Studies have investigated the potential of using farmed insects in animal feeds; however, little research has been done using wild-caught insects for this purpose. Concerns about inadequate quantities collected, environmental impacts, and the spread of pathogens contribute to the preferred utilization of farmed insects. Nevertheless, by harvesting certain pest species from intensified agricultural operations, producers could provide their animals with affordable and sustainable protein sources while also reducing pest populations. This study explores the possibility of collecting large quantities of pest flies from livestock operations and analyzes the flies' nutritional content, potential pathogen load, and various disinfection methods. Using a newly designed mass collection-trapping device, we collected 5 kg of biomass over 13 wk, primarily house flies, from a poultry facility. While a substantial number of pests were removed from the environment, there was no reduction in the fly population. Short-read sequencing was used to compare the bacterial communities carried by flies from differing source populations, and the bacterial species present in the fly samples varied based on farm type and collection time. Drying and milling the wild-caught flies as well as applying an additional heat treatment significantly reduced the number of culturable bacteria present in or on the flies, though their pathogenicity remains unknown. Importantly, these disinfection methods did not affect the nutritional value of the processed flies. Further research is necessary to fully assess the safety and viability of integrating wild-caught insects into livestock feed; however, these data show promising results in favor of such a system.

Insects are a promising source of high-quality protein, and the insect farming industry will lead to higher sustainability when it overcomes scaling up, cost effectiveness, and automation. In contrast to insect farming (raising and breeding insects as livestock), wild insect harvesting (collecting agricultural insect pests), may constitute a simple sustainable animal protein supplementation strategy. For wild harvest to be successful sufficient insect biomass needs to be collected while simultaneously avoiding the collection of nontarget insects. We assessed the performance of the USDA Biomass Harvest Trap (USDA-BHT) device to collect flying insect biomass and as a mosquito surveillance tool. The USDA-BHT device was compared to other suction traps commonly used for mosquito surveillance (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) light traps, Encephalitis virus surveillance traps, and Biogents Sentinel traps). The insect biomass harvested in the USDA-BHT was statistically higher than the one harvested in the other traps, however the mosquito collections between traps were not statistically significantly different. The USDA-BHT collected some beneficial insects, although it was observed that their collection was minimized at night. These findings coupled with the fact that sorting time to separate the mosquitoes from the other collected insects was significantly longer for the USDA-BHT, indicate that the use of this device for insect biomass collection conflicts with its use as an efficient mosquito surveillance tool. Nevertheless, the device efficiently collected insect biomass, and thus can be used to generate an alternative protein source for animal feed.

The demand for animal protein grows as the human population increases. Technological and genetic advances in traditional animal agriculture will not produce enough protein to meet future needs without significant innovations such as the use of insects as protein sources. Insect farming is growing insects, whereas insect harvesting is collecting insects from their natural habitats to produce high-quality protein for animal feed or human food. Intensive agricultural environments produce tremendous quantities of pestiferous insects and with the right harvest technologies these insects can be used as a protein supplement in traditional animal daily rations. An avenue to exploit these insects is to use traps such as the United States Department of Agriculture-Biomass Harvest Trap (USDA-BHT) to efficiently attract, harvest, and store insects from naturally abundant agricultural settings. The modular design allows for a low cost, easy to build and fix device that is user friendly and has customizable attractants to target various pest species. Although insect harvesting faces substantial challenges, including insect biomass quantity, seasonal abundance and preservation, food safety, and economic and nutritional evaluation, the potential for utilizing these pests for protein shows tremendous promise. In this forum, insect harvesting is discussed, including its potential, limitations, challenges, and research needs. In addition, the use of a mass trapping device is discussed as a tool to increase the biomass of insects collected from the environment.

The use of insects as animal feed has the potential to be a green revolution for animal agriculture as insects are a rich source of high-quality protein. Insect farming must overcome challenges such as product affordability and scalability before it can be widely incorporated as animal feed. An alternative is to harvest insect pests from the environment using mass trapping devices and use them as animal feed. For example, intensive agricultural environments generate large quantities of pestiferous insects and with the right harvest technologies, these insects can be used as a protein supplement in traditional animal daily rations. Most insect trapping devices are limited by the biomass they can collect. In that context, and with the goal of using wild collected insects as animal feed, the United States Department of Agriculture-Biomass Harvest Trap (USDA-BHT) was designed and built. The USDA-BHT is a valuable mass trapping device developed to efficiently attract, harvest, and store flying insects from naturally abundant agricultural settings. The trap offers a modular design with adjustable capabilities, and it is an inexpensive device that can easily be built with commonly available parts and tools. The USDA-BHT is also user-friendly and has customizable attractants to target various pest species.

The most prevalent insect sampling and surveillance problem is powering insect traps in the field. Most modern light traps use 6-V power supplies such as the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) suction trap. Buck converter modules efficiently reduce 12-V direct current power to 6-V, which permits the use of higher voltage batteries with lower voltage traps, resulting in longer operational duration and reduced labor requirements associated with replacing and recharging batteries in the field. We evaluated several battery configurations of 6-and 12-V lead-acid batteries in various sizes (10-20 ampere-hours) and addressed, in the circuit design, common problems that occur when using the buck converter (such as crossing polarity and excessive battery depletion). The efficacy of each configuration was assessed by measuring the voltage and suction while powering a 6-V CDC light trap. The buck converter permitted the use of cheaper and more commonly available 12-V batteries to run the CDC light traps and resulted in longer effective operation time as measured by air speed.

The most prevalent insect sampling and surveillance problem is powering insect traps in the field. Most modern light traps use 6-V power supplies such as the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) suction trap. Buck converter modules efficiently reduce 12-V direct current power to 6-V, which permits the use of higher voltage batteries with lower voltage traps, resulting in longer operational duration and reduced labor requirements associated with replacing and recharging batteries in the field. We evaluated several battery configurations of 6- and 12-V lead-acid batteries in various sizes (10-20 ampere-hours) and addressed, in the circuit design, common problems that occur when using the buck converter (such as crossing polarity and excessive battery depletion). The efficacy of each configuration was assessed by measuring the voltage and suction while powering a 6-V CDC light trap. The buck converter permitted the use of cheaper and more commonly available 12-V batteries to run the CDC light traps and resulted in longer effective operation time as measured by air speed.

Mosquitoes pose a significant risk to millions of people worldwide since they can transmit pathogens. Current methods to control mosquito populations include the use of synthetic pesticides. Nanotechnology may be a solution to develop new mosquito control. However, one barrier to expanding the impact of nanomaterials is the ability to mass-produce the particles. Here, we report a novel hybrid particle synthesis combining micro- and nanoparticles using the coprecipitation technique with the potential for mass production. These particles may have applications as a mosquito larvacide. The particles reported here were designed using a microparticle zein polymer as the core and a nanoparticle silver as the active ingredient. The hybrid NPs reported here targeted a late-stage mosquito larvae and that resulted in a high larval mortality concentration (1.0 ppm, LC90) and suppression of pupal emergence at 0.1 ppm. This research demonstrates the efficacy of a plant-based core with a metal-based AI coating (AgNPs) against larval mosquitoes.

ABSTRACT Understanding the complex interactions between transcriptome and proteome is essential in uncovering cellular mechanisms both in health and disease contexts. The limited correlations between corresponding transcript and protein abundance suggest that regulatory processes tightly govern information flow surrounding transcription and translation, and beyond. In this study we adopt an approach which expands the feature scope that models the human proteome: we develop machine learning models that incorporate sequence-derived features (SDFs), sometimes in conjunction with corresponding mRNA levels. We develop a large resource of sequence-derived features which cover a significant proportion of the H. sapiens proteome, demonstrate which of these features are significant in prediction on multiple cell lines, and suggest insights into which biological processes can be explained using these features. We reveal that (a) SDFs are significantly better at protein abundance prediction across multiple cell lines both in steady-state and dynamic contexts, (b) that SDFs can cover the domain of translation with relative efficiency but struggle with cell-line specific pathways and (c) provide a resource which can be plugged into many subsequent protein-centric analyses.

Vesicular stomatitis (VS) is a vector-borne livestock disease caused by vesicular stomatitis New Jersey virus (VSNJV) or vesicular stomatitis Indiana virus (VSIV). The disease circulates endemically in northern South America, Central America, and Mexico and only occasionally causes outbreaks in the United States. Over the past 20 years, VSNJV outbreaks in the southwestern and Rocky Mountain regions occurred with incursion years followed by virus overwintering and subsequent expansion outbreak years. Regulatory response by animal health officials is deployed to prevent spread from lesioned animals. The 2019 VS incursion was the largest in 40 years, lasting from June to December 2019 with 1144 VS-affected premises in 111 counties in eight states (Colorado, Kansas, Nebraska, New Mexico, Oklahoma, Texas, Utah, and Wyoming) and was VSIV serotype, last isolated in 1998. A subsequent expansion occurred from April to October 2020 with 326 VS-affected premises in 70 counties in eight states (Arizona, Arkansas, Kansas, Missouri, Nebraska, New Mexico, Oklahoma, and Texas). The primary serotype in 2020 was VSIV, but a separate incursion of VSNJV occurred in south Texas. Summary characteristics of the outbreaks are presented along with VSV-vector sampling results and phylogenetic analysis of VSIV isolates providing evidence of virus overwintering.

Studies were conducted to determine if predation versus scavenging versus scavenging on insecticide-killed prey affected brown recluse spiders, Loxosceles reclusa. Indicators of possible effects were measured by weight change and survival. Live house crickets, Acheta domesticus, used as prey, were exposed to one of four treatments: live (untreated control), Spinosad or pyrethroid insecticide treated surface, or freeze-killed (scavenging control) and made available to spiders for twenty-four hours once/week for eight weeks. Spiders fed pyrethroid-killed crickets had significantly lower survival than did spiders utilizing crickets exposed to all other treatments. L. reclusa had significantly greater weight gain feeding as predators than as scavengers.