The responsible agents in the European Commission seem to have been hiding in their closet hoping everyone would just go away. They were unable to create a clear, evidence-base policy for the different breeding techniques. They were unable to find the courage to stand up to the loud-mouthed activist zealots and apply the recommendations of their scientific advisers. They were unable to provide leadership on defining new plant breeding techniques. Doing nothing was not a solution, it was a disgrace and Europe, this week, has just lost a large number of bright young research minds whose skills will be beneficial to consumers on other continents.
For years the European Commission dithered on even defining what these seed breeding techniques were, content to have meetings, pass papers and PowerPoints around and hope people would be OK to continue without clarity. This classic Belgian waffle strategy is the perfect subterfuge for the activists to then take whatever legislation the severely constipated Commission officials cannot pass (think also endocrine disruption) to a European Court that does not care to understand the underlying dynamics and consequences of their decisions.
The Juncker Commission’s only strategy has been expedience (make the problems go away) and it has led to a disparate patchwork of reactionary quick-fix legislations that will take the next leadership (assuming this time they have a vision) a full term to correct. Expedience is a policy tool for lazy cowards and nothing depicts this paralytic lack of leadership more than the present regime’s dependence on the precautionary principle as a way to avoid confrontation and not make hard, necessary decisions.
I pray for the day when Brussels can produce a leader who does not run and hide when three little [activists] in chintzy bee costumes show up on the Place Schuman. Such zealots are generally mean-spirited and capable of doing awful things (trust me, I get that), but Commission officials need to be strong and responsible (that’s why they get paid so much).
These small activist groups do not speak for Europe nor its people. For example, we hear (repeatedly) how 1.3 million Europeans (mostly Germans on the extreme left and far right) signed a petition saying they don’t want glyphosate. So what! Commission officials take these bands of activists seriously without realising that their little petition expresses the will of less than 0.3% of the European public. I have 12 million European farmers standing beside me begging for someone with the courage to stand up in the European Commission and defend the science on agritech and allow farmers the freedom to farm.
I guess until now, we have not yelled loud enough for those expedient, reactive cowards to listen up.
David Zaruk is the Risk-Monger. He has been an EU risk and science communications specialist since 2000. Follow him on Twitter @Zaruk
Could your medical treatment one day be tailored to your DNA? That’s the promise of “personalized medicine,” an individualized approach that has caught the imagination of doctors and researchers over the past few years. This concept is based on the idea that small genetic differences between one person and another can be used to design tailored treatments for conditions as diverse as cancer and schizophrenia.
In principle, “personalized” is not meant to mean one person but not another, though that may not turn out to be the case. Existing genetic and medical research data conspicuously underrepresent certain populations.
Case in point: Recently, researchers published a surprising study on youth suicide rates. Scientists long believed that white youth had the highest rates of suicide. But, examining data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, they found that suicide rates for African-American children under the age of 13 were twice as high as whites.
This finding turned long-held assumptions about racial imbalances in mental illness on its head. It could not be explained by economic circumstances, suggesting that there are other factors at play, perhaps even genetic factors. Suicide is a complicated personal act, but science has shown that genes play an important role.
This unexpected result may have implications for prevention and treatment based on genes – in other words, personalized medicine. But the state of current genetic research suggests that African-Americans will likely miss out on many of the potential future benefits of personalized medicine.
As lead author Jeffrey Bridge of the Nationwide Children’s Hospital in Ohio noted to the Washington Post, “Most of the previous research has largely concerned white suicide. So, we don’t even know if the same risk and protective factors apply to black youth.”
Few experts have studied the possible genetic causes for African-American suicide, focusing instead on environmental and social reasons.
While most mental illnesses such as depression are first diagnosed in adulthood, they actually have their origins early in development, as genes and the environment interact to shape the brain of a growing fetus. For example, my colleagues and I published a study in May showing that genes and pregnancy problems combine to increase the likelihood of schizophrenia.
This should cause some alarm, because African-American women have much higher rates of pregnancy complications. Black infants die at twice the rate of white infants. Again, this is not explained by socioeconomic reasons.
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In short, a higher rate of pregnancy problems likely puts African-Americans at increased risk of developing mental illnesses, perhaps explaining the noticeable increased rate of suicides. Additional genetic data on this population could potentially illuminate the issue.
To better understand genes that increase the risk for mental illness, researchers study the brains of people who have died. They examine how genetic differences could have led to changes in the brains of people who developed these conditions. This is one of the best ways to understand any brain disorder at a biological level.
But African-Americans are underrepresented in large-scale genetic and neuroscience studies. One 2009 analysis revealed that 96 percent of participants in large genetic studies were of European descent. When researchers looked at the matter a couple of years ago, they found that the proportion of people with African ancestry in these studies had increased by only 2.5 percent. Similarly, studies of African-American brains are almost nonexistent.
Why the low participation rate? One reason is that researchers favor populations that are genetically more homogeneous to ensure a study’s accuracy. Individuals of European ancestry are more alike genetically than are African-Americans.
Some experts have posited that African-Americans are less likely to participate in genetic studies due to a lack of trust with the medical community.
At the Lieber Institute for Brain Development, where I work, people can donate the brains of family members who wished to contribute to scientific research. We have the largest collection of African-American brains donated to study mental illness, though it’s relatively small in comparison to the availability of Caucasian brains. In our experience, the donation rate for African-American families is comparable to that of white families, suggesting that lack of trust may not be as widespread as believed.
Without studies focused on the African-American brain, scientists will struggle to fully understand how any possible unique genetic risk in the African-American population translates into prevention and treatment for virtually all disorders that involve the brain, including suicide.
Researchers have to invest in correcting this shortcoming before the personalized medicine train is so far out of the station that the African-American community cannot get on it.
Daniel Weinberger is the Director of the Lieber Institute for Brain Development and Maltz Research Laboratories. Dr. Weinberger is regarded worldwide as a preeminent scientist in schizophrenia research. Follow him on Twitter @Dr_Weinberger
The hunt for a cure for the common cold began in the 1950s, shortly after scientists discovered the primary group of pathogens—known as rhinoviruses—behind the sniffles. Together it accounts for up to 75 percent of colds in adults. But scientists quickly ran into an issue that still stymies researchers today, says [immunologist] Peter Barlow.
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There’s at least 160 different strains, or serotypes, of rhinovirus, Barlow says. That means cracking the cold isn’t so much looking for one solution to one problem as it is trying to design a master key to open hundreds of different locks at once.
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One way, which a group at Imperial College London is currently investigating, is to discover some part of the viral structure that’s shared between all 160 serotypes. If they can successfully target an immune response against that common structure, then they could design a single vaccine that would offer protection against every strain of rhinovirus.
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The common cold might be a nuisance that causes most people to lay up for a few days, but it can seriously exacerbate chronic respiratory conditions such as Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease (COPD) or cystic fibrosis. “If someone is in the hospital already and has an exacerbation of an existing disease [from rhinovirus], the medication can be delivered quickly,” he notes. In this case, such a cure could save lives.
Globally, forest trees are increasingly at risk from habitat destruction …. But the guidelines for effective preservation of a tree species’ genetic diversity and adaptive potential have been limited [since] the 1970s ….
[Researchers] from The Morton Arboretum and The Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew have developed a new …. approach …. that …. can be tailored for successful conservation of any species.
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For the study, published this month in the journal Biological Conservation …. [scientists] evaluated current collecting efforts for European ash from [the] UK National Tree Seed Project (UKNTSP) …. which aims to secure genetically diverse collections of UK native trees and shrubs.
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[Researchers] developed a model of a detailed genetic survey specific to ash trees, considering the amount and distribution of the species’ diversity. Greater seed sampling from trees in certain areas (such as margins versus centers of ranges) can prove beneficial.
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The researchers identified when an ash population had optimal seed sampling …. the amount of trees per population, and the quantity of seeds collected from each tree ….
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“This is a breakthrough for the future of tree conservation, as we can now better target our seed collecting efforts, which will help us save more tree species,” said Sean Hoban, Tree Conservation Biologist at The Morton Arboretum.
Chinese athletes aiming to represent their country in the 2022 Winter Olympics will undergo genetic testing as part of the official selection process, a document posted by the country’s Ministry of Science and Technology has revealed.
“Complete genome sequencing will be applied on outstanding athletes competing in the winter games for speed, endurance and explosive force, with at least 300 athletes in each group,” the document said.
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As is the case throughout the world, Chinese Olympic athletes are traditionally selected through a series of trials and competitions. Although it does not appear that these athletic performance tests will be canceled, genetic test results will also be looked at.
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Some Chinese researchers raised concerns and came out against the plan.
“Every person is born with the right to participate in sports,” Wang Huan, a researcher with the China Institute of Sport Science in Beijing, told the daily. “Each individual has their advantages and disadvantages. The spirit of sport is to overcome weakness and fight for the best … People should not be judged by the way they were born, but what they strive to become.”
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Nir Eynon, who researches genetics and athletic performance at Australia’s Victoria University, told Gizmodo earlier this year that scientists were still unsure of how to determine the way someone’s genetics specifically impacted their athletic abilities.
Fall armyworm (Spodoptera frugiperda), an invasive insect which had severely affected maize crops in Africa has now spread to fields in [India]. The Indian Council of Agricultural Research-National Bureau of Agricultural Insect Resources (ICAR-NBAIR) members found fall armyworm in maize crop during the second week of July in [the] Thanjavur district of Karnataka.
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The officials have suggested [the] introduction of bio-pesticides such as beauveria bassiana, bacillus thuringiensis (Bt) and metarhizium anisopliae to stop these pets from spreading. They also advised integrated pest management methods like summer ploughing, split application of nitrogenous fertilizer, synchronized early sowing and destruction of egg larvae in fields.
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An …. Agriculture department [official] said “The pest was found in a maize meadow in Nainankulam in Pattukkottai taluk in a 20-day-old crop”. The pest eats away the chlorophyll of the plants turning the leaves white, said the official.
A series of bizarre events and biological errors over evolutionary history were responsible for the intoxicating medicines found inside the humble poppy, new research published in Science reveals.
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[A] team of researchers from China, Britain and Australia have unveiled the complete poppy genome, while also delving into it to understand the origin of opiates. And therein lies a tale.
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The evolutionary tale behind morphinans, involves deletion, fusion and duplication. In fact, the poppy genome has duplicated itself entirely, not once, but twice. At least.
Lead author Li Guo, from the Xi’an Jiaotong University in China, and colleagues argue that the noscapine branch component of the BIA gene cluster came into being after an ancient “whole genome duplication” (WGD) that occurred some 110 million years ago, before the poppy family split from the order of Ranunculales, a larger group that contains flowers such as buttercups and columbines.
The genes responsible for the morphinan branch compounds, however, came about through a more recent WGD event that took place only 7.8 million years ago.
More important than these, however, is STORR itself – a fusing of two separate genes to form a single novel one.
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These evolutionary contingencies not only provide an understanding of the lineage of the poppy, but also provide a window into the chemistry of opiates.
Like most United Kingdom citizens, English farmer Andrew Osmond lives with a certain sense of uncertainty brought on by Brexit.
The decision of UK voters to withdraw from the European Union …. may provide an unexpected opportunity. While the UK has no formal ban on cultivating genetically modified organisms (GMOs), its place in the [EU] has meant that UK farmers have had to accept Europe’s stridently anti-GMO position if they wanted to sell to their nearest neighbors.
With Brexit, farmers like Osmond may be able to employ the types of GM seeds that their American counterparts have been using successfully for years.
“One of the things we’ve missed out on in the UK is the whole GMO revolution,” Osmond recently told the Alliance for Science “…. but Brexit gives us an opportunity to move away from the precautionary principle …. and toward a more evidence-based science.”
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“CRISPR/Cas9 is coming and there’s a gold rush in labs around the world to enhance this technology. I think that as long as it’s explained carefully to farmers, they will be open to gene editing because it is a continuation of the plant breeding that we’ve been using for hundreds of years,” Osmond said.
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Osmond blames resistance to GMOs and gene editing in part on what he calls “a food paranoia” that is a result of Western wealth and privilege.
We are all familiar with emotions such as fear, joy, envy, anger, and excitement. To some extent these emotions are automatic: The brain systems that carry them out operate without our being aware of them. At the same time, we experience feelings of which we are fully aware, so that we are capable of describing ourselves as scared or angry or grumpy, surprised or happy. The study of emotions and moods helps reveal the porous boundaries between unconscious and conscious mental processes, documenting the ways in which these seemingly distinct kinds of cognition are constantly interacting.
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Many structures in the brain are involved in emotion, but four of them are particularly important: the hypothalamus, which is the executor of emotion; the amygdala, which orchestrates emotion; the striatum, which comes into play when we form habits, including addictions; and the prefrontal cortex, which evaluates whether a particular emotional response is appropriate to the situation at hand. The prefrontal cortex interacts with, and in part controls, the amygdala and striatum.
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When we laugh or cry—when we experience any emotion—it is because these brain structures are responding to the amygdala and acting on its instructions.
Kenya relies on only 10% of her landmass for food while 89% of the country’s landmass, home to 36% of the country’s population, is arid and semi-arid land (ASAL) and over 3 million people are severely food-insecure. The country’s food is produced by millions of smallholder farmers …. practicing rain-fed agriculture with inefficient traditional farming methods. The result is record shortfalls in food supply due to poor harvests.
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Transforming agriculture …. is not rocket science. Development partners like Africa Harvest, a non-profit organization specializing in the development and deployment of improved agricultural technologies in Africa to increase productivity, have expertise and experience that can be called upon. Banana production in Kenya, hit a high of 1 million MT of fruit a year in 1987 and then declined to a low of 500,000 MT in 1995 due to pests and diseases.
In response to this challenge, Africa Harvest pioneered tissue culture (TC) banana technology …. This technology and investment in good agronomic training enhanced access to superior banana varieties with enhanced pest and disease resistance and increased yields; from an average of 14 to 32 tons per Hectare.
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With food security as a key pillar in the Big Four Agenda for sustainable development …. Investment in the agriculture sector and the participation of all stakeholders, for enhanced results and sustainability are thus key.
Read full, original article: Achieving Food Security is not Rocket Science
AI systems’ tendency to forget the things it previously learned upon taking on new information is called catastrophic forgetting.
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For years, scientists have been trying to figure out how to work around the problem. If they succeed, AI systems would be able to learn from a new set of training data without overwriting most of what they already knew in the process.
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But Irina Higgins, a senior research scientist at Google DeepMind, used her presentation during the conference to announce that her team had begun to crack the code. She had developed an AI agent — sort of like a video game character controlled by an AI algorithm — that could think more creatively than a typical algorithm. It could “imagine” what the things it encountered in one virtual environment might look like elsewhere.
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In short, the algorithm is able to note differences between what it encounters and what it has seen in the past. Like most people but unlike most other algorithms, the new system Higgins built for Google can understand that it hasn’t come across a brand new object just because it’s seeing something from a new angle.
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[I]t marks an important first step towards AI algorithms that can continuously update as they go, learning new things about the world without losing what they already had.
