cow
dr. dolittle | July 21, 2017 Image by Keith Weller, USDA via Wikimedia Commons
Researchers at the International AIDS Vaccine Initiative at Scripps Research Institute have discovered that cows can produce antibodies that effectively neutralize HIV. Thus far, developing an effective vaccine for HIV has been hampered by the ability of the virus to mutate. Some people who have been infected with the virus for a period of years develop antibodies that are able to attack parts of the virus that do not mutate. Cows exposed to HIV, on the other hand, begin developing these antibodies within weeks of exposure to the virus. In…
dr. dolittle | September 21, 2016No joke: California Governor Jerry Brown signed a bill to regulate 'gas' emissions from cows along with other sources of greenhouse gases, of course. According to an interview from NPR, dairy cows are the number one producer of methane in California. The problem with methane is that it is a major component of smog, although according to scientists at the University of California Santa Barbara, it is not the leading cause of global warming. In fact, agriculture-related methane and carbon dioxide emissions are responsible for only 6-7% of greenhouse emissions.
Researchers at Penn State…
drorzel | November 4, 2010I'm spending the day trying to get some work done on the book-in-progress, so I'm avoiding both work- and blog-related stuff. I don't want to leave the site completely quiet, though, so here's a question to ponder, relating to SteelyKid's continuing fascination with Goodnight Moon:
How does a cow jump over the moon?
The father of one of SteelyKid's classmates, who is not originally from the US, asked why there's a cow jumping over the moon in that (or, as SteelyKid puts it: "Cow jumping MOON!!"), and I don't have a good answer. I'm aware of the nursery rhyme and the Tolkien joke, but why…
gregladen | February 19, 2009If Arnold was a bovine, he'd look like this.
Now, the lady cows say that they find this disgusting, but all the boy cows don't believe that and are intimidated nonetheless.
But seriously, this looks to me like a mutation that we've known about for some time, and published versions of mice that look like this cow (but with cute little ears and a different tail) are also out there somewhere. Imagine this mutation in a human. Would that be a Neanderthal? Sort of?
Story here.
zooillogix | August 26, 2008After reviewing thousands of images of cows on Google Earth, the new gold standard in data collection, scientists have determined that cows generally point north. Lest you think this is some crap news my brother grabbed from the Daily Mail, Dr. Sabine Begall and colleagues from the University of Duisburg-Essen published this discovery in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences journal.
When you Google "Cow Compass" this is what happens.
After factoring out variations like wind, terrain, sun, time of day, time of year, temperature, humidity, barometric pressure, dew point, breed of…
zooillogix | May 29, 2007In 2001, scientists at New Zealand biotechnology firm ViaLactia (that translates to Milk Road, right?), identified a cow with a genetic mutation that resulted in its producing skim milk. Since then, Milk Road has successfully bread a strain of cows from the original- Marge - that only produce skim milk. Marge and her offspring produce milk that is very low in saturated fats but high in healthier polyunsaturates and monounsaturated fats. This type of milk is apparently ideal for technological marvels like more-spreadable butter. Currently, dairy company's specializing in skim milk must…