#entomologists 2017

[nextplayerup]

🦋 - I'd rather stay alone...

🪲🦋🌼

🪳🐝🦟

🕸️ 🪰 🐛

[sixteenseveredhands]

The Oriental Blue Clearwing Moth: these moths were regarded as a "lost species" for more than 130 years, until they were finally sighted again in 2013

For more than 130 years, the Oriental blue clearwing moth (Heterosphecia tawonoides) was known only from a single, badly damaged specimen that was collected in Sumatra in 1887. There were no recorded sightings of this species again until 2013, when entomologist Dr. Marta Skowron Volponi unexpectedly found the moths feeding on salt deposits that had accumulated along the riverbanks in Malaysia's lowland rainforest.

These moths were observed by researchers again in 2016 and 2017, and research indicates that the moths are actually bee-mimics, as they mimic the appearance, sound, behavior, and flight patterns of local bees. Their fuzzy, bright blue appearance might seem a little out of place for a bee-mimic, but those features do appear in several different bee species throughout Southeast Asia.

When the moths are in flight, they bear a particularly strong resemblance to the bees of the genus Thyreus (i.e. cuckoo bees, otherwise known as cloak-and-dagger bees), several of which are also bright blue, with banded markings, dark blue wings, fuzzy legs, and smooth, rounded antennae. The physical resemblance is compounded by the acoustic and behavioral mimicry that occurs when the moths are in flight.

Cloak-and-Dagger Bees: the image at the top shows an Indo-Malayan cloak-and-dagger bee (Thyreus novaehollandiae) in a sleeping position, holding itself upright with its mandibles clamped onto a twig, while the image at the bottom shows a Himalayan cloak-and-dagger bee (T. himalayensis) resting in the same position

The moths also engage in "mud-puddling" among the various bees that congregate along the riverbanks; mud-puddling is the process whereby an insect (usually a bee or a butterfly) draws nutrients from the fluids found in puddles, wet sand, decaying plant matter, carrion, animal waste, sweat, tears, and/or blood. According to researchers, the Oriental blue clearwing moth was the only lepidopteran that was seen mud-puddling among the local bees.

Dr. Skowron Volponi commented on the unusual appearance and behavior of these moths:

You think about moths and you envision a grey, hairy insect that is attracted to light. But this species is dramatically different—it is beautiful, shiny blue in sunlight and it comes out during the day; and it is a master of disguise, mimicking bees on multiple levels and even hanging out with them. The Oriental blue clearwing is just two centimeters in size, but there are so many fascinating things about them and so much more we hope to learn.

This species is still incredibly vulnerable, as it faces threats like deforestation, pollution, and climate change. The president of Global Wildlife Conservation, which is an organization that seeks to rediscover "lost species," added:

After learning about this incredible rediscovery, we hope that tourists visiting Taman Negara National Park and picnicking on the riverbanks—the home of these beautiful clearwing moths—will remember to tread lightly and to take their trash out of the park with them. We also recommend that Americans learn about palm oil production, which is one of the primary causes of deforestation in Malaysia.

Sources & More Info:

Phys.org: Bee-Mimicking Clearwing Moth Buzzes Back to Life After 130 Years

Mongabay News: Moth Rediscovered in Malaysia Mimics Appearance and Behavior of Bees to Escape Predators

Journal of Tropical Conservation Science: Lost Species of Bee-Mimicking Clearwing Moth, H. tawonoides, Rediscovered in Peninsular Malaysia's Primary Rainforest

Frontiers in Zoology: Southeast Asian Clearwing Moths Buzz like their Model Bees

Royal Society Publishing: Moving like a Model - mimicry of hymenopteran flight trajectories by clearwing moths of Southeast Asian rainforests

Medium: Rediscovery in a Glint of Blue

re:wild.org: The "Search for Lost Species" Project

[coochiequeens]

As modern science and better archeology methods reexamine historical sites more of women’s history will emerge

by Sarah Durn September 27, 2021

  

The National Museum of Stockholm's Ride of the Valkyries was painted during the Victorian period, which saw renewed interest in Vikings. Fine Art Images / Heritage Images / Getty Images

In Atlas Obscura’s Q&A series She Was There, we talk to female scholars who are writing long-forgotten women back into history.

In 1871 on the sleepy island of Birka, Sweden, Hjalmar Stolpe, a Swedish entomologist turned archaeologist, discovered the lavish grave of a Viking warrior. Around the seated body were the remains of two sacrificed horses, as well as a double-edged sword, a scramasax (a long, thin knife), a bow, a shield, and a spear—every weapon known to the Viking world. It was an astonishing find, especially since Viking warrior graves rarely contain more than three weapons. There was also a full set of hnefatafl, the board game often known as Viking chess, which indicates the strategic thinking and authority of a war leader. A thousand years ago, the site would’ve abutted the Warrior’s Hall, where a garrison lived to protect the bustling Viking town of Birka. The weapons, game pieces, location: Everything told scholars that the man buried in what is known as grave Bj 581 was a prominent, well-respected Viking warrior. No one was really prepared when DNA tests were conducted in 2017 and a new story began to emerge. This was a prominent warrior, all right, but the occupant of Bj 581 wasn’t a man. She was a woman.

Viking historian Nancy Marie Brown’s new book, The Real Valkyrie: The Hidden History of Viking Warrior Women, explores what life might have been like for the warrior woman of Bj 581.

Using more evidence from the recent tests conducted on the remains, Brown traces her journey from Norway to the British Isles to Kiev then, finally, to Birka. Brown imagines the unnamed warrior meeting other prominent Viking women, such as Gunnhild, Mother of Kings, or Queen Olga, ruler of the Rus Vikings in Kiev. She also explores the Viking sagas and contemporary sources with a new lens.

How did you initially get interested in Vikings—and female Vikings in particular?

When I went to college, I actually wanted to study fantasy writing and, you know, learn to write like Tolkien. I learned very quickly that that was not appropriate for an English major in the 1970s, so I decided to study what Tolkien studied, and he was a professor at Oxford University, teaching Old English and Old Norse. So I started reading all of the Icelandic sagas that I could find in translation. And when I ran out of the English versions, I learned Old Norse so that I could read the rest of them.

One of the things I liked about [the sagas] the most was that they had really interesting women characters. There’s a queen in Norway who appears in about 11 sagas, Queen Gunnhild, Mother of Kings. She led armies. She devised war strategy. And then I was looking at the valkyries and the shieldmaids and thinking, you know, these are really interesting people that have always been considered to be mythological.

So when I learned in 2017 that one of the most famous Viking warrior burials turned out to be the burial of a woman, that just absolutely dazzled my imagination.

Is this the first confirmed grave of a female warrior that we have?

This is the one that has the best proof. There are one or two others that have since been DNA tested and proven to be female. But in each of these cases, it’s hard to say if the person in the grave, whether male or female, actually was a warrior, or if the object that we are interpreting as a weapon was used for hunting or for some other purpose.

In this case, it’s every Viking weapon known to history. So it’s such a clear result. And the DNA was so completely female.

When Stolpe discovered the Viking gravesite Bj 581 in 1887, he assumed the remains were of a man. That assumption was shown to be wrong 140 years later. Rapp Halour / Alamy Stock Photo

What do we know about the life of the Viking warrior woman in Bj 581?

In 2017, by testing her bones and her teeth, [scholars] could say she was between 30 and 40 years old when she died. They could also tell that she ate well all of her life. So she came from a rich family or maybe even a royal one. She was also quite tall, about 5’7”. By the minerals in her inner teeth, [scholars can determine] she may have come from southern Sweden or Norway, and also that she went west maybe as far as the British Isles before her molars finished forming. She didn’t arrive in Birka until she was 16.

We also have her weapons and a little bit of clothing that were found in the grave. And these link her to what is known as the Vikings’ East Way, which was the trade route from Sweden to the Silk Road.

We can link, through the artifacts and through the bones, that she could have traveled from as far west as Dublin to as far east as at least Kiev in the 30 to 40 years of her life.

How do we know that there were Viking warrior women?

They are mentioned many, many, many times in the literature. In most cases, they have been dismissed as mythological because, of course, we know warriors were men. But we don’t know that. That is an assumption that is based on traditional Victorian ideas that because women are mothers, they’re nurturing, they’re peacemakers, and they don’t fight.

That’s not historically true. Women have always fought. And they appear in most cultures until the 1800s, when Viking studies and archaeology pretty much started. So we sort of have this problem of bias in our earliest textbooks.

But now we have actual scientific proof of one warrior woman in the Viking Age. And as the scientists who did the study say they would be very surprised if she was the only one.

This small female Viking warrior figurine discovered in Harby, Denmark, has been interpreted as a mythological valkyrie. John Lee / National Museum of Denmark

There’s this assumption that the warrior men of myth must have been based on real people, but it’s not the same for the mythical warrior women. Why is that?

It’s just an assumption based on what people think women are like. Most of the material we have from the Middle Ages was written by men, and most of the material we have until the 1950s was written by men, and women are slowly making their way into the field of Viking scholarship. But many of them are still working under the assumptions that they were taught.

I noticed when I went back and reread some of the sagas in Icelandic that there wasn’t this clear distinction between the warrior women being mythological and the warrior men being human. When you actually look at the old Norse text, there’s a lot of words that have been translated as “men” that actually mean “people,” but it’s always been translated as “men” because it’s a warrior situation.

If you’re translating, you have to make decisions and sometimes your decisions have repercussions that you don’t expect, like writing women out of the history.

By the time Hjalmar Stolpe excavated Bj 581, he had become adept at recognizing where graves could be found in the hummocky Birka landscape. WS Collection / Alamy Stock Photo

Is it possible for historians to remove all of those biases?

No, I don’t think it is. I think we all are looking through our own lenses. But we have to revisit those sources every generation to see past biases. So when you have layer after layer after layer of removing biases, you may get closer to the truth.

What most surprised you in the course of researching your book?

One of the controversies right now in Viking studies is should we really be talking about men and women at all? Maybe there were all kinds of different genders. We don’t know if there were more than two genders in the Viking age. Maybe it was a spectrum.

If you look at this one group of sagas called the Sagas of Ancient Times that are often overlooked because they have all these fabulous creatures in them, like dragons and warrior women. It’s really interesting [because] these girls grow up wanting to be warriors. They’re constantly disobeying and trying to run off and join Viking bands. But when they do run off and join the Viking band, or, in another case, become the king of a town, they insist on being called by a male name and use male pronouns.

So it was very shocking to me to go back and read it in the original and say, “Wow, all this richness was lost in the translation.”

[taste-the-crown]

— you got their blood on your roses in hand

You'd heard of the Toyohashi Kita Prom Murders, everyone in the area had. It had happened in 2017, not all too long ago, when six innocent students at the Toyohashi Kita all-male highschool were killed. All of the murders were committed in one night, the night of their senior prom.

Not a lot of people know the specifics, only that each victim was killed in rather brutal fashion as one of the most popular boys went insane over what is suspected to be...Well, not being voted Prom King. The boy had became delusional, believing everyone now worshipped him.

When the cops arrived, he threatened suicide, and ended up stabbing himself to avoid jail. That stab was fatal, and now people believe all seven of those who were killed have been bound to the now-abandoned Toyohashi Highschool building, living out their sorrowful days into eternity. Apparently, only one of the murderer's competition went out alive. No one knows his name.

Today, you venture inside the building. Past the weathered police tape, and step into the previously gleeful white building, teeming with school spirit. Nowadays, it's dirty and not many people venture in. But, as you step foot in for the first time, fresh footprints are noticeable in the dirt and dust of the floor. Do you trust your gut instinct...and follow them?

@morals-and-florals @floral-samurai @the-real-kokichi-ouma (any of your blogs work ^^) @theultimatemoralcompass @chaoticblogofmuses @the-friendly-entomologist @human-monokuma // or anyone else. be warned, this blog centers around themes of insanity and mental instability. descriptive gore is present occasionally, and the mystery that shrouds Toyohashi Kita is not a pleasant one at all. be aware, and if you are not in a place to play out this storyline, do not feel obligated to. for anyone curious, the characters are all ocs beside saihara and a few others. typically triggering characters such as iruma miu, ouma kokichi, etc, are not muses in this blog. i myself am not triggered by anyone in dangan rompa besides kaede akamatsu in the slightest manner, but i try to make everyone comfortable no matter how fucked up the story in my blog is. story short, be safe everyone. if you read all the way through this, thanks.

[amrosenberg]

Taxonomies of Fandom

In the 19th century, taxonomies were a big deal. A hundred years after Linnaeus developed the system of binomial nomenclature, Darwinian natural philosophy emphasized that new and existing taxonomies should reflect the principle of common descent, giving rise to today’s system of evolutionary taxonomy. 

If you’ve read the Aubrey-Maturin series of nautical adventure novels, you might be familiar with Testudo aubreii, the majestic tortoise that Stephen Maturin named after his best friend Jack Aubrey. It is an honor not lightly to be given, a sort of taxonomy as immortality: “This is Testudo aubreii for all eternity; when the Hero of the Nile is forgotten, Captain Aubrey will live on in his tortoise. There’s glory for you.”  Putting a name to something makes it easier to understand and discuss; it can provide a starting point for study and for further investigation. 

I’ve been thinking a lot about taxonomy lately, thanks to a few conversations I’ve had this month with people looking for expertise on fans and fan studies for final projects. I’m always happy to chat about this stuff, but sometimes I’m unexpectedly run up against the limits of my expertise: to be honest, I don’t know a lot about sports fans, or the practices of fans of massive commercial domains like Disney.

I’m interested in transformative fandom, which is a relatively small (but impactful) slice of the pie, as well as digital platforms and the ways in which youth audiences in particular utilize affordances of those platforms to express enthusiasm. I suppose I’m a fan scholar in the same way that an expert in ants is an entomologist: it’s a useful bit of nomenclature, but don’t ask them about spiders. There’s obviously a lot of benefits to specialization: but for someone who has aspirations towards the public humanities, I’m increasingly aware of my own need to have a more comprehensive overview of the different types of fans. 

Over the 30 years of fan studies’ existence there have been numerous attempts to do just that: create a useful paradigm that neatly sections off fan practices into families and genii. The split between “transformational” and “affirmational” fandoms, first proposed by a pseudonymous fan in 2009 and later taken up by scholars like Henry Jenkins, is broadly handy, but problematic: it can lead to viewing “affirmational” fandom such as cosplaying, merchandise-buying, and information-collecting (such as in wikis) as purely mimetic and of lesser cultural value than “transformational” fan activities (see Hills, 2014). 

That binary also ignores the large swathes of people that perform both types of fandom, or whose fan practices exist somewhere in between, or not on that axis at all; it’s also slightly outdated. In 2009, transformational fans who wrote erotica about non-canonical ships could still be safely said to be “against” canon in some way, non-sanctioned and acting transgressively out of bounds. I would say that in many cases, that is far from the case today. 

Something I’m interested in is how fan practices develop and spread from one “genus” of fandom to another. (Presuming “species” is an individual fandom, and “genus” is a group of species connected by ancestry and shared practice). You see this in the phenomena in sports RPF, for example: slash fanfiction is a genre of practice developed by media fandom (TV/film fandom) in the 1970s and 80s, but it has been “adopted out” so to speak to form the nucleus of a sub-species of sports fans. 

This circulation of practice is especially notable in the field of transcultural fandom (see Morimoto, 2017). Fan practices developed in the context of East Asian pop music fandom, such as chart-boosting, have made their way over to Western fandoms and communities centering on non-music media objects. Digital platforms afford this circulation, which in turn results in a blurring of boundaries between fan species and increasing difficulty in parsing out which “type” of fan someone is. Practices are contagious and amoebic. The type of sparkly fancams intially made by K-pop idol fans were adopted by Succession stans. 

Like the animal kingdom, there’s just so much going on. To say nothing of what was going on. Which types of fans have gone extinct? Which modes of interacting with media are now archaeological artifacts, thanks to the shifting relationality of the apparatus of cultural production with respect to audiences? 

I think that especially in a time when many groups who might not explicitly consider themselves “fans” have freely taken up digital practices developed and popularized in fandom spaces, investigations into the origins and classifications of fans and fan culture has the potential to provide broader behavioral insights into online communities. 

[here-comes-the-bard]

i love songs that make me go "this is the exact brand of unsettling energy that i think yaevinn gives off". i think it's just like. you see this sweet little guy just being kind and pleasant. but then very quietly, barely perceptibly, you hear the 2017 version of entomologists by GHOST playing whenever you make eye contact with him.

considering the fact that entomologists 2017 is now Nowhere this is an incredibly fucking niche joke but no one does it like it does.

[xtruss]

How Do Animals React during A Total Solar Eclipse? Scientists Plan To Find Out

Scientists Will Observe How Animals' Routines at Several Zoos are Disrupted.

— By Christina Larson | March 7, 202

Washington — When a total solar eclipse transforms day into night, will tortoises start acting romantic? Will giraffes gallop? Will apes sing odd notes?

Researchers will be standing by to observe how animals’ routines at the Fort Worth Zoo in Texas are disrupted when skies dim on April 8. They previously detected other strange animal behaviors in 2017 at a South Carolina zoo that was in the path of total darkness.

“To our astonishment, most of the animals did surprising things,” said Adam Hartstone-Rose, a North Carolina State University researcher who led the observations published in the journal Animals.

While there are many individual sightings of critters behaving bizarrely during historic eclipses, only in recent years have scientists started to rigorously study the altered behaviors of wild, domestic and zoo animals.

Seven years ago, Galapagos tortoises at the Riverbanks Zoo in Columbia, South Carolina, “that generally do absolutely nothing all day … during the peak of the eclipse, they all started breeding,” said Hartstone-Rose. The cause of the behavior is still unclear.

A mated pair of Siamangs, gibbons that usually call to each other in the morning, sang unusual tunes during the afternoon eclipse. A few male giraffes began to gallop in “apparent anxiety.” The flamingos huddled around their juveniles.

Researchers say that many animals display behaviors connected with an early dusk.

In April, Hartstone-Rose’s team plans to study similar species in Texas to see if the behaviors they witnessed before in South Carolina point to larger patterns.

Several other zoos along the path are also inviting visitors to help track animals, including zoos in Little Rock, Arkansas; Toledo, Ohio; and Indianapolis.

This year’s full solar eclipse in North America crisscrosses a different route than in 2017 and occurs in a different season, giving researchers and citizen scientists opportunities to observe new habits.

“It’s really high stakes. We have a really short period to observe them and we can’t repeat the experiment," said Jennifer Tsuruda, a University of Tennessee entomologist who observed honeybee colonies during the 2017 eclipse.

The honeybees that Tsuruda studied decreased foraging during the eclipse, as they usually would at night, except for those from the hungriest hives.

“During a solar eclipse, there’s a conflict between their internal rhythms and external environment,” said University of Alberta's Olav Rueppell, adding that bees rely on polarized light from the sun to navigate.

Nate Bickford, an animal researcher at Oregon Institute of Technology, said that “solar eclipses actually mimic short, fast-moving storms,” when skies darken and many animals take shelter.

After the 2017 eclipse, he analyzed data from tracking devices previously placed on wild species to study habitat use. Flying bald eagles change the speed and direction they’re moving during an eclipse, he said. So do feral horses, “probably taking cover, responding to the possibility of a storm out on the open plains.”

The last full U.S. solar eclipse to span coast to coast happened in late summer, in August. The upcoming eclipse in April gives researchers an opportunity to ask new questions including about potential impacts on spring migration.

Most songbird species migrate at night. “When there are night-like conditions during the eclipse, will birds think it’s time to migrate and take flight?” said Andrew Farnsworth of Cornell University.

His team plans to test this by analyzing weather radar data – which also detects the presence of flying birds, bats and insects – to see if more birds take wing during the eclipse.

As for indoor pets, they may react as much to what their owners are doing – whether they’re excited or nonchalant about the eclipse – as to any changes in the sky, said University of Arkansas animal researcher Raffaela Lesch.

“Dogs and cats pay a lot of attention to us, in addition to their internal clocks,” she said.

— Associated Press | Science Writer

[membracid]

2018 Annual Report

For the last 6 years I’ve been writing a personal annual report. It’s a useful way to evaluate what I did, and a lot of times a year that feels like a failure looks better when I take a longer view.

This will also include some 2017 stuff, since I completely skipped even trying to write a report last year. If you look at these reports over time, you’ll see a pattern: my health has steadily declined since I started working at Purdue. 

I really love what I do there (see adorable photo above), but it’s not much of a surprise that it’s a physically demanding job with a lot of stress associated with it. And as I’ve devoted more and more of my life to this job -- so that I have health insurance, which is REALLY important as you will see below -- the rest of my life has shrunk.

My first year running Bug Bowl in 2015, I had what I thought was a stroke. I’m in charge of a massive outreach event for >30K people, and I’m a part-time employee. Seems reasonable that I might over do it.

I stopped writing for WIRED in 2016, because I didn’t have the time or energy to keep it up. In late April (right after Bug Bowl) I discovered lesions on my spinal cord were the reason I was having trouble walking.

 I turned down most speaking invites in 2017, because I didn’t have the time or energy to travel. I’m pretty sure I had more health things going on, but because I was still paying off my 2016 health bills, I didn’t go to the doctor.  I did still do three awesome things:

I attended SciFoo in August at Google Headquarters

I was a visiting scientist at DragonCon in September

I got to hang out with Mary Roach for a day in December.

I think the big thing I realized in 2017 is that I don’t have do do everything myself. Other people can go hang out at Google or take over my work at Sci Fi Cons. Bug outreach will be more sustainable long term, if more people are doing it.

So 2018. Well.

This year I decided to try to run a crowdfunding campaign for Bug Bowl, since a lot of our equipment was over 20 years old.  The video helps show the scale of Bug Bowl:

Success! Thanks to my many online friends, and community members, we did fund repairs. (you can still make a tax deductible contribution here). THANK YOU!

In 2018, in addition to the successful crowdfunding, I also:

Had a paper accepted to Annals of the Entomological Society of America, and I’m co-author on another that’s been submitted to American Entomologist. 

Did a super fun training for librarians about how science news gets made and covered 

Collaborated with Indiana Humanities on a bee project

Survived 4,800 girl scouts

Had someone in a position of authority at Purdue text me a penis photo

Did a bunch of media interviews, including this one which is about native bees, I SWEAR

My advice to anyone considering a crowdfunding campaign is: don’t. It’s a huge amount of effort. And I was an idiot to take it on during the busiest part of my year. Which is probably why this year’s crop of central nervous system lesions were in my brain, and I finally got my official diagnosis: MS.

I’ve suspected it for quite a while, but it’s only this year I’ve started talking about it. And seriously, folks. Please. Please don’t make your first response to someone telling you they have MS be “Oh, my [aunt/mother-in-law/nephew] had that and they died.”

This is not a fatal disease. It is a pain-in-the-ass disease, and yeah it will get worse over time. I’m gonna die, but so are you. We all will die. “Multiple sclerosis is seldom fatal and life expectancy is shortened by only a few months.”

If you look back at everything I’ve accomplished in the last 15 years: I did that with untreated MS. It’s a pretty decent list of accomplishments for anyone. 

[evoldir]

Fwd: Graduate position: UMontreal.ComputationalInsectDiversity

Begin forwarded message: > From: evoldir@evol.biology.mcmaster.ca > Subject: Graduate position: UMontreal.ComputationalInsectDiversity > Date: 7 November 2023 at 08:11:42 GMT > To: rdmpage@gmail.com > > > MSc scholarship offer: weevil temporal diversity in Panama > > Project description > From 1999 to 2017, at the Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute’s > Barro Colorado Island Biodiversity Research Center in Panama, adjacent > to a tropical forest plot established in 1982 for the study of forest > evolution, ten Malaise traps systematically captured around 15,000 weevil > specimens (family Curculionidae) representing 1,350 species. Specimens > were identified by a weevil specialist.  This computational project will > analyze temporal changes in weevil diversity in relation to environmental > (mainly climatic) and vegetation changes. The sheer volume of data from > the three datasets (insects, plants, meteorology) makes this a project of > the highest scientific calibre.  The person recruited will be supervised > by entomologist Colin Favret and numerical ecologist Pierre Legendre, with > the participation of tropical beetle specialist Hector Barrios Velazco. > > Eligibility requirements > Interest in computational analysis of biodiversity data and experience in > entomology > University degree (B.Sc. or equivalent) > Good oral and written communication skills > We encourage women, LGBTQ+, aboriginal, individuals of all backgrounds, or > with a disability, to apply. > > Benefits > $15,000/year scholarship for 2 years > Additional financial support available (teaching assistantships, > scholarships) > Flexible working conditions (flexible hours, remote work) > Wonderful work environment: entomology lab on the grounds of the Montreal > Botanical Garden; supportive team of friendly colleagues > > Dates > Evaluation of applications will begin in November 2023, but applications > will be considered until the right candidate is recruited. > The study program will last two years, starting in the 2024 winter or > summer term. > > How to apply > Please send (1) a cover letter, (2) your CV, (3) your transcript (photocopy > acceptable), and (4) the names and contact details of two references, to: > Colin Favret, colin.favret@umontreal.ca. > > Colin Favret

[entomoblog]

« En continuant à utiliser des insecticides, on sélectionne les punaises de lit résistantes »

See on Scoop.it - EntomoScience

Les punaises de lit connaissent une recrudescence en France. Parmi les causes identifiées : leur résistance aux insecticides, la multiplication des voyages et l’achat de meubles d’occasion parasités.

  Arezki Izri, Université Sorbonne Paris Nord

  Publié: 11 octobre 2023, 19:25 CEST

  La France connaît une recrudescence de punaises de lit qui fait l’actualité. Comment expliquer ce phénomène ? Quelles mesures s’avèrent réellement efficaces pour lutter contre ces insectes ? Arezki Izri, parasitologue et entomologiste médical (hôpital Avicenne-APHP, Université Sorbonne Paris Nord), fait le point sur les données qui font consensus et celles qui font débat.

    The Conversation : Pourquoi la France connaît-elle une recrudescence de punaises de lit ?

  Arezki Izri : Le phénomène ne date pas d’hier. Les punaises de lit ont commencé à réapparaître en France au tout début des années 90 alors qu’elles avaient été éliminées auparavant par les insecticides. Deux causes principales ont été identifiées : les voyages (les insectes étant transportés dans les bagages) et la résistance des punaises de lit aux insecticides.

  Les Français voyagent beaucoup et peuvent ramener des punaises de lit de partout et les touristes du monde entier sont nombreux à venir en France, ce qui favorise la propagation de ces insectes.

  D’autres facteurs interviennent comme la récupération de meubles d’occasion qui peuvent être parasités. Attention aussi à nos comportements et à nos réactions ! Que deviennent les meubles et matelas dont on se débarrasse et qui, éventuellement, contiennent des parasites ? Ils sont repris par d’autres personnes…

Néanmoins, si une personne trouve une punaise de lit dans un train, cela ne veut pas dire que tous nos trains sont infestés. À partir de rares cas, on ne peut pas faire une généralité. En juillet 2022, l’Agence nationale de sécurité sanitaire de l’alimentation, de l’environnement et du travail (Anses) a mené une enquête, en collaboration avec l’institut de sondage Ipsos, auprès d’un échantillon de 2000 personnes représentatives de la population française. D’après cette enquête, 11 % des ménages français auraient été infestés par les punaises de lit entre 2017 et 2022. Cette enquête montre également qu’il n’existe pas de lien entre le niveau de revenu d’un foyer et le fait d’être victime d’une infestation.

  [Selon l’Anses, un faible niveau de revenu ne favorise pas l’infestation par les punaises de lit. Mais du fait du coût des moyens à mettre en œuvre pour lutter contre ces insectes – près de 900 euros en moyenne par foyer selon les estimations de l’agence – l’infestation peut durer plus longtemps dans des foyers plus modestes, ndlr.]

  T.C. : Pourquoi les punaises de lit sont-elles devenues résistantes aux insecticides ?

  I.A. : On a commencé à recourir aux insecticides contre les punaises de lit depuis les années 40, ce qui a permis de tuer les punaises de lit qui y étaient sensibles. Aujourd’hui, les insecticides principalement utilisés contre les punaises de lit appartiennent à la famille des pyréthrinoïdes. On les classe dans les neurotoxiques car ils pénètrent au niveau du système nerveux de l’insecte.

Les mécanismes à l’origine de la résistance des punaises de lit à ces insecticides sont désormais bien documentés. Il s’agit essentiellement de mutations génétiques modifiant les récepteurs neurologiques des insectes à ces produits.

  Les pyréthrinoïdes pénètrent au niveau d’un orifice de la fibre nerveuse de la punaise de lit, ce qui paralyse l’insecte et le tue. Mais certaines punaises de lit, du fait d’une mutation au niveau de leur ADN, présentent une modification de cet orifice qui empêche l’action de l’insecticide. C’est pourquoi elles deviennent résistantes aux pyréthrinoïdes.

  C’est un peu comme si l’insecticide était une clé et le nerf de l’insecte une serrure. Chez les punaises de lit présentant cette malformation au niveau de l’orifice de la fibre nerveuse, la « clé insecticide » ne rentre plus dans la « serrure nerf de l’insecte ». Les punaises de lit « anormales », c’est-à-dire celles qui présentaient cette malformation, se sont ainsi multipliées.

  Cependant, ce phénomène est beaucoup plus compliqué qu’on ne le pense, parce que cohabitent en permanence des punaises de lit sensibles aux insecticides et d’autres qui y sont résistantes. En effet, quand on élimine les punaises de lit sensibles aux insecticides, celles qui survivent (parce qu’elles sont résistantes aux insecticides) peuvent donner naissance non seulement à de nouvelles punaises résistantes, mais aussi à des punaises de lit sensibles. Tout cela est une question de génétique. Mais en continuant à utiliser des insecticides, on sélectionne de plus en plus les punaises de lit résistantes.

  T.C. : Pourquoi l’Agence de sécurité sanitaire (Anses) recommande-t-elle malgré tout le recours aux insecticides dans son rapport publié en juillet 2023 ?

  I.A. : J’ai participé au groupe de travail de l’Anses. Pour lutter contre les punaises de lit, elle recommande de privilégier les méthodes non chimiques, comme le traitement par la chaleur sèche ou la congélation.

  Concrètement, le nettoyage par la chaleur peut s’opérer par l’intermédiaire d’un appareil professionnel qui diffuse une chaleur sèche pouvant aller jusqu’à 180 °C ou via des nettoyeurs vapeur (dont la vapeur monte à des températures allant de 110 à 180 °C) que l’on peut acheter ou louer. Les petits objets et le linge non lavable peuvent, quant à eux, être placés pendant 2 heures au congélateur à – 20 °C.

  Mais effectivement, au sein du groupe de travail, certains experts défendaient le recours aux insecticides contre les punaises de lit. L’Anses préconise donc de « faire appel à des professionnels de la désinsectisation en cas de persistance de l’infestation ».

Toutefois, j’ai exposé une position divergente, mes arguments étant présentés en annexe du rapport. Avec le laboratoire de parasitologie-mycologie de l’hôpital Avicenne à Bobigny et la mission punaises de lit de l’Agence régionale de santé (ARS) d’Ile-de-France, nos travaux sur la résistance aux punaises de lit ont fait l’objet de trois publications scientifiques. Nos articles viennent enrichir un ensemble de plus de 200 publications scientifiques qui confirment la résistance aux différents insecticides dans le monde.

  (Dans son rapport, l’Anses indique que « l’usage intensif d’un insecticide nuit à son efficacité en augmentant le risque de sélection d’individus résistants ». Elle rappelle également que l’effet répulsif de certains insecticides favorise la dispersion des punaises et que cette « lutte chimique » peut avoir des effets sur la santé humaine et l’environnement, ndlr).

  T.C. : Quelles sont les conséquences pour la santé humaine ?

  I.A. : La punaise de lit dispose d’une trompe qu’elle replie sous son abdomen quand elle est au repos. Pour piquer, elle pointe sa trompe dans la peau et va chercher les vaisseaux sanguins pour faire son repas de sang.

Les boutons surviennent sur les parties du corps découvertes. Toutefois, toutes les personnes ne développent pas de boutons après avoir été piquées par des punaises de lit et un certain nombre des sujets piqués ne présentent que des boutons de petites tailles. Les boutons de grande taille sont observés chez les sujets qui développent une allergie à la salive de l’insecte.

Mais la piqûre d’une punaise de lit ne donne pas de maladie infectieuse. À ce jour, aucune épidémie de maladie infectieuse transmise par les punaises de lit n’a été décrite.

  T.C. : En pratique, comment savoir si un lieu est infesté par des punaises de lit ?

  I.A. : D’abord, il faut apprendre à reconnaître cet insecte. À l’œil nu, une punaise de lit ressemble à un pépin de pomme qui se déplace rapidement. Elle apparaît de couleur rousse. Quand il sort de l’œuf, l’insecte, qui mesure moins d’un millimètre, est transparent et donc quasi invisible. Mais il va tout de suite prendre un repas de sang en piquant, ce qui va le colorer en rouge. A noter que cinq stades larvaires sont nécessaires avant que la punaise de lit devienne adulte.

  Ensuite, chez soi ou quand on se rend dans un hôtel, il faut apprendre à inspecter la literie, en soulevant les draps, le matelas, etc., à la recherche des petites taches noires qui correspondent aux déjections fécales des punaises de lit.

  Quand on intervient au début de l’infestation, par les méthodes mécaniques (ramasser et laver les textiles à 60 °C, passer l’aspirateur et jeter aussitôt le sac puis appliquer de la vapeur sèche aux endroits suspectés d’être les cachettes de l’insecte), on peut éliminer les punaises de lit sans trop de difficultés."

  Insecticide resistance and resistance mechanisms in bed bugs, Cimex spp. (Hemiptera: Cimicidae) | Parasites & Vectors, 29.06.2017 https://parasitesandvectors.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/s13071-017-2232-3

  [Image] Schematic of potential behavioral and physiological changes involved in insecticide resistance in bed bugs

Bernadette Cassel's insight:

  En relation

  Les punaises de lit touchent 11 % des ménages français indépendamment du milieu social, selon l’Anses - De www.lemonde.fr - 19 juillet, 17:35

[kenresearchcompany]

Global Seed Treatment Market is expected to grow further to a size of around US$11 Billion by 2028: Ken Research

The purpose of seed treatment is to disinfect seeds from pathogenic organisms, which could be seed-borne or soil-borne, and storage insects. A host of processes are deployed to treat seeds, including the application of fungicides or insecticides, exposing seeds to solar energy, immersing them in conditioned water, etc. A properly carried out seed treatment process helps prevent the spread of plant diseases, protects seeds from rot, seedling blights, and storage insects, and improves germination.

The Global Seed Treatment Market is estimated to have grown to a size of nearly US$7 Billion in 2022 from approximately US$5 Billion in 2017. The market is expected to grow further to a size of around US$11 Billion by 2028 at a CAGR of nearly 8% for the forecasted period of 2022-2028.

For more information, request a free sample @  https://www.kenresearch.com/sample-report.php?Frmdetails=NTk2MDEx

Seed Treatment adoption rate is expected to grow steadily in the forecasted period as it offers low-cost protection against diseases and soil-borne organisms and protects weak seeds, resulting in improved germination. According to the Agriculture industry publication Agriculture.com, a soybean fungicide/ insecticide treatment may cost anywhere between US$10 and US$12 per 140,000 seed unit. Soybean seeding rates usually vary between 80,000 and 140,000 seeds per acre. When it comes to the effectiveness of such treatments, a 2019 compilation of studies, conducted by agronomists and entomologists from 14 land-grant universities, discovered an improvement of 2 bushels per acre in soybean farming when neonicotinoid IST was combined with a fungicide seed treatment. The best result found in the study was that of a surge of 3.3 bushels per acre.

Another major factor, driving the agriculture industry to adopt Seed Treatment measures, is its capacity to empower seeds to fight against unfavorable weather conditions. Such unfavorable weather conditions might result in cold and damp soils or extremely dry soils that encourage the breeding, growth, and development of fungi spores. For instance, in the United States, in 2010 and 2012, high nighttime temperatures had an immensely negative impact on corn yields. Similarly, premature budding caused by a warm winter resulted in losses worth US$220 million of cherries in Michigan in 2012.

Ingredients used in Seed Treatment products are harmful to humans, animals, and also to seeds in some cases. Treated seeds that go unsold can not be used as animal feed. The limiting peripheral or ancillary use of these treated seeds often hampers the scalability of the market. Treating the seeds at the correct dosage rate is also critical to the treatment’s success. For instance, seeds with high moisture percentage can get easily damaged when treated with concentrated liquid products.

In the initial days of the pandemic, the Global Seed Treatment Market suffered supply chain disruptions stemming from restricted movements of vehicles, closed markets, and a limited supply of raw materials. However, soon after the initial days were over, the manufacturing of seed treatment agrochemicals resumed under the category of essential goods production in many countries. The rise in consciousness around health and efficient farming techniques also boosted the demand for high-value seeds.

Key Trends by Market Segment

By Type:  According to Ken Research’s analysis, the majority of the seed treatment procedures are carried out through the Chemical route.

Chemical treatment of seeds can be done by applying insecticides, fungicides, or nematicides, including fumigants, carbamates, etc. Non-chemical or biological seed protection processes involve bio-insecticides, bio-fungicides, and bio-nematicides.

According to the observations put out by the Iowa State University, fungicide seed treatment can be beneficial for seeds with less than 80% germination rate. These types of seeds are typically considered to be of low vigor. Fungicides are also considered effective treatment tools when seeds are planted early in cold or wet soils and reduced till and no-till fields.

For more information, request a free sample @  https://www.kenresearch.com/sample-report.php?Frmdetails=NTk2MDEx

By Treatment/Application Technique: The seed coating segment is estimated to occupy the largest market share in 2022 as far as treatment/application techniques are concerned.

The techniques of seed dressing involve treating crop seeds with fungicides and/or insecticides so that they are well-equipped to fight out the fungal diseases and insects that attack from both below and above ground. The process of seed coating implies covering the seeds with manageable amounts of exogenous materials. Film coating or microbial coating are popular seed coating types. Finally, in the process of Seed Pelleting, inert materials are added to the seeds to increase their weight, size, or shape.

Seed pelleting helps in planting crops that otherwise have irregularly shaped seeds. According to the data presented by the seed treatment company Seed Dynamics Incorporated, pelleting can increase the weight of seeds from anywhere between 1000% (10X) to 4,000% (40X). Usually, 88000 seeds of raw begonia weigh 1 gram. However, seed pelleting can increase the weight 100 times and take it to an average of 857 seeds per gram.

By Crop: The Cereal and Grains segment is expected to emerge as the largest crop segment as far as the application of seed treatment techniques is concerned.

Production in the World Cereal Market, according to the data provided by the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO), almost 2,645 million tons of cereals were produced during the 2018-2019 period, and the production was estimated to cross the mark of 2,800 million tons in 2022.

Similarly, production in the coarse grain market in the world was estimated to grow from a little more than 1,400 million tons to 1,500 million tons in 2022.

Treating seeds help reduce loss in the production of cereal grains due to pests and diseases.

By Formulation: Although the liquid formulation segment is expected to account for the largest share in 2022, the dry formulation segment is estimated to witness faster growth during the forecasted period.  

There are several types of liquid formulations that agriculturists try out on a regular basis for a range of crop seed types. For instance, soaking paddy seeds in 1% Potassium Chloride solution for 12 hours helps improve the germination potential. A similar outcome is achieved when Sorghum seeds are soaked in Sodium Chloride and Potassium Dihydrogen Phosphate solutions for 12 hours.

Dry formulation seed treatments, on the other hand, help maintain the integrity of seed coatings. The growth in this segment is driven by the utilitarian benefits of the process: it is easy to apply and store and comes at a low cost.

The effectiveness of these treatments, dry and/or wet, has been recorded by many agencies/organizations/institutions. For instance, data published by the Manitoba government showed that seed treatments helped prevent yield loss 22% of the time in soybean seeds. Studies conducted in North Dakota, on wheat seeds, over a period of 14 years, showed a 7.2% stand increase over an untreated check, 73% of the time. However, the effectiveness often varies depending on how the climate is. For instance, another research at Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada in Saskatoon found that neonicotinoid seed treatments were more effective in dry soils than in wet soils, and at 20-30 degree centigrade than at 10 degrees.

By Function: The seed protection segment occupies the largest share of the seed treatment market when seen from the prism of functions. The seed enhancement segment mostly takes care of plant nutrition needs.

Seed protection procedures can be chemical or non-chemical/biological. Seed enhancement procedures involve the application of biologicals, such as bio-fertilizers, bio-stimulants, plant growth regulators, seed priming, and seed disinfection procedures.

Protection and enhancement techniques are often deployed together for improved results. A scientific study conducted in 2018 showed how the solid matrix seed priming technique can be effectively combined with seed coating procedures. The experiment was conducted on the Kaibab Plateau in Arizona. The process resulted in 66-82% faster emergence from primed-seed pods than the untreated seeds. Seedlings that stemmed out from the primed-seed pods had 2.9-3.8-times higher density than untreated seeds.

By Region: North America is estimated to continue with its dominance over the seed treatment market even in the forecasting period, majorly due to the large-scale adoption of biotech crops in countries like the United States and Canada.

The United States has been one of the earliest adopters of Biotech crops. Biotech crops were introduced in 1996. Within the next seventeen years, by 2013, more than ninety percent of all cotton, soybeans, and corn planted in the United States was Biotech. More than 173 million acres were planted with biotech seeds in the United States by 2013.

The adoption of biotech in farming, along with genetically modified crops, has also been high in the Asia Pacific region, turning it into one of the most high-potential markets for seed treatment.

Japan, for instance, is among one of the world’s largest per-capita importers of GM food and feed and has approved more than 300 GM products for food, including 141 varieties of crops. The Philippines has also exhibited remarkable progress in adopting seed treatment. It was the first country in Asia to have given commercial clearance to Rice that was treated with beta-carotene for enhanced nutritional value.

The seed treatment market has also flourished in Europe and many LAMEA countries, such as Brazil and Argentina, to address the need for high-quality seeds, prevent anthrax diseases, combat the occasional attacks of the Yellow virus, et al.

To more regional trends, Ask for a Customization @ https://www.kenresearch.com/ask-customization.php?Frmdetails=NTk2MDEx

Competitive Landscape

The Global Seed Treatment market has nearly 150 players, including globally diversified players, regional players, and country-niche players having their expertise in addressing region-specific needs to treat seeds in a way that is conducive to the local climate conditions.

Large global players constitute ~20% of the market in terms of the number of competitors, while regional players hold the second largest share. Some of the major players in the market include Adama Agricultural Solutions, Bayer AG, BASF, Syngenta AG, Sumitomo Chemical Co., Ltd., Dow, Corteva, Inc., Croda International Plc., Nufarm, Novozymes, and more, among others.

Conclusion

The Global Seed Treatment Market Size, Segments, Outlook, and Revenue Forecast 2022-2028 is expected to continue growing on a steady and moderately-paced trajectory. The need for efficient farming is increasing worldwide. Farmers and agricultural farm owners are looking for ways to reduce the loss of yield, improve their seed’s germination potential, and protect seeds from the negative impacts of irregular climate, pests, insects, and diverse types of crop diseases. As of 2019, genetically modified crops occupied 190 million hectares of cultivable fields, indicating a growing inclination towards leveraging science and technology for the improvement of agricultural production. This inclination would serve as a tailwind for the Global Seed Treatment Market in the forecasted future.

Note: This is an upcoming/planned report, so the figures quoted here for market size estimate, forecast, growth, segment share and competitive landscape are based on initial findings and might vary slightly in the actual report. Also, any required customizations can be covered to the best feasible extent for Pre-booking clients and report delivered within maximum 2 working weeks.

Market Taxonomy

By Type         

Chemical

Non-Chemical

By Treatment / Application Technique

Seed Dressing

Seed Coating

Seed Pelleting

By Crop         

Grains and Cereals

Oilseeds and Pulses

Fruits and Vegetables

Other Crop Types (Forages, Alfalfa, Flower seeds, etc.)

By Formulation         

Liquid Formulation

Dry Formulation

By Function  

Seed Protection

Seed Enhancement

By Region     

North America (USA, Canada, Mexico)

Europe (Germany, UK, France, Spain, Italy)

Asia Pacific (China, Japan, South Korea, India, Indonesia, Australis)

Latin America, Middle East, and Africa (LAMEA)

Key Companies        

Adama Agricultural Solutions

Bayer AG

BASF

Syngenta AG

Sumitomo Chemical Co., Ltd.

Dow

Corteva, Inc.

Croda International Plc.

Nufarm

Novozymes A/S

[snailss-fmp]

RESEARCH <> ENTOMOLOGY

nysmuseum. (2020). Field Trip to the NYSM: The Entomology Collection. [Online]. Youtube. Last Updated: 8th July. Available at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mlYeKg9s2Ck [Accessed 28 November 2022].

WIRED. (2022). How Entomologists Use Insects to Solve Crimes | WIRED. [Online]. Youtube. Last Updated: 21st October. Available at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j8PoWlQkduA [Accessed 28 November 2022].

CALIFORNIA Magazine. (2017). Why Entomology? – Bugged, Episode 3. [Online]. Youtube. Last Updated: 3rd October. Available at: Why Entomology? – Bugged, Episode 3 [Accessed 28 November 2022].

Entomological Hub. (2020). Insect collections in museums | how to collect insects | entomology lectures | Module 01.07. [Online]. Youtube. Last Updated: 4th August. Available at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LSuFFirfWOo [Accessed 28 November 2022].

Sci-ology. (2018). Defining Characteristics of the Insect Orders | Entomology. [Online]. Youtube. Last Updated: 7th December. Available at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QL906_79HJM [Accessed 28 November 2022].

[dailyunsolvedmysteries]

Bizarre Things That Happened In 2020

A star went missing - For nearly 2 decades, astronomers studied a star in a galaxy 75 million light years away, reports The Atlantic. Recently, they looked at latest observations and realised they could not find it anymore. It could be the first instance of a star collapsing into a black hole without first exploding into a supernova.

Mystery drones over Colorado and Nebraska - In January 2020, people in the US states of Colorado and Nebraska began to report mysterious drones in the sky. According to the New York Post, rumours flew thick and fast about drones as big as car flying in grid patterns in the night sky.

Murder hornets -  The "murder hornet" turned up at Washington state near the Canadian border, sparking panic. "An Asian giant hornet can sting you multiple times and deliver larger doses of venom just because of the size of them," said Sven-Erik Spichiger, managing entomologist at the Washington state Agriculture Department, about the murder hornets. "What we're told from the literature is that most people can survive one or two stings"

A monkey stole COVID samples -  In a bizarre incident in one of Uttar Pradesh's largest government hospitals, a monkey attacked a lab technician, snatched vials containing blood samples from three coronavirus patients and escaped. A video of the incident, which occurred in May, shows the monkey sitting atop a tree with the samples it stole.

Poland accidentally invaded Czech Republic -  In a minor misunderstanding, the Polish military recently invaded and briefly occupied territory in the Czech Republic - and stopped locals from entering a church in their own country. The misunderstanding was quickly cleared up and the Polish army retreated.

Pentagon released 3 UFO videos -  The United States Department of Defense officially released three short videos showing "unidentified aerial phenomena". In a statement dated April 27, the Department of Defense said that the videos were taken by Navy pilots in 2004 and 2005, and had been circulating on the Internet since they were leaked in 2007 and 2017.

Locust Invasion - Locusts invaded India’s capital, coined as the worst in decades. India’s response team had a hard time containing the swarmageddon, affecting almost half-dozen states.

Mysterious Seed Packages -  Unsolicited seed packages appeared in mails across 30 states.

Firenado in California -  A rare fire tornado was spotted near a fire in California.

Monoliths were erected across the world -  Mysterious monoliths were erected and then removed in Utah, Romania, California and even San Antonio.  The first monolith appeared Nov. 23 in Utah’s red-rock desert. Days later, it quickly vanished with no trace of who was responsible for placing it or removing it. Soon after, another monolith was found in northern Romania on top of a hill.

[brokehorrorfan]

Phenomena will be released on 4K Ultra HD on March 8 via Synapse Films, in conjunction with Arrow Films. Limited to 6,000, it's available to pre-order for $59.95 from Synapse.

The 1985 Italian giallo film is directed by Dario Argento (Suspiria, Deep Red) from a script he co-wrote with Franco Ferrini (Demons). Jennifer Connelly, Daria Nicolodi, Dalila Di Lazzaro, Donald Pleasence, and Patrick Bauchau star.

All three versions of the film - the 116-minute original Italian version, the 100-minute international cut, and the 83-minute U.S. Creepers cut - have been newly restored in 4K with Dolby Vision HDR.

The limited edition set includes a slipcase with artwork by Wes Benscoter, reversible sleeve, booklet, fold-out poster, and six mini lobby cards. Special features are listed below.

Disc 1: Italian version:

Lossless Italian DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 and PCM 2.0 stereo soundtracks, derived from the original 4-channel Dolby Stereo elements (with English subtitles)

Lossless “hybrid” English/Italian DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 soundtrack

Audio commentary by Murder by Design: The Unsane Cinema of Dario Argento author Troy Howarth

Of Flies and Maggots - 2017 feature-length documentary with co-writer/director Dario Argento, actors Fiore Argento, Davide Marotta, Daria Nicolodi and Fiorenza Tessari, co-writer Franco Ferrini, cinematographer Romano Albani, production manager Angelo Iacono, special optical effects artist Luigi Cozzi, special makeup effects artist Sergio Stivaletti, makeup artist Pier Antonio Mecacci, underwater camera operator Gianlorenzo Battaglia, and composers Claudio Simonetti and Simon Boswell

Interview with musician Andi Sex Gang

Italian and international theatrical trailers

“Jennifer” music video, directed by Dario Argento

Japanese pressbook gallery

Disc 2: International & Creepers versions:

Lossless English DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 and PCM 2.0 stereo soundtracks on the international version, derived from the original 4-channel Dolby Stereo elements

Lossless English PCM 1.0 mono soundtrack on Creepers, mastered from the original 3 track DME magnetic mix

Audio commentary on the international version by film historians Derek Botelho and David Del Valle

The Three Sarcophagi - Visual essay by Arrow producer Michael Mackenzie comparing the different cuts of Phenomena

Creepers theatrical trailer

U.S. radio spots

Also included:

Booklet featuring liner notes by Mikel J. Koven, Rachael Nisbet, and Leonard Jacobs

Fold-out poster

Six lobby card reproduction artcards

The young Jennifer Corvino (Jennifer Connelly) is sent to a private Swiss academy for girls where a vicious killer is on the loose. Jennifer has the unique ability to telepathically communicate with insects and an entomologist, Dr. John McGregor (Donald Pleasence), enlists her help in locating the murderer. As the mystery unfolds, they find themselves in a bizarre murder plot with maggots, mutants and razor-wielding chimpanzee mayhem! Can Jennifer uncover the killer’s identity before becoming a victim herself?

[lesbian-roguefort]

HAPPY BIRTHDAY ENTOMOLOGISTS 2017??? BTW????????