Drug Making Genes Added To Corn Jump To Soya

Anonymous Cowdog writes "Google News turned up a scary item today: Apparently, genetically altered corn, designed not to repel pests or withstand bad weather, but rather to grow pharmecuticals (for diabetes and diarrhea) has been accidentally mixed with soy plants in the field, resulting in 500,000 bushels of contaminated soybeans being quarantined by the US FDA. Ooops. Here's the story, and here's another story about the same case. The company who brought us this nice event is called ProdiGene. Looks like they're also working on an edible AIDS vaccine (kinda makes sense, eat Tofu, enjoy free love!) Now, I was thinking, will our government protect us from doom-by-hand-me-down-genes? and on a hunch (honest!) I did this google search for keywords ProdiGene and "george w bush". Result? A not so reassuring article."

Comments

Misleading headline

[mskfisher]

The headline on this story seems misleading - the genes did not jump to soybeans from the corn, the genetically-modified corn was accidentally added to some unmodified soybeans.
AFAIK, genes don't have the ability to do an inter-species jump like that...

Re:Misleading headline

[cybrpnk2]

I'm pro-genetic engineering, but we've gotta be careful while we tamper with the forces of nature. Genes CAN apparently jump species barriers, see for example this...

Re:Misleading headline

[Anonymous Coward]

You shouldn't be so sure that genes can't jump between species. Plants are a lot more 'in contact' with each other than most realize.

1. Most plants have a symbiotic relationship with certain fungi - this is called mychorriza. This often means that seperate plants can exchange fluids wit their neighbors, among other things; for all we know this is not limited to the same species.

2. Many plants hybridize readily with other species; mostly fairly close relatives, but not always.

3. Some - perhaps all - bacteria can incorporate genetic material from other species. One could imagine a bacterium take genes from a plant or animal host and eventually passing it on to - who knows?

Finally - we don't know all there is to know about what micro organisms can and do. In fact, we know next to nothing about this. The way that some are willing to play with these things - and with the life and health of the entire planet's population (inluding you and I and our children) - is totally incomprehensible.

Re:Misleading headline

[mysticgoat]

I agree that the genes are not jumping from corn to soybeans.

That genes can do inter-species jumps is proven. This is common among some bacteria and viruses-- check out the swapping that is constantly going on between avian, swine, and human influenza species. Look at the problems with MRSA-- it isn't just that some staph aureus strains have become methycillin resistant; the greater problem is that this resistance is being transmitted across bacterial species to other pathogens. There is no good reason to suppose that eukaryotes (plants and animals) have not retained this ability (to incorporate new genetic material from ingested or invasive organisms) to some degree.

So while a jump from corn to soybean is highly unlikely, a jump from corn to smut or ergot or root blight cannot be ruled out. The possibility of transfer from such a disease to another crop is therefore present. Further, if the post-harvest residue is being composted in an environmentally friendly way, the chance for genetic transfer from the decaying corn plants into some resident of the complex ecosystem of the compost heap is very much present.

The concept of "species" is a very useful taxonomic mental construct. But when engineering, we've got to think in terms of system functions and not be limited to the bounaries of our classification schemes.

Here's the sound bite:

It is silly to think that new genes are introduced only into a species when they are put out in the field. Once they are moved out of the laboratory, new genes are introduced into an ecosystem.

How is it possible?

[djkitsch]

How is it practically possible to completely isolate these new genetically "enhanced" strains anyway? Surely as long a they're being grown in the big wide world, the genetic changes will crep into the food chain anyway...?

Of course, I speak as a complete idjit when it comes to all things biological...

Re:How is it possible?

[Mr. Slippery]

How is it practically possible to completely isolate these new genetically "enhanced" strains anyway? Surely as long a they're being grown in the big wide world, the genetic changes will crep into the food chain anyway...?

Which is exactly why we need to not fscking grow them out in the big wide world.

GM plants should be grown only in sealed greenhouses, at least for the first few decades until we thouroughly understand them. Anything less is criminal negligence with the ecosystem.

The sad truth about GM foods...

[DaveOf9thKey]

Nobody is really going to care about this issue until contaminated foods leak into the market and people start dying. When the lawsuits start flying, and when the connection between Bush and ProdiGene is covered by Dan, Peter and Tom (or perhaps Brian by then), THEN we'll start seeing some real action.

Until then, pass that Cap'n Crunch/flu vaccine this way.

Amber mutations

[daniel_howell]

Whatever happened to 'amber mutations' for this sort of genetically engineered 'drugs factory'? An amber mutation is one which will not kill the plant/animal with it, provided it gets some substance not commonly available in the environment. But if the susbtance is not provided then the organism simply dies.

It was originally used with lab and sealed-vat based organisms to protect against accidental releases, but it could easilly be applied to farm based plants. Since the kind of farming that uses genetically modified organisms also tends to use a significant quantity of pesticides, herbicides, and fertilizers it would be simple to add one more non-toxic chemical to the mix, without which the plants would simply die (or fail to reproduce). You could then deal with any problems by withdrawing the supplement, and any escapees would quickly die. There would still be a slight risk of genetic 'contamination' of nearby crops, but it would be much lower than at present.

If I were a cynical type I would suspect that biotechnology companies are counting on accidental contamination to make it impossible to ever go back to a 'GMO free' state, thus safeguarding their business. Another (cynical) alternative is that to build in a safeguard is tantamount to admitting that you *need* a safeguard, which would adversly affect their sales.

Sometimes it's hard not to be a cynic.

Re:Amber mutations

[Tsu-na-mi]

Most GM seeds are hybrids, and thus are inherently infertile. There is no need for a 'suicide gene'.

On your cynical comment, you're more correct than you think. I believe the companies _want_ their patented genes to spread, so they can extort money out of people contaminated by their crops. There was a story a year or so ago about a farmer in Western Canada who had GM varieties growing on his farm (that he did not buy from the seed company). He argued that it must have blown off a passing seed truck, or something, but the court ordered him to destroy his entire crop (since it had the _unlicensed_ patented seeds mixed in. THAT is where the problem lies IMHO.

I work in the ag industry (data analysis), so we hear all about this stuff. The GM food itself isn't the problem, it's the associated patents, etc. that are the problem.

No biological equivalent to chroot

[SgtChaireBourne]

Genetically modified crops can be a real controversial issue. The research can be both interesting and useful, the trouble lies in the implementation and with the rush to get things to market.

Gene hacking is not the same as the gradual breeding proceses that have gone on for millenia. In the latter, each step is relatively stable, in the former, large potentially disruptive leaps can be made more or less overnight. Unfortunately, unlike with computers you don't have the comfort of chroot and/or virtual machines.

Re:No biological equivalent to chroot

[Oculus Habent]

You do, however, have test fields, laboratories, sampling, testing, et cetera.

It's not as though on Monday a scientist modifies a gene and on Friday it's being sold in 100,000 grocery stores.

There is a huge process of making sure there aren't any adverse changes to the plant, that you haven't accidentally made a super corn laced with cyanide...

If you think that scientists are just randomly changing genes in foods intended to be sold, you've lost your grip on reality. Experimentation happens, but no sane food/drug company would risk the impact of such a level of carelessness/unconcern.

Maroon carrots and golden rice made their way into the market - I didn't hear much screaming about genetically altered food then.

ever ehard of cross polinisation ?

[aepervius]

Maybe you are right, but the study on cross polinisation make a lot of people kinda warry in EU, and a lot of people there says that definitly 3 or 4 years was not enough to study the complete "life" cycle and possible jump a gene might make between plants, and the possible bad results of , say, a gene resisting desherbant into a wild specy.

And when such SLOPYNESS comes to light, I can certainly give reason to people asking for more study of impact.

Re:ever ehard of cross polinisation ?

[elakazal]

Well, the cabbage/radish hybrid at least sounded like a good idea. I don't think the idea of something you can eat the leaves and the roots on is a bad idea...that just apparently wasn't the right solution.

Is it consistent about where on the plant it produces the different fruit? I suppose it could be some sort of weird chimaera... Fruit development is effected by all kinds of things, though... The sort of square, elongated look of certain apple varieties is a response to cold night temperatures (if I remember...could be wrong on this), and since most of our apples in this country come from places like Washington or New York, that's what we're used to...but if you grow the same thing in the south (and you can get it to grow...the already disease prone apples are a pain in the ass in the warm, humid south) the apples are more like normal, round apples. Odd stuff.

Citrus plants are all quite happily cross-fertile (assuming you can get ploidy issues straightened out), so who knows what the genetic backround it is...

Re:ever ehard of cross polinisation ?

[kowaikawaii]

Just because horizontal gene transfer is theoretically possible doesn't mean that it's likely. They are still looking for evidence of horizontal gene transfer between bacterial genomes in nature and, with the exception of plasmid transfer which plants don't really have, haven't found it. Bacteria are the genetic sluts of biology (due in part to their simpler genomes and physical structures, lesser defenses, and generation times orders of magnitude shorter), so if they can't find horizontal gene transfer between bacterial chromosomes, how likely is it that such would occur in plants?

Also, A+ to those who pointed out that a corn-soybean crossbreed would be (a) sterile and (b) very difficult to grow/unlikely to occur.

Re:ever ehard of cross polinisation ?

[archeopterix]

Just because horizontal gene transfer is theoretically possible doesn't mean that it's likely. They are still looking for evidence of horizontal gene transfer between bacterial genomes in nature and, with the exception of plasmid transfer which plants don't really have, haven't found it.

As far as I know there is some indirect evidence of horizontal gene transfer coming from phylogenetics. Scientists have found very similar pieces of DNA (introns) in different species that are phylogenetically far away. Moreover, their closer relatives do not have such pieces. One can consider several explanation of this phenomene:

1. Their common ancestor had this piece of DNA. This is not improbable, but we are talking about pieces of DNA that aren't expressed (that's what introns are), so there is little or no evolutionary pressure on them, so one must explain why the closer relatives dumped them.
2. They same piece of DNA evolved independently in both species. Not very probable, see 1 - no pressure on introns, so convergence not very probable.
3. Horizontal gene transfer occured.
4. The phylogenetical tree is wrong. Well, it seems that however we arrange the tree, some introns do stick out.

Of course, this is not an established scientific proof, but it seems that scientists find more and more of evidence supporting point 3. By the way, crossbreeding is not the only possibility of HGT - viruses are capable of transferring genetic material (at least their own) between organisms, so they may be responsible for HGT. Again, google for 'introns' 'horizontal gene transfer'.

PS. Feel free to point out oversimplifications in the above post.

Re:Caution...

[DAldredge]

That "leader" of that African country didn't refuse the food aid because it was genetically altered. It was refused because he is using food as a weapon to starve out his opponents.

Just do a google search on "Zimbabwe Food"

http://www.africaonline.com/site/Articles/1,3,50 13 2.jsp
http://www.alertnet.org/thefacts/reliefreso urces/4 89432
http://www.washtimes.com/world/20020605-231 50816.h tm
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/africa/215941 8.st m

From the first URL.

"The Zimbabwe government has told some non-governmental organisations involved in food distribution to stop operations. Aid workers have been told they could be arrested if they continue to distribute food without being registered with the government."

Big deal?

[jaredcoleman]

Maybe I'm dense, but I don't understand the huge fear about genetically altered food. Sure it would be bad if say, a large number of plants were altered to take in oxygen and release CO2, but why can't I eat such a plant? It's not like my body is going to absorb their DNA, actually my enzymes and acids will break the food down and absorb the nutrients, then get rid of the waste. As long as a company can show that any genetic alterations do not make the plant produce poisons, what's the big deal? I've been wondering this for a while, and help would be appreciated.

Re:Increasing Problem

[RealityProphet]

Taken from another tack, remember that the modifications are usually patented. So, if a crop of genetically modified plants is in close proximity to other crops, it could dirty other farmers' crops. This could cause them to have to destroy their entire crop, for no other reason than being downwind of a genetically modified crop.

They do not ... (breathe in, exhale, repeat)

[JoeGee]

Read farther down in the posts. Some leftover GM corn kernels were allowed to mature in fields which had been replanted with non-GM soybeans. The resulting harvest had soybean seeds mixed with a tiny amount of GM corn kernels.

The soybeans did not acquire genetic material from the corn.

It is my (possibly flawed) understanding that such a transfer might, might, conceivably (we're talking one in several million odds or so) happen with a viral vector, but such a virus would be considerably more likely to glom onto a completely different corn gene and transpose it. Even if the modified gene did jump, the virus carying the gene would have to infect one of the soybean's sex cells to be present in the end food product, or to be passed on.

Why not put dangerous genes in non-food crops?

[Anonymous Coward]

Okay, yeah, we have thousands of years of experience in getting high yields for the crops that we eat (corn, wheat, etc.). But why the hell would we stick genes for pharmeceuticals in those plants, when we know that they have a very high chance of spreading to crops intended for eating? Why not mandate that they have to go into plants that we don't eat or otherwise use?

Why not roses or birch trees or poison ivy? Heck, why not kudzu, which we already know will grow just fine without much human intervention? I mean, if we grant that sticking funky genes in plants is a good idea, and we further grant that growing them anywhere but in sealed greenhouses is acceptable, why put them in crops where gene transfer is potentially catastrophic? Imagine if the price of wheat suddenly tripled or quintupled because huge swaths of crops had been contaminated by pollen that made them produce tumor necrosis factor?

Re:Why not put dangerous genes in non-food crops?

[airuck]

Large Scale Biology in Vacaville, California is doing just that. They use tobacco.

The reason that so many GMO efforts focus on food crops is that many of these crops have well understood genetics and are extremely productive in converting sunlight to biomass.

Greenhouses could be used, but the extreme expense could invalidate one of the main purposes of complex molecule production in plants: cost.

TNF in your gut would be digested into small, biologically inactive peptides. Nutritious and delicious!

Re:Article doesn't mention gene jumping

[Idarubicin]

It might also be worrying if you were allergic to normal corn (if they still grow that in the USA) (and found it in your soy food).

Nobody eats normal corn these days. The original corn plant actually looked a lot like wheat. Tiny kernels. No supersweet peaches and cream. Corn has been bred and tweaked for centuries to give the product we describe in so cavalier a manner as 'corn'.

Fear and loathing of GMOs

[airuck]

Are GMOs really that scary? Hollywood and some environmental activists would have you believe that genetic engineering is a fusion of Frankenstein's monster and an out of control grass fire. The concepts of relative risk and benefits are rarely discussed. There is also the laughable notion that agriculture is a pristine environment which can only be tainted by GMOs.
Wake up. Most plants and animals associated with agriculture are

• not native to the region in which they are grown
• heavily inbred and hardly recognizable
• displacing the "natural" biota
• a huge source of pesticides, fertilizers, and waste products
• heavily dependent on fossil fuel

Modified crops can and will turn sunlight into complex molecules for industry and medicine. There is already an addressed need to monitor our food supply for chemicals and pathogens. So new tests and controls are now necessary. So what?

Jeffrey Bates - Pay Attention!

[djtack]

The headline isn't just misleading, it's just plain wrong. The story is less than an hour old and there are already a fistful of comments pointing this out.

If any of the editors are reading this thread, the headline needs to be corrected!

BTW, I reread the summary a few times, and it seems that the person who submitted the story got it right. The poster makes no mention of any sort of horizontal gene transfer between the corn and soy, but only claims the crops were "accidentally mixed", which is what happened. It's Hemos who fscked this one up.

Re:why is george bush a badguy in this?

[Smallpond]

You left out the part about what his being in
the "Working Group on Food Security". Nice
to know that we have independent oversight for
the food supply. I guess there just weren't any
other qualified applicants.

Re:Typical FUD

[VON-MAN]

"Slashdotter assumes there must be some GW Bush conspiracy going on"

Never read the Bush link, eh? Well here's a quote from the article: " Anthony G. Laos, president and chief executive of ProdiGene, Inc. was appointed by President George W. Bush to serve as a member of the Board for International Food and Agriculture Development (BIFAD). Mr. Laos will serve a four-year term, expiring on July 28, 2005.".

This is not about conspiracys (for crying out loud), this is about the nasty GW habit of appointing the wrong people for the wrong jobs (Admiral John M. Poindexter, anyone?). Would we now expect to see the BIFAD to take actions against ProdiGene? Well, it would suprise me.

No, agribusiness *wanted to* control GMOs

[bgeer]

You're right to be cynical, unfortunately you're being cynical about the wrong side in this debate. The truth is that Monsanto wanted to put in a "terminator" gene to control the spread of GMOs, but the luddite/green left screamed bloody murder. They claimed that Monsanto was using this as a cynical ploy to make third-world farmers dependent on GMOs, and then starve them to death unless they paid Monsanto. Fortunately they seem to be finally coming around to the realization that a Terminator gene is actually a good idea as a result of stories like this one.

Anthony Laos

[PseudonymousCoward]

A quick search on opensecrets.org shows that Anthony Laos has made numerous contributions to George Bush's political campaigns since 1994, and to other Republican campaign funds. Anyone who thinks Bush appointed him to BIFAD solely on the basis of agricultural expertise is simply naive.

Now why would he want to serve on such a board? To help consumers understand the issues? For the opportunity to push his company's products more widely into a market reluctant to embrace GM foods? For the opportunity to advise on the kinds of safeguards and constraints that should be imposed on companies developing such products?

Is it Bush-bashing or leftist psychobabble to raise such questions?

Tactics: Scare-mongering

[gryf]

What part of 'science' includes a title like 'Drug Making Genes Added To Corn Jump To Soya' when referring to a story about a logistical mistake?
Here we have one crop, untested and whose long-term effects have never been fully studied, growing accidentially side-by-side with seed currently undergoing testing of the crop's potential long term effects.
It's these kinds of tactics that hide the weak underpinnings of the anti-GM rabble-rousing, which is not to be confused with informed debate. Posting this story in this fashion is as ethically valid as fighting corporatism by smashing a row of small shops. Such attempts to raise people's awareness of the problems undermines the very attempt to educate by clouding the issue with baseless accusations.

Re:Doesn't sound so bad to me.

[avi33]

What's so suspicious about the current President appointing someone to a position in a federal agency?

Perhaps because he's the CEO of a company that has a shitload to gain by affecting policy change. Ever heard of conflict of interest?

Who the hell else is going to do it?

How about a scientist, a public policy expert, an impartial analyst.

If your car were broken down, would you take it to a mechanic or a car salesman?

Re:How does cross-pollenation work?

[triumphDriver]

Isn't it possible for a virus to insert DNA from on species into another? Isn't this one way viruses mutate? They pick up genetic material from the host?

Re:Don't use an opinion as proof.

[Arti]

Self citation is perfectly legitimate, and bias does not preclude truth. It is true, for example, that genes held in plasmids are beautifully suited for cross-species transfer.

Nobody eats millet?

[razzbar]

I saw millet for sale in a so-called "natural foods" store, in bulk, so I bought some. Boiled it up, ate it. Liked it.

Another "nobody eats that stuff" story I remember had to do with the arsenic level in the Wailoa river in Hilo, Hawaii ("the shortest river in the USA"). Techs found high levels of arsenic in the intestines of a certain kind of fish, but disregarded it because "nobody eats fish guts". But guess what? Filipinos call it "baloong".

"Twinkies are considered a delicacy in my country"