America’s Never-Ending Battle Against Flesh-Eating Worms
theatlantic.com
America’s Never-Ending Battle Against Flesh-Eating Worms
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Re: America’s Never-Ending Battle Against Flesh-Eating Worms
#2A little tangential, but having just been in an argument here with someone who advocated a "nightwatchman state," I wonder what they'd think of the USDA's efforts here (as well as the other governments'). It seems almost impossible that this could have been coordinated by private industry alone: while there's an obvious benefit to the cattle industry, it seems hardly likely that they would have sponsored the years of investment in basic research that led to this, let alone successfully negotiated with Panama for the rights to dump irradiated bugs from coast to coast. Could it have been done?
It's also striking how much these efforts were made harder by US foreign policy and involvement in the wars of Central America, and are still made hard because of our poor relationship with Cuba.
Re: America’s Never-Ending Battle Against Flesh-Eating Worms
#3I wonder what would happen if instead of releasing sterile male screwworms, we used the gene drive to release screwworms that could only have male descendants. I've heard of a similar idea to eradicate malaria by doing that to mosquitoes.
Re: America’s Never-Ending Battle Against Flesh-Eating Worms
#4Great article. Wikipedia page is also interesting.
Re: America’s Never-Ending Battle Against Flesh-Eating Worms
#5I wonder what would happen if instead of releasing sterile male screwworms, we used the gene drive to release screwworms that could only have male descendants. I've heard of a similar idea to eradicate malaria by doing that to mosquitoes.
The article says they are working on it:
“Biologists are also developing a genetically modified male-only strain of screwworms, which would require fewer flies to be raised and released.”
Re: America’s Never-Ending Battle Against Flesh-Eating Worms
#6I wonder what would happen if instead of releasing sterile male screwworms, we used the gene drive to release screwworms that could only have male descendants. I've heard of a similar idea to eradicate malaria by doing that to mosquitoes.
It seems that the mosquito effort was not a success after all [0].
[0] https://m.dw.com/en/genetically-modified-mosquitoes-breed-in...
Re: America’s Never-Ending Battle Against Flesh-Eating Worms
#7I wonder what would happen if instead of releasing sterile male screwworms, we used the gene drive to release screwworms that could only have male descendants. I've heard of a similar idea to eradicate malaria by doing that to mosquitoes.
The article says they are working on it: “Biologists are also developing a genetically modified male-only strain of screwworms, which would require fewer flies to be raised and released.”
That seems like they would still be doing the same thing, except that the flies they would be able to release 100% male flies instead of 50/50 males and females
Re: America’s Never-Ending Battle Against Flesh-Eating Worms
#8I wonder what would happen if instead of releasing sterile male screwworms, we used the gene drive to release screwworms that could only have male descendants. I've heard of a similar idea to eradicate malaria by doing that to mosquitoes.
The article does mention that...
Re: America’s Never-Ending Battle Against Flesh-Eating Worms
#9Is this in danger of being undone by Trump's antics?
Re: America’s Never-Ending Battle Against Flesh-Eating Worms
#10I wonder what would happen if instead of releasing sterile male screwworms, we used the gene drive to release screwworms that could only have male descendants. I've heard of a similar idea to eradicate malaria by doing that to mosquitoes.
It seems that the mosquito effort was not a success after all [0]. [0] https://m.dw.com/en/genetically-modified-mosquitoes-breed-in...
Different approach, that attempt was to reduce population sizes not cause extinction. Though it is evidence that Gene Drive is less likely to work than many expect.