Our most recent guest speaker was David Mayonado, the technology development representative from Monsanto.  He came to talk to us about Industry and Agriculture.  He showed us an interesting chart about the changing tools for agricultural pest management.  GMO’s and RNAi are used today for pest management.  GMO’s are genetically modified organisms that are used to increase yield, control pests, and increase drought tolerance.  Monsanto has been working recently with RNAi technology.  RNA interference is a natural mechanism to control the expression of a gene so it has the possibility to turn off specific genes.  Also known as gene silencing, scientists designed a type of RNA that matches part of an essential gene in the western corn rootworm.  Then, corn is genetically modified to produce the RNA.  When the rootworm ingests the corn, the RNA enters the cells and the cells react as if the RNA was a virus.  The cell turns off the targeted gene, which is essential for life in the rootworm.  This causes the worm to die.  This type of pest control is happening with corn, potatoes, and tomatoes. It was amazing to learn about the research going on with RNAi and GMO’s in the Ag industry.   David Mayonado taught us more about working in industry and let us know that there is a demand for agricultural scientists.