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Biohackers Are Engineering Yeast To Make THC
meghan elizabeth writes How do you get weed without the weed? By genetically engineering yeast to produce THC, of course. Once theorized in a stoner magazine column more than a decade ago, a biotech startup working in Ireland is actively trying to transplant the genetic information that codes for both THC and another cannabinoid called CBD into yeast so that "marijuana" can be grown in a lab—no plants necessary.
So let's say I start a company that uses GMO THC yeast to make bread dough. The dough does not contain any THC; just the yeast that can create it. I sell this bread dough in your supermarket's freezer section as unrisen, unbaked loaves.
You purchase the bread dough, take it home, thaw it out, let it rise overnight. (Or, for an hour or two in a warm oven.) It happily produced CO2 and THC, the bread rises, you then bake it. You then can make some 'fun' sandwiches. Is my business legal?
In my lab, we call them scientists (or chemist, biologist, etc).
SJWs are the new boogeyman. -Me
The law is not equipped to forsee such advances in drugs. However if this is commercially possible, and this becomes popular, THC enabled yeast will be added to lists of forbidden substances. (just like "bath salts")
Just sayin...
If I'm not back again this time tomorrow...
Yeast with THC sounds like a perfect combination, get high while eating something baked and it could be any bread, a dope bagel, a funny muffin, a nostalgic croissant, the branding possibilities are endless!
You can't handle the truth.
Dude, we are totally gonna get baked.
They better act fast if they want to skirt the law with yeast, while there's still a law to break. In USA, Pot will be legal nationwide by 2018
At least that's been my bet. According to the LA Times today, the DEA in Washington is showing "fatigue" at enforcing it and the White House is ready to give up on the "war on pot". http://www.latimes.com/nation/...
Gently reply
here in the UK oil used to be a class-A drug like heroin whilst the resin or plant matter was a class-B. The main reason for this, I believe, was the method of extracting oil with isopropanol can be a bit of a fire/explosion risk. When they reclassified weed/resin as class-C they also lowered oil's classification. Then they moved plant/resin backup to class-B which is where oil remains now; because governments are fickle like that.
Just wait until the grommits (dead heads that never wash, aka louse sprinkler when they spin dreadlocks) get yeast infections with this stuff.
John McAfee 'It was like that time I hired that Bangkok prostitute; to do my taxes, while I fucked my accountant'
How long until they make yeast illegal?
I'm really looking forward to a prison sentence for trying to make my own bread
I've got better things to do tonight than die.
Actually, I've been calling for someone to graft the THC-production complex into kudzu. That way, either we get government help to wipe it out, or the government finally gives up; either way, kudzu becomes useful for something.
Of course, I don't have much deep knowledge about GM or plant biology, so coming up with this idea was about on a par with saying "somebody ought to build a flying car". Here's hoping that the task these folks are tackling turns out more tractable than that one.
They are genetically engineering stuff to produce stuff that is already available? Benefit would be....?
I'm not going to bother with genetic engineering. I'm going to get a 3D printer, download THC.sdl and CBD.sdl, and print my own cannabinoids.
Which reminds me I also have to print a new bong because this one is starting to smell like yeast.
I'm not a user, but my understanding is that pot is a very hearty plant, easy to grow and cheap to grow. Why invest money, time, and effort in learning to get the THC without it?
Or, you could just go to the store and buy some.
Guy from Seattle
So that's why my Johnnie Walker costs more than Everclear...
Imagine you could use yeast to make alcohol!
Great, i like making bread.. Will i now have to get a license to buy yeast ?
When you outlaw yeast.. only outlaws will eat sandwiches..
There is also a female joke in there too, but ill leave that one alone.
---- Booth was a patriot ----
For over 20 years it has been discussed that it might be possible to get the genes into your lawn's Bermuda grass.
Then your gardener could really rake in the grass for real dough.
Dude, don't bogart the bread.
On the making of medicines, bread, wine, yoghurt, cheese,,,,,,,
Seriously though, imagine if such a strain takes over the world's yeast supplies as deeply as Monsanto's patented DNA has the world's corn supplies.
So... near zero?
No doubt, many would be looking forward to it.
Sorry, but there are lots of very specialized yeast strains. You don't use the same yeast for wine as you do for beer, and that's different from the one you use for bread. Etc. San Francisco sourdough bread used to be made from a regionally available wild yeast, but I think things may have changed so that it no longer lives here. Certainly given the urban levels of pollution I wouldn't want to depend on catching a wild yeast. There was one bakery that used to have a baker who kept his culture growing on his hairy chest, but the food & drug people forbade this., even though it had been safe and popular for decades.
You aren't going to get one strain of yeast to take over the world. Particularly not one that's become dependent on being cultured in a lab.
I think we've pushed this "anyone can grow up to be president" thing too far.
Sure, medicinal cannibas may have 250 active compounds, but how many of those - individually or in combination - are necessary to treat 95% of patients?
If we can identify the ones needed to treat the vast majority of patients and synthesize them or find a bio-factory (e.g. yeast) that we can control much better than the traditional source (the plant), we can deliver drugs that are more pure and more consistent than your average joint or brownie, yet still do the job for almost all patients.
If I get cancer and need this for medical reasons, I would much prefer to take a drug that has a known, consistent potency and known, consistent nominally-inactive ingredients than something I cut off a plant.
Knowledge is how to play a game, intelligence is how to win, wisdom is knowing what game to play.
With only THC and none of the other cannabinoids all you are just going to get is very anxious and very paranoid and I doubt anybody wants that. We discover something new about the endocannabinoid system almost every day. If you expose yourselves to chronic high levels of THC alone you are going to find some of those receptors downregulated retarding the action of GABA. Cannabidiol (CBD) is essential, it is a weak cannabinoid receptor antagonist/agonist the role depends on dose concentration and is highly anxiolytic. Trust me you want it.
A company like Luxco, maker of Everclear, can benefit from economies of scale by scaling up production volumes of its products. But in order to do that, the company has to try to be everything to everyone.
Perhaps the goats have been too busy bending over and pulling their behinds apart.
The rest of the world has been at this for over two decades. Where have you been?
Still waiting on Serviscope_minor to wake up to fucking reality and realize that Jessica Price isn't going to fuck him.
" You don't use the same yeast for wine as you do for beer, and that's different from the one you use for bread."
I do, and I get great results every time.
"Turbo" yeasts and specialty brewer's yeasts tend to suck. Fleischmann's active dry yeast? Works like a charm. I can even make 20% port non-fortified with that stuff.
Still waiting on Serviscope_minor to wake up to fucking reality and realize that Jessica Price isn't going to fuck him.
Industrial hemp is banned because of the drug ban despite the fact it is not the smoking kind of hemp. Under that logic, they have ban all yeast because 1 species can make you high.
Democracy Now! - uncensored, anti-establishment news
Good luck since THC isn't a protein. You need to encode the machine.
AFAIK men can get yeast infections too. Don't be sexist (jk ;-)
Growers aren't Showers. And these guys think advertising the fact they can make the active ingredient in a test tube isn't going to attract the Law? Good luck with that.
a biotech startup working in Ireland... bla bla bla... so that new medicinal (and, perhaps recreational) "marijuana" can be grown in a lab—no plants necessary.
If they are working with yeast in Ireland their goal is to make beer that has alcohol THC and CBD.
Having to work for a living is the root of all evil.
A silver lining to a yeast infection!
I'm trying to teach myself to set people on fire with my mind... Is it hot in here?
I'm surprised there aren't more people who raise the concerns of this being a GMO. I would have thought that the proponents of weed for medicine aren't bitching about franken-blunts.
-- I ignore anonymous replies to my comments and postings.
That's got to be the weirdest "THINK OF THE CHILDREN!!!" argument I've ever seen.
Ever since the 90s, starting in Florida with testing on various tomato cultivars (because of the high trichome content on the plant itself.)
Fuck man, I learned about this stuff in Ag. Sci. in high school in 1997.
Still waiting on Serviscope_minor to wake up to fucking reality and realize that Jessica Price isn't going to fuck him.
I think we may have different definitions for "good tasting". I did do that, however, before I was of drinking age. (And then I didn't even know enough to remove the sediment. Yuck, but it was alcohol.)
I think we've pushed this "anyone can grow up to be president" thing too far.
The stuff I make with Fleicshmann's tastes better than most stuff one gets at the grocery store here in California.
I make mine usually from hibiscus tea and wild red grapes found in the Santa Ana riverbed, and raw cane sugar.
Absolutely fucking tasty.
Still waiting on Serviscope_minor to wake up to fucking reality and realize that Jessica Price isn't going to fuck him.
Both wine and "ale" beers are made with saccharomyces cerevisiae yeast. Although there are different strands preferred for different styles of wine and beer, the differences shouldn't be too over the top. You're not going to end up with a fine best bitter with champagne yeast, nor are you going to get a competition-standard claret with ale yeast- but the results will be drinkable and tasty enough. See, for example, "champale" (beer brewed with champagne yeast which has been sold commercially).
Lager is made with a different species of yeast (s. carlsbergensis). So using a wine yeast is never likely to make a decent approximation of a lager.
Source: Have been making wines and beers for a decade, including many experimental batches as per the above.
Sounds plausible. I find most commercial beers undrinkable. Guiness is, however, quite good, especially if it's not too chilly. (It really *is* best at room temperature.)
So possily I'm just too picky.
I think we've pushed this "anyone can grow up to be president" thing too far.
I like stories like this because they make my uid relevant again. Oh to be 19 and picking a random uid while stoned. Too bad you can't change them on a one time basis or something. What a waste of a ~500k UID.
I'm a firm believer in the philosophy of a ruling class, especially since I rule.