Termites

Discovery in amber reveals ancient biology of termites

CORVALLIS, Ore. The analysis of a termite entombed for 100 million years in an ancient piece of amber has revealed the oldest example of "mutualism" ever discovered between an animal and microorganism, and also shows the unusual biology that helped make this one of the most successful, although f...

HealthSource of Chicago: New Techniques for Back Pain Relief in Chicago

...ally don't take into consideration what is going on under the surface. Some of the worst of this damage is called degenerative disc disease. It's like termites working, unseen, on the foundation of a house, eating it away, bit by bit. When people's spine, feet, knees, pelvis or feet are out of alignment o...

Pesticide Residue Common on Kitchen Floors

... (52 percent), cypermethrin (46 percent) and fipronil (40 percent), a relatively new residential-use insecticide used to kill fleas and ticks on pets, termites and ants and cockroaches in bait traps, according to the study. The insecticide concentration was mostly low, the study reported. Even so, the pres...

Panamanian termite goes ballistic: Fastest mandible strike in the world

...behavior, you can't hope to understand the brain," Seid adds. Why are the termites so fast? When insects become small they have difficulty generating forces t...fast movements is employed by locusts, trap-jaw ants and froghoppers. "The termites need to store energy to generate enough destructive force. They appear to ...

Microbes as climate engineers

...onsible for producing the methane, 150 million tonnes a year. Microbes in wetlands produce an additional 100 million tonnes and those that live inside termites release 20 million tonnes of methane annually. 90 billion tonnes of carbon a year is absorbed from the atmosphere by the oceans, and almost as much...

Termites in Biological News

Did termites help Katrina destroy New Orleans floodwalls?

Lanham, MD; October 14, 2008Three years after Hurricane Katrina devastated New Orleans, people still speculate over causes of the destruction of the city's floodwall system. A new article in the fall issue of American Entomologist (Vol. 54, No. 3) suggests that Formosan subterranean termites pla...

Diuscovery in amber reveals ancient biology of termites

CORVALLIS, Ore. The analysis of a termite entombed for 100 million years in an ancient piece of amber has revealed the oldest example of "mutualism" ever discovered between an animal and microorganism, and also shows the unusual biology that helped make this one of the most successful, although f...

Fungus-farming termites descend from an African rain forest Eve

Agriculture is not unique to humans: some insect groups have also evolved this way of life. One such group is the fungus-farming termites, which cultivate fungi as food inside their nests. Such termites can be found in both rain forest and savannah habitats in the Old World tropics, from Africa to ...

Termite killer lingers as a potent greenhouse gas

... Sulfuryl fluoride (SO 2 F 2 ), a gas commonly used to rid buildings of termites and other pests, is a greenhouse gas that remains in the atmosphere about 36 years, six to 10 times longer than previously thought, according to a res...

Academy participates in project to discover drugs, biofuels in tropical seas

...r snails, particularly the highly venomous cone snails found in Philippine waters. Another target of research is shipworms, the marine equivalent of termites and the scourge of wooden structures in estuarine and marine habitats worldwide. A relative of the clam, these animals host bacteria inside their gill...

Discovering drugs, biofuels in tropical seas

...velopment of Ziconotide, a commercial drug considered more effective than morphine in blocking out extreme pain. Shipworms, the marine equivalent of termites and the scourge of wooden structures in estuarine and marine habitats worldwide, are the focus of the third aim. A relative of the clam, these animals...

Entomological Society of America names 2008 award winners

...el selection on divergence estimation in dragonflies. Jessica recently won an NSF Postdoctoral Research Fellowship to work on the systematics of lower termites with Dr. Dave Grimaldi at the American Museum of Natural History. Dr. Jeffrey D. Bradshaw (North Central Branch) recently received his Ph.D. fro...

America's smallest dinosaur uncovered

...size of a chicken, ran on two legs and scoured the ancient forest floor for termites is the smallest dinosaur species found in North America, according to a Uni...describe the specimen and explain how it it likely specialized in consuming termites by using its small but powerful forelimbs to tear into logs. "Proportion...

Iowa State-ConocoPhillips collaboration advances 26 research projects in first year

...rgrove, an associate professor of biochemistry, biophysics and molecular biology who is studying natural enzymes called cellulosomes, enzymes found in termites and the first stomachs of cows that excel at breaking down cellulose from plants. A grant from ConocoPhillips is helping him develop a method to make ...

Entomological Society of America recognizes 2007 fellows and honorary members

...ored and coauthored over 160 peer-reviewed articles on termite biology and control, and his research results on the population ecology of subterranean termites and slow-acting toxicants led to the development of the Sentricon System, a monitoring-baiting system for population control of these cryptic pests. ...

Termites in Biological Technology

Digesting the termite digestome -- a way to make biofuels?

...n Tartar describe how the enzymes produced by both termites and the micro-organisms that inhabit their gut kn...rough millions and millions of years of evolution, termites and their symbionts have acquired highly specialis...et of enzymes. These enzymes are secreted by both termites and the symbionts that colonise their gut, and act...

DOE JGI plumbs termite guts to yield novel enzymes for better biofuel production

... WALNUT CREEK, CA --- termites -- notorious for their voracious appetite for wood...f wood in a very short time, as anyone who has had termites in their house is painfully aware. Instead of using harsh chemicals or excess heat to do so, termites employ an array of specialized microbes in their h...

Verenium Explores Bacterial Genes Inside Termite Guts to Understand How Wood is Broken Down and Converted to Energy

...f Energy's (DoE) Joint Genome Institute (JGI), was to better understand how termites break down cellulose and xylan into component sugars. Such an understanding...components, such as cellulose and xylan, requires a battery of enzymes, and termites are extremely successful in breaking down wood, so they're a rich potential...

Termites in Biological Definition

Archaea

...n environments like marshland , sewage , and soil . Many methanogenic archaea are found in the digestive tracts of animals such as ruminants , termites , and humans. Archaea are usually harmless to other organisms and none is known to cause disease. Form Individual archaeans range from 0.1 to ...

Artificial life

... then modified the environment and watched the way that the simulated, script-driven insects reacted. They then compared that to the reaction of real termites to identical changes in laboratory colonies, and refined their theories about the rules which underlay the behavior. James Doyne Farmer was a key f...

Cellulose

...on linters , is used in the manufacture of nitrocellulose , historically used in smokeless gunpowder . Some animals, particularly ruminants and termites , can digest cellulose with the help of symbiotic micro-organisms - see methanogen . Cellulose is processed to make cellophane and rayon , and...

Termites in Biological Dictionary

Rhizobia

.... August 4th, 2009, from www.yourdictionary.com/ rhizobi a . Comments: ... Mychorrhiza. Fungi. Rhizobia . Ants. Collembola. Nematodes. Earthworms. termites ... Rhizobia . Characterisation of Phaseolus vulgaris, Glycine max, and Macroptilium ... rhizobia ... Rhizobia - Wikipedia, the free encyclope...