Category: Announcement

A paper titled, “Sexual repurposing of juvenile aposematism in locusts” has been published by Dr. Greg Sword (Texas A&M University) and his colleagues. This work has been highlighted in the Texas A&M AgriLife Today: Study identifies sex-adapted color-change gene in locusts.

Today, NCBI released the genome of the desert locust, sequenced under the direction of Dr. Childers at the USDA, who is also a BPRI faculty member. Please see the associated press release for further details. The new annotated genome is available by following this link.

The National Center for Biotechnology Information (NCBI) has finished the automated annotation of the Central American locust genome, Schistocerca piceifrons, as of March 28, 2022. This is the second of a set of six genomes that will be processed by NCBI in the coming months and builds up on the release of the Schistocerca americana genome a few weeks ago. The new annotated genome is available at https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/genome/annotation_euk/Schistocerca_piceifrons/100/

The National Center for Biotechnology Information (NCBI) has finished the automated annotation of the American bird grasshopper genome, Schistocerca americana, as of March 23, 2022. This is the first of a set of six genomes that will be processed by NCBI in the coming months and represents an important milestone for the BPRI. The new annotated genome is available at https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/genome/annotation_euk/Schistocerca_americana/100/

Mr. Hector Medina, Coordinator, National Grasshopper and Locust Program of the National Food Safety and Quality Service of Argentina recently met with the BPRI outreach committee to share his experience in locust management activities in Argentina. He explained that Argentina mostly follows a farmer-centered mitigation approach. He emphasized that the most critical outcome that his program expects from the BPRI is to provide information on biological factors that contribute to changing the ‘solitarious’ and ‘gregarious’ phases of grasshoppers. These biological factors will help improve the early warning system predicting locust swarming and ultimately help reduce crop harm.

The BPRI in its starting phase has positions open at several levels. Please see our Jobs page for details.