Stem cells reverse blindness caused by chemical burns

By Alicia Chang, associated ANGELES PressLOS dozens of persons who have been blinded or otherwise serious eye damage when they were sprayed with chemical substances, corrosive substances have their sight restored with transplants or their own stem cells — a stunning success on the field this cell terapiiNaukowców Italian reported Wednesday The treatment completely worked in 82 107 eye and partially in 14 other, with benefits lasting up to a decade now. One man whose eyes were severely damaged more than 60 years ago has now vision near normal. "It is a Roaring success, "said ophthalmologist Dr. Ivan Schwab from the University of California, Davis, who had no role in the study — the longest and largest of this type.Stem cell transplants offer hope to the thousands of people worldwide every year, which was suffering from chemical burns in their eyes from the harsh cleansers or other substances in the workplace or at home.Approach does not allow people with damage to the optic Nerve or macular degeneration, which includes the retina. Nor will work in people who are completely blind in both eyes, because doctors must be at least some healthy tissue, which can be used to transplant.In the study, published online by the New England Journal of Medicine, researchers took a small number of stem cells from the patient's eyes healthy, multiplied them in the laboratory and place them in the eye of roasted, where they were able to develop new corneal tissue to replace, which had been damaged. Because stem cells are from their own bodies, patients do not need to take anti-rejection drugs.Adult stem cells have been used for decades to cure blood cancers such as leukemia and diseases such as sickle cell anemia. But the problem of how damage to eyes is a relatively new uses.Scientists studying cell therapies for a host of other diseases, including diabetes and heart failure, with limited success.Adult stem cells, which are located around the body, they differ from embryonic stem cells that come from human embryos and the ethical issues are mixed, because deleting cells requires destroying embryos.Now people of eye burns, you can get an artificial cornea, a procedure that carries out such complications like infection and Glaucoma, or can be obtained is a transplant using stem cells from a cadaver, but need to take drugs to prevent rejection.An Italian study involved 106 patients treated between 1998 and 2007. Most had extensive damage to one eye, and some had such limited vision, that they could only sense, count fingers or perceive the hand movements. Many are blind for years and had unsuccessful restore their vision.The cells were taken from the limbus, rim around the cornea, the clear, which includes a colorful part of the eye. In a healthy eye stem cells in limbus are factories, mixing new cells to replace dead corneal cells. When injury kills off the stem cells, scar tissue forms of corneal clouding vision and causes blindness.In the study of Italian doctors removed scar tissue over the cornea and glued stem cells cultivated in the laboratory over the injured eye. In cases where both eyes are damaged by burns cells were taken from by limbus.Scientists after patients with an average of three years and some for as long as a decade. More than three-fourths of the regained sight after the show. Additional% 13 were considered a partial success. Although their vision improved, they still had some cloudiness in the cornea.Patients with superficial damage was visible in one to two months. Those with more extensive damage took several months longer. "They were very happy. Some said it was a miracle, "said one of the leaders of the research, the University of Modena Graziella Pellegrini Center for regenerative medicine in Italy. "There was no miracle. It was simply technique. "The test has been partly financed by the Italian Government.Researchers in the United States have been testing different way to use self-supplied stem cells, but the work is preliminary.One of the successful transplants or in Italian involved a man who had a serious injury in both eyes due to chemical burn in 1948. Doctors have been grafted stem cells with a small part of his left eye for both eyes. His vision now is close to normal.In 2008 they were settled in connection with the work of the citrus fruit chemical eye burns in the United States, according to the Bureau of Labour Statistics. Schwab UC Davis said transplants or stem cells could be not assist this blinded by burns in both eyes, because doctors need stem cells to follow procedure. "I don't want to give false hope to respond to their prayers, "he said Dr. Sophie Deng, expert of the cornea in the UCLA Jules Stein Eye Institute, said the biggest advantage is that the Italian doctors were able to expand the number of stem cells in the laboratory. This technique is less invasive than sampling large eye tissue and reduces the risk of injury to the eye. "The key is whether you can find good stem cell populations and expand it, "she said.Copyright 2010 Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed. 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ROUNDUP.Top of resistant weeds pose a threat to the environment

By David Mercer, associated Press, CHAMPAIGN, fig — when the weed killer ROUNDUP.Mount was introduced in the 1970s, has proved it can kill almost any plant but are still safer than many other herbicides, and enabled farmers to give up major chemicals and reduction of tilling that may contribute to erosion.But 24 years later, sturdy several species of weeds resistant to ROUNDUP.Góra evolved, forcing farmers to return to some of the less secure practice abandoned decades earlier.The situation is worst in the South, where some farmers now walk the fields with hoes, killing weeds in their Great grandfathers were happy to leave behind. And the problem is quickly spreading belt corn and beyond, with the ROUND.Mount now proving unreliable in killing at least 10 species of weeds in at least 22 States. Some species, like the Palmer Amaranth in Arkansas and water hemp and marestail in Illinois, quickly grow and large, producing tens of thousands of seeds. "It's getting too big case," says Mike Plummer, 61-year-old farmer and agronomist at the University of Illinois, which soybeans and cotton near Southern Illinois Creal Springs Community. "If you got it, this is a real big deal."When Monsanto introduced Roundup in 1976, "since sliced bread, it was like the best thing," said Garry Niemeyer, who grows corn and soybeans near Auburn in Central Illinois. The weed killer, known generically as glyphosate, is absorbed by the plants leaves and kills them by blocking the production of the protein they need to grow. The US Environmental Protection Agency considers that have low toxicity for humans and animals, and plants is sprayed on, there is less danger to the environment because it rapidly binds to soil and becomes inactive.The introduction of Monsanto seeds designed to survive the ROUND.Mountain made things even better for farmers, because it can spray on emerging weeds growing crops erase beside them. Seeds containing Monsanto's Roundup Ready features are now used to grow approximately 90% of the soybeans nation and 70% of its maize and cotton.With increased dependence on Roundup herbicide to corn fell from 2,76 pounds per Acre in 1994 to 2.06 in 2005, the most-recent year for which the U.S. Department of Agriculture has no data. Distributed over 81.8 million acres planted in 2005 and annually is a decrease of more than 57 million pounds of herbicides.Farmers also found they could reduce, or in some cases, eliminating tilling, reducing erosion and fuel.But with all herbicides, the more it is used, the more likely that it will run individual plants within a species, which have only a few genetic varieties survive which kills most of their relatives. With each generation of the survivors they represent a larger percentage of species St. Louis-based Monsanto maintains resistance is often overstated, noting that most weeds show signs of immunity. "We believe that glyphosate will remain an important tool in the Arsenal of farmers, "said Monsanto Spokesman John Combest. Nevertheless, the company began paying cotton farmers $ 12 an acre to cover the costs of the other herbicides for Use next to Roundup, to increase its effectiveness.Trend confirmed by certain groups of food safety in the belief that biotechnology will not restrict the use of chemicals in the long term "that is were converted," says Bill Freese, chemist with a Washington, D.C.: Center for food safety, which promotes organic farming. "They intend to significantly increase the use of these chemicals, and that is bad."The first weeds in the United States, which survived the ROUND.Góra, it was found that about 10 years ago in Delaware. Agricultural experts said the use of other chemicals is already Creeping up. Monsanto and other companies develop new seeds intended to resist older herbicides such as dicamba and 2,4-D, killer weed developed during World War II and a component of Agent Orange, which was used to destroy the jungle foliage during the war in Vietnam and is blamed for health problems among veterans.Penn State University Weed scientist David Mortensen, estimated that in three or four years, farmers use dicamba and 2,4-D will be increased by 55.1 million pounds in the year due to resistance to ROUNDUP.Góra. That would both far list of herbicides used intensively by the farmers.Dicamba and 2,4-D easily drift outside the areas where you are sprayed, making them a threat to neighbouring crops and wild plants, "said Mortensen. Which, in turn, could also endanger wildlife. "We found that the plants (wild), which grows on the edge of the field actually supports the beneficial insects such as bees, "he said.Australian scientist Stephen Powles was sort of weed Evangelist recording Roundup, calling this tool in near miraculous agriculture.Australia has been involved in the ROUNDUP.Top of resistant weeds from the mid-1990s, but changes in farming practices that have helped to conduct effective, he said. That is enabled using a wider array of herbicides to kill off weeds ROUND.Góra, resistant and using other methods of weed control.These alternative methods, such as planting cover crops, the so-called "such as rye to deter weeds during the winter and in other cases, when the fields are planted with corn, soybeans and cotton, are key," said Freese, chemist, Center for food safety.Otherwise, he said, "that we are talking here of pesticide treadmill. This is only coming back to kick us in the butt now with resistant weeds. "Copyright 2010 Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed. Guidelines: You share in the USA TODAY Community, so please keep your comments smart and civil. Don't attack other readers personally and keep your language decent. Use the "report abuse" button to make the difference. Learn more.

Legends of ancient once walked among early humans?

Wild, Hairy, spammers fought griffons and Nomads Fat Camel — have Paleontologists unearthed mythic figures from folklore?Denisova Cave of Siberia held the pinky unknown early human species, genetics reported in March. Research Naturejournal, led by Johannes Krause Germany, Max Planck Institute for evolutionary anthropology, offered no response to it has become the "ancient" human species, more than one million years old and living in the vicinity of their human and Neanderthal cousins as recently as 30 000 years ago.But at least one scholar intriguing answer: "the discovery of evidence from different hominin (human) lines in Central Asia as recently as 30 000 years ago does not come as a surprise for those who have looked at the evidence of historical and anecdotal" wild people "target bytujacych region" wrote researcher Michael Heaney United Kingdom Bodleian Library Oxfordin a letter to the times of London Wild?Herodotus, the father of historians, wrote about these human cousins, "arimaspians," approximately 450 BC, they were "strong warriors, good Men rich in herds of cattle and sheep and goats; they are one-eyed, "Shaggy with horsehair, the toughest of men", "according to John Tzetses, writer of the era of the Byzantine Empire. They also fought against the griffons, mythical winged Lions with faces, gold Eagle, according to Herodotus and his contemporaries, Aristeas, who clearly know their stuff when it occurred to enhance writing historical.Heaney noted that legend Hairy wild people, or were fare almases in Russian steppes centuries. "Reports of wild men, though having a common mythic subtext, often reflect what we know from the original hominins," says Heaney, by e-mail. "Presumed almases from Central Asia may be one of a number of pre-(homo) sapien ancestors."At its gold mine guard griffon opponent? In the companion piece (1993) to look at the Arismaspians by Heaney, Stanford historianAdrienne, the Mayor, the author of The first fossil Hunters: paleontology in Greek and Roman times, suggested their legend sprang from the bones of dinosaurs discovered by nomads in their total Western Mongolia steppes. "This region may also be Bayan-Ulgii ????? (province) in Western Mongolia and environs, where I have wandered many days long, and have seen the ancient and modern small mines," says archaeologist Jeannine Davis-Kimball of the Centre for the study of Eurasian Nomads, which requires the origin of the dinosaur bones of griffon stories justified. But as for the Arimaspians are the same as a newly-discovered human in an archaic, Davis-Kimball has a fairly strong doubts. "We have mined hunters and gatherers epoch of bronze and small inhabitants along the rivers of Eurasian — former precede nomads by 1000 or maybe even many years more people. I have seen lots of skeletons of many locales in My trip from Hungary to Mongolia, but none is fully correlated with the new hominid line or one-eyed Arimaspians, "Davis-Kimball says, by e-mail. "It is too difficult for me to believe that the hominids living withstand years ago can be perpetuated in mit until Herodotus or about 450 BC."An explanation of the other came in 2008 Archaeology Ethnology and anthropology of Eurasia journal by Dima Cheremisin Russian Academy of Sciences, which looked at the ancient people of Siberia, the Pazyryk culture iron age tribe burial mounds dot the mountains of Altai. "Mythical griffon is the most popular figure in the art of the Pazyryk culture, suggesting that people identified with the" Pazyryk culture griffons protection gold, "said by Aristeas and Herodotus," Cheremisin noted.And cryptozoologists, who study the legendary creatures, proposed a similar ancient explanations for people in the past, to the emergence of the Yeti or Bigfoot. Bernard Heuvelmans, father of modern Cryptozoology, theorized in 1980, that such emergence of wild individuals may be based on the ancestral memories of course Neanderthals Of, enabling that people seem to have interbred with Neanderthals, in accordance with the may report in the journal Science led by Svante Pääbofor a long time, researcher of ancient genome which also co-authored the report discovery Denisova Cave. More than 50 000 years ago, probably in the Middle East, early modern human and intermingling Neanderthals led to modern Europeans and Asians typically having a genome that is Neanderthal 1-4%, according to research.Such crossing is another staple of old stories. Hercules, the hero of the Greek myths, the lion skin around in with the Club over his shoulders and walked in was wondrously strong, somewhat like a Neanderthal, because the origin of the half-Divine. Even the old testament contains references to Nephilim, "giants," who married people and had children. "These stories go back millennia, but they do not go back that far," says the biblical archaeologist Robert Cargill UCLA. "There is no way that the author of the book of Genesis had in mind the Neanderthals." People most likely to occur, the ancient people were trying to clarify the origin of the high, "says Cargil and giving Back to the time when things were so bad that even semi-divine creatures was faulty.Of course, the fun is over. After all the scientists in 2003 discovered another species of humans, Pope John Paul II, nicknamed "hobbits" for their teams puny about three metres high, who had died probably 12 000 years ago in Indonesia So we hobbits, giants and probably cyclopean men wild, running in Prehistory. It is not quite the Lord of the rings, but we certainly Forgive Herodotus for some of its higher stories. Guidelines: You share in the USA TODAY Community, so please keep your comments smart and civil. Don't attack other readers personally and keep your language decent. Use the "report abuse" button to make the difference. Learn more.

Design of new details on nationwide borrows earthquake

As far as the study of earthquakes, Professor of geology, Oregon State University Bob Lillie has a simple Theory: the more that is known, better persons can prepare and protect themselves.More knowledge about vulnerabilities in certain parts of the nation could lead to stricter building regulations in these places, so probably less overthrow structures, "he says."If we know about the risks, then we can bet on less risk, "Lillie says.Lillie is part of a group of scientists dealing with USArray, nationwide research project, which allows researchers to study earthquakes in unprecedented ways.The project, which includes a travelling with 400 sejsmografy high-quality, portable placed in temporary facilities, to reach the mark in the middle of this summer in its objective to measure the upheavals of the Earth's surface below from California to Maine, "says Project Director Bob Woodward. In the summer, the device will be installed in several countries, including South Dakota, Minnesota, Iowa, Missouri and Arkansas, he said. Number density and systematic position of equipment give researchers a much more detailed picture of seismic activity in the UNITED STATES, "he says. Scientists are intrigued by tremors detected in North-Western Pacific and installed additional equipment in order to learn more about them, "he says.The project, which is formed on the West Coast in 2004, is in the East so scientists can have a systematic way of studying the whole nation, Woodward says. Instruments, at a distance of approximately 40 miles from each other, stay on the site for two years, before they moved, Woodward says. USArray project is scheduled to reach the East coast by 2013, says.USArray's of the annual budget is around 13 million dollars annually from the National Science Foundation, "he says. As part of a wider project known as the EarthScope, also funded by the Foundation. EarthScope's objective is to examine the structure and evolution of North America and learn more about what causes earthquakes and volcanoes.Before the instruments have been installed, "he was kind of like taking pictures from a camera with only a few pixels," says Woodward. "400 Stations where recalls much higher camera resolution. Now you can directly see the seismic Waves rolling across the country. "The project was included in Arizona, California, Colorado, Idaho, Montana, New Mexico, Oregon, Utah, Washington and Wyoming, he says. Emily Brodsky, seismologist, which researches earthquake at the University of California-Santa Cruz, he says, "By the whole view, you can start to see these in a way never seen before."2011, sejsmografy will be in place near the site of some of the most powerful earthquake in U.S. history — an area known as the new Madrid fault between St. Louis and Memphis, Woodward says.Almost 200 years ago, in 1811 and 1812, a series of earthquakes centered in the nearby small town of New Madrid, Missouri was so strong that witnesses said the nearby Mississippi River began to flow back, "says Chuck Langston, Director of the Center for the study of earthquake and information at the University of Memphis."The earthquake was felt in Boston, "Langston says. "There is a transfer, which the River dammed up, and its part toward the back. Spectacular, must have been it. Big waves and water moving every which way. "Although California is commonly associated with earthquakes, says Woodward, vulnerabilities exist throughout the nation, stretching on the East coast of the UNITED STATES.More than 500 billion dollars of losses could result from strong earthquake in the area of Los Angeles, according to Jan 14 Congressional Research service report for Congress. "Estimation of even higher — around $ 900 billion — includes injury to heavily populated areas of the central corridor, New Jersey-Philadelphia if earthquake 6.5-magnitude occurred along the fault lying between New York and Philadelphia, "States the report.Can be changed to the earthquake occurred in the region, "says Michel Bruneau, engineering professor at the University of Buffalo, which has Done an earthquake in extensive research. Bruneau is a study in 2008, which finds the size-5 earthquake damaged buildings in New York in 1737; and quake magnitude-5.5 hit the region in 1884, according to research reported in the Bulletin of the Seismological Society of America. Researchers wrote that there are stronger earthquakes in the area.Martin reports in Argus leader, Sioux Falls, S.D. guidance: sharing in the community of USA TODAY such please keep your comments smart and civil. Don't attack other readers personally and keep your language decent. Use the "report abuse" button to make the difference. Learn more.

Legends of ancient once walked among early humans?

Wild, Hairy, spammers fought griffons and Nomads Fat Camel — have Paleontologists unearthed mythic figures from folklore?Denisova Cave of Siberia held the pinky unknown early human species, genetics reported in March. Research Naturejournal, led by Johannes Krause Germany, Max Planck Institute for evolutionary anthropology, offered no response to it has become the "ancient" human species, more than one million years old and living in the vicinity of their human and Neanderthal cousins as recently as 30 000 years ago.But at least one scholar intriguing answer: "the discovery of evidence from different hominin (human) lines in Central Asia as recently as 30 000 years ago does not come as a surprise for those who have looked at the evidence of historical and anecdotal" wild people "target bytujacych region" wrote researcher Michael Heaney United Kingdom Bodleian Library Oxfordin a letter to the times of London Wild?Herodotus, the father of historians, wrote about these human cousins, "arimaspians," approximately 450 BC, they were "strong warriors, good Men rich in herds of cattle and sheep and goats; they are one-eyed, "Shaggy with horsehair, the toughest of men", "according to John Tzetses, writer of the era of the Byzantine Empire. They also fought against the griffons, mythical winged Lions with faces, gold Eagle, according to Herodotus and his contemporaries, Aristeas, who clearly know their stuff when it occurred to enhance writing historical.Heaney noted that legend Hairy wild people, or were fare almases in Russian steppes centuries. "Reports of wild men, though having a common mythic subtext, often reflect what we know from the original hominins," says Heaney, by e-mail. "Presumed almases from Central Asia may be one of a number of pre-(homo) sapien ancestors."At its gold mine guard griffon opponent? In the companion piece (1993) to look at the Arismaspians by Heaney, Stanford historianAdrienne, the Mayor, the author of The first fossil Hunters: paleontology in Greek and Roman times, suggested their legend sprang from the bones of dinosaurs discovered by nomads in their total Western Mongolia steppes. "This region may also be Bayan-Ulgii ????? (province) in Western Mongolia and environs, where I have wandered many days long, and have seen the ancient and modern small mines," says archaeologist Jeannine Davis-Kimball of the Centre for the study of Eurasian Nomads, which requires the origin of the dinosaur bones of griffon stories justified. But as for the Arimaspians are the same as a newly-discovered human in an archaic, Davis-Kimball has a fairly strong doubts. "We have mined hunters and gatherers epoch of bronze and small inhabitants along the rivers of Eurasian — former precede nomads by 1000 or maybe even many years more people. I have seen lots of skeletons of many locales in My trip from Hungary to Mongolia, but none is fully correlated with the new hominid line or one-eyed Arimaspians, "Davis-Kimball says, by e-mail. "It is too difficult for me to believe that the hominids living withstand years ago can be perpetuated in mit until Herodotus or about 450 BC."An explanation of the other came in 2008 Archaeology Ethnology and anthropology of Eurasia journal by Dima Cheremisin Russian Academy of Sciences, which looked at the ancient people of Siberia, the Pazyryk culture iron age tribe burial mounds dot the mountains of Altai. "Mythical griffon is the most popular figure in the art of the Pazyryk culture, suggesting that people identified with the" Pazyryk culture griffons protection gold, "said by Aristeas and Herodotus," Cheremisin noted.And cryptozoologists, who study the legendary creatures, proposed a similar ancient explanations for people in the past, to the emergence of the Yeti or Bigfoot. Bernard Heuvelmans, father of modern Cryptozoology, theorized in 1980, that such emergence of wild individuals may be based on the ancestral memories of course Neanderthals Of, enabling that people seem to have interbred with Neanderthals, in accordance with the may report in the journal Science led by Svante Pääbofor a long time, researcher of ancient genome which also co-authored the report discovery Denisova Cave. More than 50 000 years ago, probably in the Middle East, early modern human and intermingling Neanderthals led to modern Europeans and Asians typically having a genome that is Neanderthal 1-4%, according to research.Such crossing is another staple of old stories. Hercules, the hero of the Greek myths, the lion skin around in with the Club over his shoulders and walked in was wondrously strong, somewhat like a Neanderthal, because the origin of the half-Divine. Even the old testament contains references to Nephilim, "giants," who married people and had children. "These stories go back millennia, but they do not go back that far," says the biblical archaeologist Robert Cargill UCLA. "There is no way that the author of the book of Genesis had in mind the Neanderthals." People most likely to occur, the ancient people were trying to clarify the origin of the high, "says Cargil and giving Back to the time when things were so bad that even semi-divine creatures was faulty.Of course, the fun is over. After all the scientists in 2003 discovered another species of humans, Pope John Paul II, nicknamed "hobbits" for their teams puny about three metres high, who had died probably 12 000 years ago in Indonesia So we hobbits, giants and probably cyclopean men wild, running in Prehistory. It is not quite the Lord of the rings, but we certainly Forgive Herodotus for some of its higher stories. Guidelines: You share in the USA TODAY Community, so please keep your comments smart and civil. Don't attack other readers personally and keep your language decent. Use the "report abuse" button to make the difference. Learn more.

The Group seeks to list endangered for Franklin's Bumblebee

Jeff Barnard, associated PressGRANTS PASS, Oregon — protection lodged a petition Wednesday add Bumblebee from Southern Oregon and Northern California to the list of threatened species.Society for invertebrate conservation and Robbin Thorp, entomologist at the University of California at Davis, formally petitioned the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service to protect the insect — called Bombus Franklin — under the endangered species Act. Scott Hoffman Black, Executive Director of the Xerces society in Portland, Oregonsaid petition is part of efforts to reverse this decline in bumblebees and other native bees in the world due to Habitat loss, pesticides and diseases of the transition from commercial greenhouses.The group is preparing a petition to protect other species of Bumblebee. Bee Franklin was elected to This petition because the documentation of its decline is more detailed than for other species. THORP found 94 Franklin bumblebees in 1994, but he has not found any since 2006. Farmers often hire Honeybee pollinate crops, farmers, but uli was decimated by the killer of mysterious Honeybee known as colony collapse disorder.Some farmers are turning to bumblebees to pollinate, particularly for hothouse crops such as tomatoes, peppers and strawberries and crops such as berries, cranberries, raspberries, squash or melon. Bumblebees pollinate approximately 15% of all crops grown in the nation, it is worth 3 billion dollars. "Decrease in Franklin's Bumblebee should serve as an alarm clock that we can begin to lose important pollinators, "Black said. "We hope that will remind us to Franklin's Bumblebee pollinators in the u.s. towards extinction."While many native pollinators have seen decreases related to loss of Habitat, and pesticides, Franklin's Bumblebee and some related species have suffered deep and sudden that Thorp has theorized the theory may be associated with fungi, which has been accidentally transported from bumblebees imported from Europe for commercial use.The work of researchers at the University of Illinois to See if mushrooms known as nosema bombus due to decrease in a number of related bumblebees, Bombus Western once common, Bumblebee and banded patch rusty yellow Bumblebee in the Northeast. Earlier this year, the Xerces society and other conservation groups urged Federal authorities and scientists begin governing shipments of agricultural commercially domesticated bumblebees to protect wild bumblebees from disease threatening their survival.Report of the National Academy of Sciences 2007 blamed the decline of pollinators around the world on a combination of Habitat loss, pesticides, pollution and diseases passing from greenhouses using commercial bumblebees.Copyright 2010 Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed. Guidelines: You share in the USA TODAY Community, so please keep your comments smart and civil. Don't attack other readers personally and keep your language decent. Use the "report abuse" button to make the difference. Learn more.

ROUNDUP.Top of resistant weeds pose a threat to the environment

By David Mercer, associated Press, CHAMPAIGN, fig — when the weed killer ROUNDUP.Mount was introduced in the 1970s, has proved it can kill almost any plant but are still safer than many other herbicides, and enabled farmers to give up major chemicals and reduction of tilling that may contribute to erosion.But 24 years later, sturdy several species of weeds resistant to ROUNDUP.Góra evolved, forcing farmers to return to some of the less secure practice abandoned decades earlier.The situation is worst in the South, where some farmers now walk the fields with hoes, killing weeds in their Great grandfathers were happy to leave behind. And the problem is quickly spreading belt corn and beyond, with the ROUND.Mount now proving unreliable in killing at least 10 species of weeds in at least 22 States. Some species, like the Palmer Amaranth in Arkansas and water hemp and marestail in Illinois, quickly grow and large, producing tens of thousands of seeds. "It's getting too big case," says Mike Plummer, 61-year-old farmer and agronomist at the University of Illinois, which soybeans and cotton near Southern Illinois Creal Springs Community. "If you got it, this is a real big deal."When Monsanto introduced Roundup in 1976, "since sliced bread, it was like the best thing," said Garry Niemeyer, who grows corn and soybeans near Auburn in Central Illinois. The weed killer, known generically as glyphosate, is absorbed by the plants leaves and kills them by blocking the production of the protein they need to grow. The US Environmental Protection Agency considers that have low toxicity for humans and animals, and plants is sprayed on, there is less danger to the environment because it rapidly binds to soil and becomes inactive.The introduction of Monsanto seeds designed to survive the ROUND.Mountain made things even better for farmers, because it can spray on emerging weeds growing crops erase beside them. Seeds containing Monsanto's Roundup Ready features are now used to grow approximately 90% of the soybeans nation and 70% of its maize and cotton.With increased dependence on Roundup herbicide to corn fell from 2,76 pounds per Acre in 1994 to 2.06 in 2005, the most-recent year for which the U.S. Department of Agriculture has no data. Distributed over 81.8 million acres planted in 2005 and annually is a decrease of more than 57 million pounds of herbicides.Farmers also found they could reduce, or in some cases, eliminating tilling, reducing erosion and fuel.But with all herbicides, the more it is used, the more likely that it will run individual plants within a species, which have only a few genetic varieties survive which kills most of their relatives. With each generation of the survivors they represent a larger percentage of species St. Louis-based Monsanto maintains resistance is often overstated, noting that most weeds show signs of immunity. "We believe that glyphosate will remain an important tool in the Arsenal of farmers, "said Monsanto Spokesman John Combest. Nevertheless, the company began paying cotton farmers $ 12 an acre to cover the costs of the other herbicides for Use next to Roundup, to increase its effectiveness.Trend confirmed by certain groups of food safety in the belief that biotechnology will not restrict the use of chemicals in the long term "that is were converted," says Bill Freese, chemist with a Washington, D.C.: Center for food safety, which promotes organic farming. "They intend to significantly increase the use of these chemicals, and that is bad."The first weeds in the United States, which survived the ROUND.Góra, it was found that about 10 years ago in Delaware. Agricultural experts said the use of other chemicals is already Creeping up. Monsanto and other companies develop new seeds intended to resist older herbicides such as dicamba and 2,4-D, killer weed developed during World War II and a component of Agent Orange, which was used to destroy the jungle foliage during the war in Vietnam and is blamed for health problems among veterans.Penn State University Weed scientist David Mortensen, estimated that in three or four years, farmers use dicamba and 2,4-D will be increased by 55.1 million pounds in the year due to resistance to ROUNDUP.Góra. That would both far list of herbicides used intensively by the farmers.Dicamba and 2,4-D easily drift outside the areas where you are sprayed, making them a threat to neighbouring crops and wild plants, "said Mortensen. Which, in turn, could also endanger wildlife. "We found that the plants (wild), which grows on the edge of the field actually supports the beneficial insects such as bees, "he said.Australian scientist Stephen Powles was sort of weed Evangelist recording Roundup, calling this tool in near miraculous agriculture.Australia has been involved in the ROUNDUP.Top of resistant weeds from the mid-1990s, but changes in farming practices that have helped to conduct effective, he said. That is enabled using a wider array of herbicides to kill off weeds ROUND.Góra, resistant and using other methods of weed control.These alternative methods, such as planting cover crops, the so-called "such as rye to deter weeds during the winter and in other cases, when the fields are planted with corn, soybeans and cotton, are key," said Freese, chemist, Center for food safety.Otherwise, he said, "that we are talking here of pesticide treadmill. This is only coming back to kick us in the butt now with resistant weeds. "Copyright 2010 Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed. Guidelines: You share in the USA TODAY Community, so please keep your comments smart and civil. Don't attack other readers personally and keep your language decent. Use the "report abuse" button to make the difference. Learn more.