bio-, bi-, -bia, -bial, -bian, -bion, -biont, -bius, -biosis, -bium, -biotic, -biotical
(Greek: life; living, live, alive)
Don’t confuse this element with another bi- which means "two".
The most important things in life are not things.
2. The study of language functions as related to or derived from biological characteristics of an organism.
2. A rock that is formed from or by organic material, either by noncombustible, inorganic processes that form an acaustobiolith, or by combustible, organic processes that form a caustobiolith (a combustible organic rock).
2. Pertaining to the products and operations of applied biology.
3. Any virus, therapeutic serum, toxin, antitoxin, or analogous product of plant or animal origins used in the prevention, diagnosis, or treatment of disease; for example, vaccines, and blood plasma products.
2. A reference to the products and operations of applied biology.
3. Any substance, as a serum or vaccine, derived from animal products or other biological sources and used to treat or to prevent disease.
2. The internal mechanism of an organism that regulates circadian rhythms (daily cycles of activities) observed in many living organisms and various other periodic cycles.
The mechanism of the biological clock has long proved elusive; however, a molecular basis for such a clock in the fruit fly Drosophila has been discovered, and similar mechanisms may well apply in other organisms.
It is based on the cyclical rise and fall in the concentrations of certain proteins which form part of a negative feedback loop that controls transcription of their own genes.
The most famous successful example was the introduction of the gray moth, Cactoblastis cactorum, into Australia to control the prickly pear, Opuntia inermis, which was over running vast tracts of land. The moth's caterpillars eat the shoots of the plant.
Another example is the introduction of parasitic wasps that lay their eggs inside the eggs of pest insects; such as, corn borers that attack corn (maize).
Populations of insect pests may also be reduced by releasing sterile males to mate with the females, or by using sex-attractant chemicals (pheromones) to trap males or females.