Entomology expert at the museum, Stuart Hine, agreed it was plausible to use insects to detect explosives.

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"There are all kinds of things out there, " says George Hamilton, chair of the Department of Entomology at Rutgers University.

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Peer reviewed, I suppose, but in a journal no one in the entomology world had ever heard of when it came out.

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Any negative effects therefore need to be balanced against these benefits, says Assistant Professor of Entomology John Losey, the lead researcher on the Nature paper.

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According to a study published in the latest issue of the Journal of Economic Entomology, by Paul van Mele of the Consultative Group on International Agricultural Research and his colleagues, African mango farmers could increase their harvests by as much as two-thirds with the help of these doughty insects.

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The evidential value of entomology may come as no surprise to lovers of crime fiction, but the fact that it is scientists at the Natural History Museum - more normally associated with the fossilised remains of long dead plants and animals - who are pushing the boundaries of modern forensic science, comes as something of a revelation.

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