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Blocking innovation: How Canada’s novel plant-breeding rules hinder progress in food production
You’ve heard it before on SAIFood: Canada’s plant breeding sector is facing regulatory barriers to innovation. Today’s blog provides further ...
Sharon Peacock: COVID-19 Variant Hunter
The UK is a world leader in sequencing SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes COVID-19. Of all the coronavirus genomes that ...
Debating the possible origins of COVID-19: A lab-escaped bioweapon? Animal poop? Random mutations of an existing virus?
“Virus outbreak: research says COVID-19 likely synthetic,” shouted the headline in the Taipei Times on February 23, 2020. The idea ...
Organic farming has a sustainability problem — and now the EU is in a dilemma of their own making
European Union (EU) agricultural scientists are in a bit of a pickle. I’m not sure to what extent it is ...
Sierra Club endorsement of disease-resistant chestnut tree divides the anti-GMO movement
Across the eastern seaboard, the majestic American Chestnut tree once dominated forests. A main source of timber for cabins, shipbuilding, and ...
Podcast: NatGeo promotes pesticide fears; How weed affects your brain; Real-life Jurassic Park?
Despite its long history as a reputable science magazine, National Geographic has recently embraced simplistic narratives about the environmental impact ...
Viewpoint: ‘The Dirty 8’ — Which are the most notorious advocacy groups spreading disinformation about food, farming, biotechnology and agricultural sustainability
When it comes to food safety, there's no shortage of well-funded advocacy groups stirring up public concern. Under the guise ...
The evolutionary history of human tolerance
Environmental pressures may have led humans to become more tolerant and friendly towards each other as the need to share ...
Natural GMOs: Plants and animals ‘steal genes’ from other species during process of evolution, mimicking transgenics
Little did biologist Gregor Mendel know that his experiments with sweet peas in a monastery garden in Brno, Czech Republic, would ...
Viewpoint: 6 debunked anti-GMO talking points activists should abandon for good
The public still accepts some blatant untruths about biotechnology, food safety, and sustainability ...
Artificial intelligence is teaching robots to evolve autonomously so they can pioneer exploration on distant planets
It’s been suggested that an advance party of robots will be needed if humans are ever to settle on other ...
Book review: Jennifer Thompson’s ‘GM Crops and the Global Divide’ addresses Europe’s neo-colonialist attempt to intimidate Africa into rejecting crop biotechnology
Jennifer Thomson’s excellent new book, “GM Crops and the Global Divide” (CSIRO Publishing, 2020), is a highly informed, lucid, and ...
Rural, Republican America deeply skeptical about the reality of COVID and the importance of vaccines. Here’s why
At 70, Linda Findley has long been active in her small town of Fort Scott, Kansas, which sits more than ...
Podcast: Media’s COVID hypocrisy; Mandatory vaccines; Biodegradable plastic from GM plants
The mainstream press has viciously criticized COVID conspiracy theorists and vaccine rejection. Yet when it comes to other critical science ...
Viewpoint — ‘Selective skepticism’ and media hypocrisy: Why are liberal news sites vigilant in challenging COVID misinformation but give anti-biotechnology and chemical scare-mongers a free pass?
In recent months, the mainstream press has been on a crusade against COVID vaccine skepticism, tenaciously promoting science-based medicine and ...
Would you agree to be infected with COVID for science? Intentional ‘challenge’ studies underway as researchers explore new vaccines and treatments
Lauren Thomas, who just turned 26, is trying to get into a clinical trial at the University of Oxford, where ...
Podcast: Should farmers embrace ‘natural’ organic chemicals to replace ‘synthetic’ inputs? Moving beyond the outdated debate
As the benefits of biotechnology come to fruition, people are letting go of the dated view that we should be ...
Viewpoint: FDA’s ‘pause’ on distribution of the J&J vaccine was overly risk-averse
Citing “an abundance of caution,” the FDA on [April 13] recommended a “pause” in the administration of Johnson & Johnson’s ...
Battling AIDS has provided valuable lessons for managing the pandemic
World AIDS Day this year finds us still deep amid another pandemic – COVID-19. The highly infectious novel coronavirus has ...
Our food has never been safer, so why are we so scared of it?
Why you shouldn't trust your brain ...
How do you spot a liar? (Hint: Non-verbal cues don’t matter much)
Police thought that 17-year-old Marty Tankleff seemed too calm after finding his mother stabbed to death and his father mortally bludgeoned ...
How the Biden Administration can accelerate prosperity by fixing agricultural-biotech regulations
The Biden administration has a rare opportunity to accelerate agricultural innovation and spur broad and lasting economic growth by taking ...
Viewpoint: ‘War against the West’: Russia powers global vaccine rejectionist movement even as it inoculates its own citizens
Anyone active on social media is aware that there is a great deal of passionate but ill-founded opposition to vaccination, ...
Podcast: Nature makes ‘GMO’ fish; Biology and gender; Curing sickle cell with CRISPR
Anti-GMO groups have long warned about the dangers of AquaBounty's genetically engineered salmon. But as it turns out, transgenic fish ...
Message to social media ‘prophets of doom’ Drs. Whistle Blower, Anti-Vaxx and Dangerfield: No, COVID vaccines aren’t dangerous and are incredibly effective
It’s hard to ignore the wave of anti-vaccine videos circulating on social media. Curiosity makes us click, and we watch ...
Playing victim: People who claim grievances more likely to lie and cheat, but victim status comes with evolutionary benefits
Victimhood is defined in negative terms: “the condition of having been hurt, damaged, or made to suffer.” Yet humans have ...
Podcast: If you get a COVID vaccine, you’re pro-GMO; 5G conspiracies; Lab-grown humans?
All the approved COVID-19 vaccines were developed with the help of genetic engineering. If we rely this technology to end ...
