Illumination 2.0

Back before there was Drunk History , back before The Man Show , there was media circulating that targeted the shaky hand that held the urine-soaked wallet.   My friend from high school, Herb Rosen, took his experience of bartending in Chicago's dives and opened his own place-- Liars Club  over on Fullerton Ave in Chicago.  It was (is) a crusty place in a (then) no-name neighborhood that had a KISS pinball machine and $1.00 drafts of PBR.  It is still there, still a dump, but the best place in Chicago for a cheap beer and Misfits or Decendents on the jukebox. It was where an entrepreneurial effort of catering reading material for late-night misfits would gain some traction...    Self Publishing Roots During high school in the 80's my friends and I were basement publishers.  We printed media called "fanzines" -- photocopied reviews of bands, music and other sundries.  It was a place for creative energy and clever writing before the internet gave us an instant, wo

This week's podcast--   Are food labels adding clarity or confusion?  Focus groups show that consumer sentiment toward food labels is changing.  Colleen Parr-Dekker is the Director of Communications at Elanco.  They have performed extensive focus group analysis and consumer surveys to understand how consumers feel about labels and food.  The excess of abstract information and claims has left most consumers unsure what labels even mean.  Consumers are clueless about terms like “antibiotic free” or “free range”, while companies use these tactics as marketing angles to differentiate their products.  Surveys show that terms like “natural” or “organic” are losing influence.  The results are surprising!

The website GM Watch has harassed me for years, providing false, derogatory information about me.  I ignore it.  Most people ignore it.  They speak to their echo chamber and that's about it.  Recently they have found a tremendous ally in someone that used to be very close to me. She has been funneling information to them that is happily crafted into willful misinterpretations that are potentially quite damaging.  They then used bots to create spam letters to my university calling for investigation.  They only generated 1000.  However, the smear campaign fueled by personal issues to resolve has forced me out of my current position.  It is not fair to my university, students, farmers or colleagues to have leadership working with tremendous personal distraction. Anti-GE interests have been relentlessly spamming social media and email of journalists and papers to cover the story.  Nobody is interested. The Independent Florida Alligator  is going to run a story based on this a

In this week's podcast Dr. Paul Vincelli interviews Dr. Devang Mehta about genetic engineering solutions to plant virus problems.  Dr. Mehta describes the use of RNAi and CRISPR techniques, and some of the surprising things learned from their use.  The work is mostly performed in cassava, a key crop in the Developing World.

Extension specialists are the boots-on-the ground connection between the university and the farm. This week's podcast is a conversation with Dr. Chad Lee, Extension Agronomist at the University of Kentucky. Dr. Lee tells it like it is. How important are GE crops? Are they the most important technology on the farm? What about common myths? Soy, corn, no till, glyphosate, dicamba.... A wonderful conversation! This week's podcast.

I can't say for sure that I've ever met Shawn Smith.  Chances are that I likely rode with him at some point, but was likely riding behind him as this elite cyclist disappeared over the hill in front of me. Gainesville, FL has a pretty tight-knit cycling community of riders, with excursions pedaling out daily from the edges of town on to beautiful country roads.  Hardly a time goes by that group rides are buzzed by drivers passing too close. Some do it because they are impatient and won't slow down to safely pass. Some to it on purpose because they feel a sick need to harass athletes or recreational riders.  Others do it because they are staring at a phone, reaching under a seat, or engaging any one of dozens of activities not conducive to driving.  We see it every day as drivers.  That car drifting  into the bike lane, then rapidly pulling back to where it is supposed to be. Every. Damn. Day. Distracted drivers kill almost ten people a day, and injure about 1000 a day

When I read it I think, "No S-- Sherlock." But to Carrie Gillam this is rhetorical red meat, another way to sell a book, put dollars in her pocket, and advance a cause --- by exploiting credulous media and readers.  Her second recent article in the Guardian says that the herbicide formulation Roundup is more toxic to human cells than glyphosate alone.  This revelation has been published many times before in actual journals, so this is not new information, just time to stoke the fear fire a bit more. Yes, products formulated to penetrate cells are usually toxic to cells-- in a petri dish.  Use of the product on crops means your cells do not get the same exposure, and your body is not a layer of slime in a Petri dish.    Researchers have examined glyphosate for toxicity or endocrine disruption potential against tissue culture cells. These limited systems are great ways to start understanding how a compound might affect cells, which can then inform later studies in