Fruit Flies Raised in Outer Space Have Weak Immune System. An experiment that involved Drosophila fruit flies being raised in outer space at the Space Shuttle Discovery showed that the flies have a weaker immune system compared to regular Drosophila flies raised on Earth. The flies were sent into space aboard the Space Shuttle Discovery as eggs. It takes about 10 days for the flies to develop into adults and after the return trip, scientists found that the space flies had a weak immune response system to fungus. However, the immune system reacted normally to bacteria. Scientists noted that the flies also showed a high expression of heat-shock protein genes that moderate the Toll pathway which mediates fungus infections. The 12 day space mission brings to light the link between gravity and the immune system. Venturing into space might be a bold adventure, but it may not be good for your immune system. The flies were sent into space as eggs on a 12-day mission aboard the Space Shuttle Discovery.
Video: Fruit Flies Raised in Zero-Gravity. Dung Beetles Use Dung As A Mobile Thermal Refuge For Thermoregulation | Quantum Day. Dung beetles are also called scarab beetles. These are the same beetles worshiped by the ancient Egyptians. They believed that a giant dung beetle rolled the Sun across the sky and buried it at night. They probably got the idea from observing that these beetles roll balls of manure across the plain and bury it under the ground.
Dung beetles do this since they use these balls of dung for food or as a brooding ball where the female beetle will lay its eggs inside it. When the larvae hatches, they feed on the dung. There are some dung beetles that feed on mushrooms, leaves, and fruits. Dung beetles have sensitive sense of smell. These insects contribute greatly to the ecological balance of the land. Beetles use dung balls to stay cool Dung beetles roll the balls of dung away to avoid it from being stolen by others. Aside from rolling the ball to safety, scientists have discovered that these dung beetles also use the balls to keep cool and maintain body temperature. Video: The Dung Beetle. Study Shows How Bumble Bees Determine The Most Optimal Route While Foraging. Unlike the honey bee that is fast and active, the bumble bee is a slow and gentle bee. It hardly attacks humans and never swarms on a victim.
As for bee stings, only the queen bee and its worker bees have a sting and unlike the honey bee that dies when it uses its stings, the bumble bee does not. The shape of the bumble bee is also distinct from other bees,it is round and furry. They have black and yellow bands although some species have orange or red bands, or may be entirely black. Bumble bees do not live in a hive, they build a nest cavity or live in tunnels in the ground made by other animals. Bumble bees are not as aggressive as honey bees. How bumblebees find efficient routes without a GPS Scientists from Queen Mary, University of London have tracked bumblebees for the first time to see how they select the optimal route to collect nectar from multiple flowers and return to their nest. "But, as they gained experienced, the bees gradually refined their routes through trial and error. Brown Widow Spiders Invade Southern California Displaces Black Widow Spiders.
The Brown Widow Spider (Latrodectus Geometricus) is one of the widow spiders under the genus Latrodectus. It is related to the black widow spider (Latrodectus Mactans). The Latrodectus genus is all under the family Theridiidae. It is a large family of spiders, also known as the tangle-web spiders, cobweb spiders and comb-footed spiders. The diverse family includes over 2200 species in over 100 genera). The origin of the brown widow is uncertain as specimens have been independently discovered in both Africa and the Americas. The spider is lighter in color than the black widow.
The brown widow also has a black-and-white geometric pattern on the dorsal side of its abdomen. Are brown widows displacing black widow spiders around southern California homes? Brown widow spiders are relatively new to North America, where they were first documented in Florida in 1935, and even newer to southern California, where they were only recently discovered in 2003. Kinds of Spiders and the Secret Behind The Strength of Their Webs. Spiders weave their own silk to build webs. It is this silk that is known to be one of the strongest materials to exists.
On a pound per pound basis, spider silk is stronger than steel. Researchers have studied and analyzed the structure of the spider web to discover what makes spider webs resilient and how these properties relate to the molecular structure of silk fibers. Research such as these may open up the possibility of synthesizing spider web for practical real world applications as well as apply the same knowledge to design principles that might apply to networked systems such as the Internet or the electric grid.
A key property of spider silk that helps make webs robust is something previously considered a weakness: the way it can stretch and soften at first when pulled, and then stiffen again as the force of the pulling increases. This stiffening response is crucial to the way spider silk resists damage. Spider webs, it turns out, can take quite a beating without failing. New Wasp Species Discovered in Indonesia: Megalara Garuda, The King of Wasps. Wasps are insects in the order Hymenoptera and suborder Apocrita.
These insects are neither a subspecies of the bee or of the ant. Wasps prey on other insects. Wasps contribute to the natural control and natural biocontrol of other species. Parasitic wasps are increasingly used in agricultural pest control as they prey mostly on pest insects and have little impact on crops. Contrary to popular belief, most wasps are solitary and do not sting or attack humans. A new and unusual wasp species has been discovered during an expedition to the Indonesian island of Sulawesi. It was independently also found in the insect collections of the Museum für Naturkunde in Berlin, where it was awaiting discovery since the 1930s, when it had been collected on Sulawesi.
The species belongs into the digger wasp family, which is a diverse group of wasps with several thousands of species known from all over the world. Most wasps have the following characteristics.