Non-browning apples set to hit the market
Reading Time: 2 minutesOkanagan Specialty Fruits, the company behind the non-browning Arctic Apple sets to commercial launch with US retailers this fall, following the completion of successful market testing. Arctic Golden apples, whose polyphenol oxidase (PPO) genes have been silenced through genetic modification was approved by the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) and Food and Drug Administration (FDA) […]
Philippines tops in Southeast Asia for GM corn production
Reading Time: < 1 minuteMedia practitioners, farmers, and government agency officers were briefed during a media conference on ISAAA’s latest report, Global Status of Commercialised Biotech/GM Crops: 2016 at the Acacia Hotel, Alabang, Muntinlupa City, Philippines on May 19. The 2016 report states that Philippine biotech corn adoption increased to 812,000 hectares in 2016, a remarkable 16% increase (110,000 […]
Why do elephants have big ears?
Reading Time: < 1 minuteDuring a hot day, we tend to sweat. However, elephants are unable to do so. Ever wondered how do they regulate their body temperature? Elephants are massive animals and they produce a lot of body heat. As they inhabit very hot regions, it is pivotal to have an efficient method to eliminate excess body heat. […]
Who came up with the practice of vaccination?
Reading Time: < 1 minuteAn English doctor and ‘The father of immunology’, Edward Jenner presented the gift of vaccination to the world. In 1796, he performed his famous experiment on eight year old James Phipps. Jenner extracted pus from a cowpox postulate and inserted it into an incision on the boy’s arm. He was experimenting his theory, speculated from […]
Rahim’s long and winding road to criminology
Reading Time: 8 minutesDr Mohammad Rahim Kamaluddin says it all for criminology. It is a blend of science and the arts. It is multidisciplinary, involving psychology, forensics, pathology, humanities and the social sciences. In this interview with MAHALETCHUMY ARUJANAN, he takes our readers into the how, and why, and what of criminology and speaks of a fruitful and […]
Cancer-killing power of plants
Reading Time: 2 minutesFour species of Phyllanthus, herbs commonly found throughout the tropics and subtropics, pose great potential as nontoxic breast cancer treatments. While their therapeutic properties have been reported, a team from the University of Malaya recently investigated specifically how the plants’ extracts combat breast cancer. Phyllanthus is a large family of flowering plants with hundreds of […]
What are rhinoceros’ horns made up of?
Reading Time: < 1 minuteRhinoceros or rhinos are large, herbivorous mammals that are commonly identified by their horned snouts. The word rhinoceros were derived from Greek words in which ‘rhino’ meant nose and ‘ceros’ meant horn. There are five species and 11 subspecies of rhinos in which some possess two horns while others only have one. Rhinos use their […]
How do bats navigate at night?
Reading Time: < 1 minuteEver heard the idiom ‘as blind as a bat’? It is commonly utilised to denote a person with poor eyesight. On the contrary, bats aren’t blind. Most of them can see really well, even in dim light. As an example, most fruit eating bats possess large, bulging eyes that aid them to find their way […]
How do parrots mimic human speech?
Reading Time: < 1 minuteIf you’re wondering why parrots imitate sounds they hear, it’s because they’re social creatures. They feel a need to be able to interact and fit in with those around them. When kept as pets, these birds see their human owners as their family and want to communicate with them. Since a human owner usually can’t […]
Making biological drug with spider silk protein
Reading Time: 2 minutesSCIENTISTS at Karolinska Insti-tutet in Sweden have managed to produce synthetic lung surfactant using DNA sequence derived from spider silk proteins. Surfactant is a drug used to strengthen the lungs of premature babies by reducing the surface tension in their pulmo-nary alveoli (the structures in the lung that allow for respiration) and allowing them to […]