Burmese python’s hungry escapades may have consequences for human health

Date:  October 4, 2017

Source:  University of Florida Institute of Food and Agricultural Sciences

As the large, invasive Burmese python eats its way through south Florida's mammals, the mosquitoes in the area have fewer types of animals to bite. Now, more mosquitoes are drawing blood from a rat that carries a virus dangerous to humans.

One of the only mammals left in the Everglades for mosquitoes to bite is the hispid cotton rat, a rodent which is one of the only known hosts of a mosquito-borne virus called the Everglades virus. The virus causes fever, headache and even encephalitis in rare cases.

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Diving deep into the dolphin genome could benefit human health

Date: February 25, 2017

Source: National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST)

In movies and TV shows, dolphins are often portrayed as heroes who save humans through remarkable feats of strength and tenacity. Now dolphins could save the day for humans in real life, too -- with the help of emerging technology that can measure thousands of proteins and an improved database full of genetic data.

"Dolphins and humans are very, very similar creatures," said NIST's Ben Neely, a member of the Marine Biochemical Sciences Group and the lead on a new project at the Hollings Marine Laboratory, a research facility in Charleston, South Carolina that includes the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) as one of its partner institutions. "As mammals, we share a number of proteins and our bodies function in many similar ways, even though we are terrestrial and dolphins live in the water all their lives."

Neely and his colleagues have just finished creating a detailed, searchable index of all the proteins found in the bottlenose dolphin genome. A genome is the complete set of genetic material present in an organism. Neely's project is built on years of marine mammal research and aims to provide a new level of bioanalytical measurements. The results of this work will aid wildlife biologists, veterinary professionals and biomedical researchers.

Protein Maps Could Help Dolphins and Humans

Although a detailed map of the bottlenose dolphin (Tursiops truncatus) genome was first compiled in 2008, recent technological breakthroughs enabled the creation of a new, more exhaustive map of all of the proteins produced by the dolphins' DNA.

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Toxic Caterpillars: Pesticide To Destroy Bug

Swathes of woodland will be sprayed in a bid to eradicate a toxic caterpillar which can cause eye problems and breathing difficulties. 

The Forestry Commission will use helicopters to spray a pesticide over one part of England where the oak processionary caterpillar has made its home. 

The insects, which usually emerge from eggs in May, are covered in thousands of tiny hairs which release an irritating substance called thaumetopoein. 

The hairs are blown about by the wind and cause painful skin rashes in humans and animals. 

They can also lead to eye and throat problems in more extreme cases. 

Stewart Snape, of the Forestry Commission, said: "Most oak processionary moth treatment is done by spraying individual trees from the ground, but it's much more difficult to find and treat the pest in a woodland environment than in trees in a park or street, with a significant risk that some will be missed. 

"The most effective way to treat the woodland is to spray it from a helicopter using an ultra-low-volume spray system. Helicopters can fly lower and slower than fixed-wing aircraft, and therefore target the spray very accurately. 

Continued: http://uk.news.yahoo.com/toxic-caterpillars-pesticide-destroy-bug-190112759.html#xokaTKB

Pig Genomes Provide Massive Amount of Genomic Data for Human Health

ScienceDaily (Nov. 14, 2012) — The availability of a reference genome for a species is extremely important in the deeper understanding of its biology and evolution, and today marks the publication of two studies involving researchers from the BGI on the whole-genome sequencing, analysis and production of high quality reference genomes for the pig in the journals Nature and GigaScience (a BGI and BioMed Central journal).

The Nature study from the Swine Genome Sequencing Consortium presents the reference genome of a breed of pig that is an economically important food source, and the GigaScience study, led by researchers from the BGI, Beijing Institute of Animal Science (IAS) and Chinese Academy of Agriculture Science (CAAS), focuses on a miniature pig used for medical research.

The Nature study includes the additional genomes of a number of European and Asian wild and domesticated swine species, and also released today is a series of accompanying articles covering pig genome structure and function, genome annotation, and findings of biomedical relevance in a number of BioMed Central journals.

Pigs are one of the oldest domesticated livestock species, and as well as providing one of the largest sources of meat worldwide, also provide important medical industrial resources, such as pharmaceutical-grade heparin and heart valves for xenotrans plantation. The pig shares many of the same complex genetic diseases as humans, making them excellent models for studying the underlying biology of human disease.

Continued:  http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2012/11/121114134512.htm