Search Results for: parasites

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Seminar series; Britt Koskella, University of Exeter

The first set of our weekly Wednesday posts by final-year undergraduate students as part of their Research Comprehension module. Students write blogs inspired by guest lecturers in our Evolutionary Biology and Ecology seminar series in the School of Natural Sciences. This week; views from Sam Preston and Emma Dunne on Britt Koskella’s seminar, Bacteria-phage interactions within their long-lived …

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What I did this summer: Tortured some bees

Among the multiple pressures currently driving decline in bee populations, little attention has been given to naturally occurring toxins in plant nectar.  We carried out research this summer on invasive Rhododendron ponticum, a plant that contains neurotoxins in its floral nectar.  We found this toxin to be lethal to honeybees, but apparently benign to the …

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Neglected diseases: Ascaris

It has been estimated that less than 10% of global spending on health research is devoted to diseases or conditions that account for 90% of the global disease burden. These are mostly diseases of the world’s poorest people. The general public, and funding agencies, often equate third world diseases with the big three killers; HIV/Aids, …

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Disney Ecology

In light of the current stresses of exam season, I have been contemplating my parallel educational history. Of equal, if not superior, importance to any stage of my conventional academic life, I have had a Disney education. If I visit medieval castles or forts rich in feudal history I can’t help but mentally locate Rapunzel’s …

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Complementary colours

Any designer will tell you that choosing the right colour combinations are essential to strike the right tone and balance in a room, particularly if your goal is to attract clients. Well, what if your room is a web and your client is a moth? This is just the situation the rather drab and dreary …

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Good-bye Guinea worm?

The media is all abuzz about the Carter Centre’s recent announcement that 542 cases of guinea worm infection were reported in 2012. That is a remarkable achievement, considering that 3.5million cases where the reported when the Carter Centre began their eradication programme in 1986. The guinea worm (Dracunculus medinensis) is a particularly gruesome parasitic nematode …

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The 12 days of NERD club

NERD club, for the uninitiated, is a weekly meeting of the Networks in Ecology/Evolution Research Cluster Dynamic of the School of Natural Sciences, Trinity College Dublin. We present and discuss our research and also general aspects of academia such as science communication, job hunting and using twitter. The members include interns, PhD students, postdocs and …

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Smoking nests

We all know that cigarettes and smoking are bad for you. However, a recent Biology Letters paper which was featured on BBC Nature suggests that the discarded remains of cigarette butts may help to maintain the health of some urban birds. Researchers from the National Autonomous University of Mexico found that smoked cigarette butts incorporated …

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The plight of the bumble bee; diapause, immunity and parasitic attack

Bee populations are in severe decline, an alarming and worrying trend when you consider their vital importance as commercial and ecological pollinators. Research and media attention often focuses on afflictions of honeybees such as the Varroa mite and colony collapse disorder. However, parasites are also major contributors to the plight of the bumble bee. Bumble …

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