Sure, mosquitos are an important link in the food chain for amphibians, birds and other insects, but they’re annoying, they’re persistent and they can actually kill you. Two researchers at Western Carolina University are working on a faster, cheaper, more reliable method to identify which ones will. 

Joe Davis, a double alumnus of Western Carolina University with a bachelor’s in emergency medical care and a master’s in biology, has had a unique higher education journey. 

The Highlands Biological Foundation (HBF) announced the next lecture in their Zahner Conservation Lecture Series, taking place at 6 p.m. on Thursday, Aug. 1, at the Highlands Nature Center. 

The Highlands Biological Foundation (HBF) invites the community to the next installment of its Zahner Conservation Lecture series at 6 p.m. on Thursday, July 18. 

Brian Byrd, Western Carolina University’s mosquito expert and professor in the environmental health sciences program, along with Scott Huffman, professor in WCU’s Department of Chemistry and Physics, have been approved for grant funding from NCInnovation to continue their work in developing tools that utilizes spectroscopy to analyze vibrational signals from mosquitoes. 

Kids ages 5-13 can become citizen scientists. 

To the Editor:

I’ve never written a letter to an editor but I cannot sit silent after reading Mr. Hoffman’s opinion that “fertilized eggs are not living beings.” Obviously he has never carried a child in his body and heard the heart beat nor felt the movement of the child.

It is time to have a fact-based discussion about the biology and history of our knowledge about human reproduction. Much of the current discussion does not reflect the reality of human reproduction. Declaring a fertilized egg to be a person is ridiculous from biological, historical and religious perspectives. 

To the Editor:

Your guest columnist Steven Crider has a unique way of twisting and re-labeling reality that leaves clear-thinking readers scratching their heads — or should.

I don’t deserve to be called a scientist, but maybe I’m at least a fringe scientist after spending 50 years doing engineering and then medicine.