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GMOs Perfected Down to the Chromosome Level
Roland Piquepaille writes "If don't like the concept of 'Frankenfoods,' I have bad news for you. U.S. researchers have developed an artificial chromosome for corn plants. The Chicago Tribune reports that researchers can now make chromosomes to order. These artificial chromosomes are accepted as natural by the plants and passed through generations. As the Monsanto Company bought rights to use this mini-chromosome stacking technology in corn, cotton, soybeans, and canola, I guess we'll soon eat food made from permanently genetically modified organisms (PGMOs?)."
your closer to the truth then many people here will be willing to admit. frankly what will doom the human race is the thinking that we can control anything. we are tampering with some stuff that if done wrong will kill us and yet we are letting the most irresponsible group of people among us have control of this, multi-national corporations. they have no incentive other then to get this out the door asap so they can look good on their next quarter finical report. If there was ever a use for a government and a space station/colony, forgetting about all the energy and maintaince concerns, THIS is it.
I weep for the messed up world we will be leaving our kids.
The article summary is deceptive. Inserting a gene into the current genome of crop is just as permanent a change as added a new mini-chromosome. In either change the changes will be inherited by the offspring of the individual plant.
The main difference between this technology and currect methods on inserting genes is that more than one gene can be added as easily as a single gene, whereas in the previous system "stacking" multiple genes required much more effort than a single gene, since each had to be inserted individually and then combined using conventional breeding.
I for one think this technology is a step in the right direction, as it will make it easier to create artificial species barriers, which require two-five genes to be inserted, but would prevent GM crops from crossbreeding with traditional varieties in the field. THIS IS NOT TERMINATOR TECHNOLOGY! The plants would still be fertile, just only with others carried the added chromosome.
But couldn't they have found someone besides Monsanto to implement it?
is that normal plant patents (at least in the US) only cover grafting, budding, cuttings, and other forms of asexual reproduction. Basically you can't patent a natural genetic variant you discover and then prevent people from using it as breeding stock.
Hence you can buy a patented rose bush, breed it with another patented rose bush, and be the exclusive patent holder of the offspring (or decide to let the offspring be patent free). This is a big check on the power of plant patents
This changes with GMOs. With GMO's, offspring which carry the artifical genetic structure are subject to the control of the patent holder. This means that farmers now have a great deal more to worry about in terms of being sued for intellectual property violations simply by growing their own seed crops. This is a large deal because it effectively decommoditizes the food crop industry and turns it into something much more similar to the proprietary software industry....
LedgerSMB: Open source Accounting/ERP
Can we start splicing chromosomes with humans please? I want my catgirl, dammit. What use is bringing food to the masses when I don't have my fucking catgirl?
Marxism is the opiate of dumbasses
Sigs are too short to say anything truly profound so read the above post instead.
Selective breeding is not the same as direct splicing of genes or chromosomal insertion. At least with selective breeding you can progressively see what other traits pop up and change rather than saying the end result is perfect. I'm a bit dubious about the testing, too. You could eat whole mayo every day for decades before you have related heart attack. How are they testing the products with lifetime use taken into account?
I also want to see how long it takes the chromosomes to hop to different plants. They should sue God if that happens.
"Common sense will be the death of us all"
Actually, some fellow from E.L.F. was training to shoot the executive officers of Monsanto after firebombing a Ford dealership and cutting loose some horses from a meat packing plant or some such.
:)
Anyways, to cut a story short, one of the execs at Monsanto back then was Rumsfeld... as in Don Rumsfeld.
As it turns out, the kid was sold out by his friends, and "choked himself to death in the sheriff's jail with a plastic bag" which he miraculously held shut over his throat until after he was dead... after which he let go (some rigormortis, eh?)
Most believe he was murdered so he wouldn't inspire others to try the same trick... I don't hold any beliefs on this issue but find it very telling what taking "effective" action against Monsanto will guarantee you... a black plastic bag over your head
" What luck for rulers that men do not think" - Adolf Hitler
Actually, this would be a good thing. Then people wouldn't get in trouble for accidentally growing Monsanto's crops (pollen blew in on the wind and mingled with some unsuspecting farmer's seed crop), and it wouldn't take over from other varieties in the wild. Thus, you could still grow heritage wheat (or whatever) in your backyard.
Ah but that has already happened. A farmer in Alberta, Canada, Percy Schmeiser, was found to have Monsanto's Roundup Ready corn in his field. Corn he did not plant, but it had crossbred with corn he grew. Like farmers throughout the world since the dawn of agriculture, he saved seeds from one year's crop to plant the following year. Even though he didn't steal anything from Monsanto when Monsanto sued him he lost his crop. In another case an organic farmer, which bans GE, in Canada lost a shipment when inspectors in Europe, Germany I think, found alien DNA in his corn.
FalconShould there be a Law?
A mistaken, but often-quoted, example of GM foods causing new allergies concerns genetic material from Brazil nut plants that was inserted into a soy plant to improve its nutritional qualities. A gene coding for a Brazil nut chemical that can cause allergies in some people was also transferred into the soy.
Scientists were aware of the possibility of this transfer, and conducted laboratory testing on the soybean before its release. During the laboratory testing procedure, the allergenic Brazil nut protein was detected in the soy. The modified soy plant was not released, the soybean never reached the market and people never consumed products containing it.
Percy Schmeiser did in fact specifically plant RR canola (not corn, you illiterate fuckwit).
He sprayed his farm with roundup and gathered seed from everything it didn't kill. You can argue about whether or not he should have the right to do that, but the law says he can't.
Every so often there will be a mistake made by the cellular mechanisms and the nucleus will divide without the rest of the cell dividing. This results in a condition known as polyploidy, when this happens it is possible for fertile hybrids to occur, which means chromosomes can and do hope species, and have done long before GMed crows were even dreamed of. Wikipedia has a good article on Polyploidy and which crops have which ploidy levels
Triploid crops: banana, apple, ginger, citrus [3]
Tetraploid crops: durum or macaroni wheat, maize, cotton, potato, cabbage, leek, tobacco, peanut, kinnow, Pelargonium
Hexaploid crops: chrysanthemum, bread wheat, triticale, oat
Octaploid crops: strawberry, dahlia, pansies, sugar cane
as you can see extra chromosome are quite common in food crops.
Apocalypse Cancelled, Sorry, No Ticket Refunds
There seems to be discussion of cross pollination and the legal responsibilities of the subjected farmer...
Since it is unreasonable to expect farmers to protect themselves against cross pollination, it far more reasonable that Monsanto Company (or whoever it has been patented under) engineer it to not cross pollinate somehow. Just because your neighbor's unprotected WiFi signal reaches your home, doesn't make you legally responsible for putting up RF-blocking walls or you have to go to jail... If that were the case, watching broadcast television or listening to the radio that offers copyrighted IP could be a possible felony.
I'm all for patents etc.. But if it is impossible to enforce your patent, it shouldn't even allowed. That's not too unlike having a 'private' radio broadcast on a public frequency and suing everyone who tunes in to it. It should be YOUR responsibility to encode the transmissions or operate on some private channel that is not meant for public consumption.
Fact: Everything I say is fiction.
The case is nowhere near as straightforward as most people seem to believe. If you research the details, he bought massive quantities of Round-Up, which was basically the first smoking gun in Monsanto's case[1].
The quantity of Round-Up be bought exceeded the amount that could be applied to his non-crop acreage, ruling out the possibility that it was purchased solely for border weed control etc. This was a very strong indication that he not only knew he was growing RR Canola, but that he was actively selecting for it by spraying his fields.
The other smoking gun was the fact that his crop was 95-98% RR canola[2]. That level of 'contamination' indicates very aggressive, active selection for the target genotype. You do not get that from the trace contamination due to windblown seed or accidental cross-pollination.
I don't doubt that the first few plants were accidental, either through unintentional cross-pollination or stray seed, but once he found that they were round-up resistant, he actively worked to integrate the rr the genotype into his own populations. He probably just didn't feel like he was doing anything wrong.
Small-time seed producers have done exactly the same sort thing with non-GMO germplasm from, e.g., Pioneer Hi-Bred for decades. They'd buy and plant a bag of hybrid seed, and look through the field for accidental selfs (plants produced by accidental self-pollination due to incomplete detasseling during hybrid production) to steal their inbreds from their female heterotic lines. That is just as illegal as what Schmeiser did, but you don't really hear about those guys being busted and completely ruined because Pioneer isn't run by the same type of raging pricks as the guys at Monsanto.
[1] http://www.cooperativeresearch.org/context.jsp?item=gm-54 - "Monsanto argues that in spite of Schmeiser's claims that he did not use Roundup on his crops in 1998, there is no evidence that he used Muster and Assure herbicides as claimed. Furthermore, Monsanto provides evidence that Schmeiser purchased 720 liters of Roundup in 1998."
[2] http://scc.lexum.umontreal.ca/en/2004/2004scc34/2004scc34.html - Schmeiser never purchased Roundup Ready Canola nor did he obtain a licence to plant it. Yet, in 1998, tests revealed that 95 to 98 percent of his 1,000 acres of canola crop was made up of Roundup Ready plants. ... The trial judge found that "none of the suggested sources [proposed by Schmeiser] could reasonably explain the concentration or extent of Roundup Ready canola of a commercial quality" ultimately present in Schmeiser's crop."