Scientific discoveries this week: 3/25/13
South Bend, Indiana
In 2011, researchers from the United States Department of Agriculture found a crabapple tree that had been infested by a fruit fly they could not identify. Many feared that the fruit fly was the invasive apple maggot fly, known as Rhagoletis pomonella. If this was the case, it could trigger a quarantine process affecting three counties in the state of Washington. The larvae were sent to a team of researchers from Notre Dame that identified the fly as Rhagoletis indifferens, which is not known to infest apples.