ARS Newslink

ARS News Service
USDA Agricultural Research Service
October 1, 2010

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Waging war for the wiliwilis:
An ARS entomologist played a key role in "recruiting" a black, two-millimeter-long wasp from East Africa, to help wage war on one of its own kind-the Erythrina gall wasp, an invasive species that's decimated Hawaii's endemic wiliwili (Erythrina sandwicensis) and introduced coral bean trees. (9/27)
http://www.ars.usda.gov/is/pr/2010/100927.htm

Digging deep to curb ammonia emissions:
Dairy farmers can greatly reduce ammonia emissions from their production facilities by injecting liquid manure into crop fields below the soil surface, according to research by ARS scientists. (9/28)
http://www.ars.usda.gov/is/pr/2010/100928.htm

Blueberries to fight hardening of the arteries:
Blueberries may help fight atherosclerosis, also known as hardening of the arteries, according to results of a preliminary U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA)-funded study with laboratory mice that provides the first direct evidence that blueberries can help prevent harmful plaques or lesions, symptomatic of atherosclerosis, from increasing in size in arteries. (9/29)
http://www.ars.usda.gov/is/pr/2010/100929.htm

Surprising news about black aspergilli:
ARS scientists in Athens, Georgia, have reported for the first time that several species of Aspergillus niger, or black aspergilli, are capable of infecting corn and peanuts as endophytes, and the researchers also showed that, under laboratory conditions, these species produced mycotoxins. (9/30)
http://www.ars.usda.gov/is/pr/2010/100930.htm

The state of our rangelands:
A new report by ARS and NRCS scientists and conservationists and their U.S. Geological Survey colleagues shows that non-federal rangelands in the Western United States are productive, but that non-native grasses and shrubs pose a potential threat to the rangelands' productivity. (10/1)
http://www.ars.usda.gov/is/pr/2010/101001.htm

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Newslink is the weekly e-mail pointer for web links to stories issued each workday by the Agricultural Research Service, U.S. Department of Agriculture.

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ARS News Service, Information Staff, Agricultural Research Service
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