Biotech crops expressing Bacillus thuringiensis (Bt) insecticidal crystalline (Cry) proteins became commercially available in the US in 1996. In 2006, 19 million ha of Bt corn were planted worldwide, which resulted in a significant reduction in the amount of chemical insecticides that are necessary to control agricultural pests. Despite the high adoption rates of this novel insecticide, little ...

Many air-breathing aquatic foragers may be killed by aerial or subsurface predators while recovering oxygen at the surface; yet the influence of predation risk on time allocation during dive cycles is little known in spite of numerous studies on optimal diving. We modeled diving behavior under the risk of predation at the surface. The relationship between time spent at the surface and the risk ...

The present study involves the flora of the Estil wetland and its surroundings in Astara, northwest Iran. During 2006-07, we examined the plant specimens collected in this area and determined that there are 247 vascular plant taxa (229 species, 11 subspecies, and seven varieties) in 170 genera and 60 families. The largest families are Poaceae (27 taxa), Asteraceae (26), and Brassicaceae (21). G...

extended-spectrum β-lactamase (esbl)-producing enterobacteria has become a considerable global concern because of their potential dissemination in humans, in domestic animals, wildlife and the environment. the present study aimed to explore the esbl producing  enterobacteria in aquatic sources of bangladesh as the water may be the potential source of dissemination of this alarming antimicrobial...

The isolated effects of a single insecticide can be difficult to assess in natural settings because of the presence of numerous pollutants in many watersheds. Imidacloprid use for suppressing hemlock woolly adelgid, Adelges tsugae (Annand) (Hemiptera: Adelgidae), in forests offers a rare opportunity to assess potential impacts on aquatic macroinvertebrates in relatively pristine landscapes. Aqu...

The transition from aquatic to terrestrial eggs is a key evolutionary change that has allowed vertebrates to successfully colonize and exploit the land. Although most amphibians retain the primitive biphasic life cycle (eggs deposited in water that hatch into free-living aquatic larvae), direct development of terrestrial eggs has evolved repeatedly and may have been critical to the evolutionary...

SynopsisEvaluation of the potential response of parasites of aquatic organisms to climate change illustrates the complexity of host-parasite relationships and the difficulty of making accurate predictions for these biological systems. In recent years, trematodes have proven to be a useful model to evaluate potential effects of climate change on host-parasite systems. In the first part of this a...

BACKGROUND & OBJECTIVES Vector control will for sometime remain a primary weapon in the war against vector borne diseases. Malaria is of paramount importance in this with its associated high morbidity and mortality especially in sub-Saharan Africa. This study on generational mortality associated factors in Anopheles mosquitoes life-table analysis was designed to investigate the fecundity, level...

• Point sources of nitrogen and phosphorus are facilities that discharge wastewater containing these nutrients directly into the waterway. nonpoint sources discharge nutrients indirectly by rainwater runoff; agriculture can be a cause of nonpoint nutrient pollution from chemical fertilizers and animal manure. Nutrients, primarily nitrogen and phosphorus, are a leading cause of water quality imp...