Science Cartoon on "Veg diet of spiders"

Veg diet of spiders

        Spiders, a group of predominantly insectivorous predators, occasionally use plant food to supplement their insect prey. Martin Nyffeler, Eric J. Olson and William O.C. Symondson reviewed the literature and found that using plant as food by spiders are common. After reviewing 95 reports they concluded more than 60% spiders belongs to ten families are using plants in their diet. Spiders feed on a wide diversity of plant-derived products including floral nectar, extrafloral nectar, stigmatic exudate, plant sap, honeydew, seeds, Beltian bodies, Müllerian bodies and pollen (originating from very different plant types such as coniferous and deciduous trees, herbaceous plants and shrubs, annual weeds, grasses, climbing plants, orchids, carnivorous plants, and ferns).However, why spiders are including plants in their diet and what is the effect of herbal diet on physiology of spiders are still unknown and area to be explored.

Present cartoon is based on above research.

Journal Reference: Nyffeler et al (2016), Plant-eating by spiders, Journal of Arachnology, 44(1):15-27  http://dx.doi.org/10.1636/P15-45.1

 

 

Science Cartoon based on decision of US Govt to release research Chimp

Science Cartoon based on decision of US Govt to release research Chimp 

 

Science cartoon on "Bacteria on International Space Station"

Bacteria on International Space Station

No place is completely clean! Either you roam on earth or fly to the International space station (ISS), you will get bacteria everywhere. Consider it as dirty but the fact is, scientist found the presence of bacteria on ISS also.  Venkateswaran and his team collected samples from ISS and two clean rooms at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL, Pasadena, CA) to study the presence of microflora. They found strong evidence that specific human skin-associated microorganisms make a substantial contribution to the ISS microbiome, which is not the case on Earth-based classrooms. For example, Corynebacterium and Propionibacterium (Actinobacteria) but not Staphylococcus (Firmicutes) species are dominant on the ISS in terms of viability and total bacterial community composition. Their finding is published in Open Access journal Microbiome on 27 Oct 2015.

Original Paper: Microbiomes of the dust particles collected from the International Space Station and Spacecraft Assembly Facilities

Article on Science Magazine site: The International Space Station is home to potentially dangerous bacteria