The female mosquito is the most dangerous animal in the world.
Every year, her bite spreads diseases and parasites that kill almost one million people and cause debilitating illnesses in hundreds of millions more.
www.oxitec.com
We need new tools and I believe the use of GM mosquitoes brings hope.
Annelies Wilder-Smith, Nanyang Technological University
* MEMORIAL FOR A MOSQUITO *
Thousands of male Aedes aegypti mosquitoes carrying the Wolbachia bacterium were released.
These Gene-mozzies have an engineered modification which leaves their female counterpart sterile.
A human made problem (dengue fever as a result of inadequate housing and public health systems) is solved by human intervention (genetic alteration of the assumed aggressor).
A NEW LINE OF DEFENSE was produced during a stay in Singapore. The spatial proximity of ethnic, religious and ecosystemic diversity
was something that impressed me. In the subway, all announcements are made in the four official languages (English, Malay, Mandarin, Tamil).
Next to a Buddhist temple one can find a Catholic church or an Islamic mosque - in a miniature-sque style, never old, always colourful, often well attended.
And albeit Singapore is often dubbed as a young, super-tech-ready country, one can find many and old histories in regard to its location as a trade hotspot and its role in ethnic merging.
Traditions have been passed and shaped in inter- and cross-ethnic ways so to say.
Every year, the country is reclaiming land on a large scale.
Creating cohesive landmasses creates ecological impacts on swamps, species and reefs.
Much native flora and fauna have gone extinct whereas new, foreign flora and fauna have increased its biodiversity.
|