Oilseed rape: the modified plants have scorpion and moth genesChinese scientists have inserted scorpion and moth genes into oilseed rape (canola) plants to make them poisonous to insects feeding on them.

The researchers say that using two foreign genes at the same time means insect pests will be less likely to develop resistance to the genetically modified (GM) plants. The findings were published online in Plant Cell Report on 19 July.

Insects that can withstand the powerful pesticide DDT that was banned in the 1970s have an additional genetic advantage over their rivals that has helped them spread across the globe ever since, according to research published in Current Biology tomorrow (9 August 2005).

This discovery overturns current theories that resistance to pesticides burdens insects with a genetic disadvantage that would stop them from competing with non-resistant insects once farmers stop using that pesticide.

Nearly 20 years ago Reactor number 4 at Chernobyl exploded, sending radiation across a large region of what is now the Ukraine, Belarus, and Russia. Some 40 radionucleotides were released into the environment, including Strontium 90 (90Sr) and Cesium 137 (137Cs). Yet despite radiation levels dangerous to humans, most natural areas in the region have rebounded, and by ecological standards, are functioning normally. The session, organized by James Morris and Timothy Mousseau (University of South Carolina, US) will reveal how the environment has responded -- from genetic mutation rates, to plant and animal communities, to nutrient cycling.

The National Human Genome Research Institute (NHGRI), part of the National Institutes of Health (NIH), today announced it has awarded grants totaling more than $32 million to advance the development of innovative sequencing technologies intended to reduce the cost of DNA sequencing and expand the use of genomics in biomedical research and health care.

Record oil prices and incentives to find alternative fuel sources are lighting a fire under research to turn biomass materials such as manure into energy.

Routinely discarded as medical waste, placental tissue could feasibly provide an abundant source of cells with the same potential to treat diseases and regenerate tissues as their more controversial counterparts, embryonic stem cells, suggests a University of Pittsburgh study to be published in the journal Stem Cells and available now as an early online publication in Stem Cells Express.

Using a powerful microscope and computer software, a team of scientists from Johns Hopkins, the University of Arkansas, Worcester Polytechnic Institute and elsewhere has developed a faster and more objective way to examine the surfaces of fossilized teeth, a practice used to figure out the diets of our early ancestors.

Scientists from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill School of Medicine and the UNC Lineberger Comprehensive Cancer Center have identified a protein that may inhibit cellular movement, or migration.

The continual and inevitable shortening of telomeres, the protective "caps" at the end of all 46 human chromosomes, has been linked to aging and physical decline. Once they are gone, so are we. But there are more ways than one to grow old.

Oregon Health & Science University researchers have identified some of the key factors that prevent the repair of brain damage caused by multiple sclerosis (MS), complications of premature birth, and other diseases and conditions. The findings offer important clues about why the nervous system fails to repair itself and suggest ways that at least some forms of brain damage could be reversed. The research is published in the August edition of the scientific journal Nature Medicine.

In their efforts to understand the complex biology of life, scientists often seek to isolate individual elements of the puzzle for study, to break the problem down to a more manageable size. Single genes and molecules are closely analyzed to better understand their specific interactions with other single entities within larger systems.