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Date: | Sun, 13 May 2012 22:05:52 -0400 |
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What happens to bees with this E-beta-farnasene?
http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2012/may/13/gm-crops-harpenden-wheat-activists?CMP=twt_gu
Aphids cause more than £100m of damage to crops in this country," he said.
"However, instead of killing them off with insecticides, which wash off the
soil into rivers and streams and cause pollution, we have persuaded the
wheat to emit a chemical called E-beta-farnasene, which is emitted by
aphids when they are threatened. It tells other aphids to fly away. It also
attracts aphid predators such as ladybirds and wasps."
The chemical therefore delivers a double whammy. It scares off aphids and
attracts predators that will kill off the aphids that didn't heed the first
warning. However, the chemical – which smells of Granny Smith apples,
according to Pickett – quickly dissipates when sprayed on crops, limiting
its effectiveness.
"We had to get the wheat to manufacture the chemical," he added. After
years of research, his team succeeded in creating a GM variety that did
this by inserting into the wheat's DNA a gene that makes organisms
manufacture E-beta-farnasene
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