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Scientists decode the bedbug's genes to help kill it
Just the very thought of bedbugs probably makes your skin crawl, and that's made all the worse by their ability to adapt to new threats. Like it or not, that pesticide you used years ago probably doesn't work any more. What to do? Genetics might just come to the rescue. Scientists have created the first full genome sequence for the bedbug in hopes of defeating its resistance to sprays and other attempts at extermination. You'd think this would have been easy (humans can sequence woolly mammoths, for goodness' sake), but it wasn't -- the team had to compare bedbug genes from 1973 with present-day samples, and even the differences before and after the bugs had their blood meals.
