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 […]
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 […]
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 […]
Brazil approves world’s first commercial GM sugarcane
Reading Time: 2 minutesBRAZIL has approved the commercialization of a genetically modified sugarcane, developed by the Brazilian sugarcane breeding and technology company, Centro de Tecnologia Canavieira (CTC). This is the first time such permission has been granted any-where in the world. The approval came from the National Technical Biosafety Com-mission (CTNBio). The GM sugarcane contains the gene Bt […]
Textile Town set to become herbal hub in North Johor
Reading Time: 2 minutesTANGKAK — well known as the Textile Town of Malaysia – owing to the scores of textile merchants and retailers selling fabrics and other cloth products will soon another moniker, perhaps as the country’s Kacip Fatimah Hub. Kacip Fatimah (Labisia pumila), a herb said to be the ideal tonic for women’s health and wellness is […]
The most influential species of all evolution
Reading Time: 2 minutesEVER wonder what is the most influential (defined as the species that has most changed life on Earth) species in the history of the planet? Homo sapiens? You got it wrong. Though we’d like to think we are the masters of the universe, we don’t even make it in the top five. It is … the earthworm. Yeah, you read that […]
Transforming spinach leaves into beating human hearts
Reading Time: 2 minutes BY LUKA ZUPANČIČ US scientists have managed to transform spinach leaves into functional beating heart tissues with their own vascular networks, possibly opening up a new branch of tissue engineering science based on plant mimicry. The scientific field of tissue engineering and regenerative medicine emerged in the last decade as an answer to the […]
Watsons, Bayer jointly promote healthy living in conjunction with World Allergy Week
Reading Time: 3 minutesPETALING JAYA: Watsons Malaysia and Bayer Co. (Malaysia) collaborated for a health public forum held in conjunction with World Allergy Week 2017. World Allergy Week is an annual initiative of the World Allergy Organisation to raise awareness of allergic disease and related disorders. Themed “Healthy Living”, the forum organised by Watsons Malaysia and Bayer Co. […]
US-based Malaysian scientist scores a first
Reading Time: 2 minutesThe prestigious UK-based Journal of Medical Microbiology has a new face in its editorial bench. For the first time in the journal’s history, the senior position of Co-Editor-in-Chief has been bestowed to a scientist outside of the UK – and quite fittingly to a formidable Malaysian researcher, Prof Kalai Mathee who hails from Ipoh. The […]
…. And sunflower is Hawaii’s largest biofuel source
Reading Time: < 1 minuteHawaii’s longest operating biodiesel producer, Pacific Biodiesel Technologies is planting sunflowers as its first biofuel crop on 115 acres in Maui’s central valley. The project is the largest of its kind and the only biofuel farming operation running on 100% renewable fuel in Hawaii, showcasing the company’s sustainable, community-based model of agriculture and renewable energy. […]