Organic farming can yield up to three times as much food as conventional farming on the same amount of land---according to new findings which refute the long-standing assumption that organic farming methods cannot produce enough food to feed the global population.

Researchers from the University of Michigan found that in developed countries, yields were almost equal on organic and conventional farms. In developing countries, food production could double or triple using organic methods, said Ivette Perfecto, professor at U-M's School of Natural Resources and Environment, and one the study's principal investigators.

Scientists at the University of Minnesota have been evaluating the impact of antibiotic feeding in livestock production on the environment.

This particular study, funded by the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA), evaluated whether food crops accumulate antibiotics from soils spread with manure that contains antibiotics. Results from the study are published in the July-August 2007 issue of the Journal of Environmental Quality.Soil Science Society of America Meeting in November 2006.

Scientists have made significant advances towards the development of a technique that could be used to confirm whether someone is infected with variant CJD.

The technique, which has so far been used mainly in animal models, works by mimicking and accelerating the replication of prions - abnormal proteins that progressively kill off brain tissue and are thought to cause the disease.

The development of a living being is based on general laws written into the genetic code of each cell and which enable them to develop a specialist function, modifying the way they divide, their form and their behavior.

These changes are coordinated through a series of instructions that must be correctly interpreted within the cell, and this means that the information must pass along a pathway of signalling molecules. These pathways have been conserved across evolution, and therefore studies using models such as the fruit fly provide information about these same processes in humans and other animals.

Not all fat is bad. Brown fat is a type of adipose tissue that generates heat and counters obesity caused by overeating.

Researchers at Dana-Farber Cancer Institute have identified a long-sought "master switch" in mice for the production of brown fat and they say that turning up the equivalent switch in people might be a new strategy for treating overweight and obesity. The investigators said their next step is to rev up the control in mice and overfeed them to see if they are resistant to becoming obese.

Brightly colored birds are among the species most adversely affected by the high levels of radiation around the Chernobyl nuclear plant, ecologists have discovered. The findings help explain why some species are harder hit by ionising radiation than others.

Dr Anders Møller of the Université Pierre et Marie Curie and Professor Timothy Mousseau of the University of South Carolina examined 1,570 birds from 57 different species in the forests around Chernobyl at varying distances from the reactor. They found that populations of four groups of birds - those whose red, yellow and orange plumage is based on carotenoids, those that laid the biggest eggs, and those that migrated or dispersed the furthest - declined more than other species.