Biosentients - Science Biology… etc

New research announced recently, Wednesday 30th September, by a team of leading researchers working with the UK’s national Synchrotron, Diamond Light Source, could have a significant impact on the development and refinement of new eco-friendly pest control methods for worldwide agriculture. Reported in the Journal of Molecular Biology, the study was carried out by Dr Jing-Jiang Zhou and his colleagues at the world’s oldest agricultural research centre and the largest UK facility, Rothamsted Research, in collaboration with Professor Nick Keep’s group from the Institute of Structural and Molecular Biology at Birkbeck, University of London……..

A newly released study of microscopic marine microbes, called phytoplankton, by scientists at Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution (WHOI) and the University of South Carolina has solved a ten-year-old mystery about the source of an essential nutrient in the ocean. Roughly a decade ago researchers discovered a rare form of organic phosphorus in marine organic matter. Not only were the scientists surprised to find this form of phosphorus, called phosphonate, but the concentrations in which it was found were very high, throughout the ocean. Researchers hypothesized that phosphonate is produced and consumed in the ocean, but no one understood where it came from and why it was so abundant……..

Natural systems are the focus of two intriguing and imperative research areas: creating revolutionary capabilities for sensing and response; and obtaining hydrocarbons from plants and microorganisms. The National Science Foundation (NSF) has announced 20 grants in these areas for FY 2009, awarding a total of $39,991,202 over four years to 94 researchers from 27 institutions through the NSF Office of Emerging Frontiers in Research and Innovation (EFRI)……..

Australian scientists have discovered a huge number of new species of invertebrate animals living in underground water, caves and “micro-caverns” amid the harsh conditions of the Australian outback. A national team of 18 scientists has discovered 850 new species of invertebrates, which include various insects, small crustaceans, spiders, worms and a number of others……..

We had a squirrel incident in the back yard in suburbia this last week. Somehow, three baby squirrels had fallen from their nest high in the cypress tree on a cold and rainy night. The mother was whistling for them, but the little things must have been too dazed to move. Queequeg found them for us, and before he could do what dogs do, Libby put him in the house then retrieved the half-drowned squirrel pups and put them on a soft towel in a box in our garage. She didn’t think they would live, but by morning, they were, quite literally, bright-eyed and bushy-tailed. When she let them out ………

Normally, I don’t have much luck photographing spiders, but at this time of the year, when cooler temps are moving in, I have gotten a few nice shots, especially of wolf spiders, the terrible hunters of the forest ………

A new WWF report celebrates the recent discovery of 163 new species in the Greater Mekong region of South-east Asia - including a bird-eating fanged frog, a leopard-patterned gecko and a bird that would rather walk than fly - but we also warn they could soon face extinction because of climate change……..

Since the human response to infection is highly complex, research to understand how people fight infection is facilitated by studying how similar processes occur in simpler organisms. Zebrafish are becoming an important model for human disease, since they are easily handled, maintained and manipulated and a number of fundamental processes between zebrafish and humans are conserved. In addition, the small zebrafish embryo is highly amenable to drug screening assays. The functional similarity between the initial responses of zebrafish embryo and humans to infection suggests that the zebrafish embryo appears to be a valuable model for understanding early immune responses and identifying potential therapeutics for infection or immune mediated disease. However, the initial response of zebrafish to infection and how it compares to the human response is not well understood……..

Sometimes to see something properly, you have to stand farther back. This is true of Chuck Close portraits where a patchwork of a number of small faces changes into one giant face as you back away. It may also be true of the frogs of Central America, where the pattern of extinctions emerges clearly only at a certain spatial scale……..