Controversial Trial of Genetically Modified Wheat Ends In Disappointment

sciencehabit writes: A controversial GM wheat trial has failed after more than £2 million of public money was spent protecting it from GM opponents. Researchers had hoped that the wheat modified to produce a warning pheromone would keep aphids away and attract their natural enemies, reducing the need for insecticides. Despite showing promise in the laboratory, the field trial failed to show any effect. “If you make a transgenic plant that produces that alarm continuously, it’s not going to work,” ecologist Marcel Dicke of Wageningen University in the Netherlands says. “You have a plant crying wolf all the time, and the bugs won’t listen to it any longer.”

Comments

GMOs have so many different problems

[pubwvj]

Proponents of GMOs tend to focus on the opposition to GMOs based on perceived health risks but there are many other reasons that GMOs are problematic. A huge issue is that patents are being granted on life, on genes. The patent applicants did not invent these genes. Rather they stole them and now want to patent them so they can control the use and make money. All GMO work should be open source and open license. This doesn't solve the many other problems but it chips away at the problems. Of course, the GMO proponents will oppose this.

Re:GMOs have so many different problems

[Anonymous Coward]

I'm somewhat a proponent of GMOs, being a Molecular Biologist I suppose helps, but I don't oppose what you say.

You are right that granting patents to genes is stupid - the researchers didn't invent the genes at all as they exist in nature, much like gravity exists and cannot be patented.

Rather, the novel application of a gene should be allowed to be patented, not the gene itself (and by extension all applications regardless of any innovation). Simply making everything open source and license won't solve anything, it only creates problems with RnD recovery. The real issue is that the basic discovery of a gene can be patented even if no novel use is applied, which is actually quite trivial these days (i've just done this myself, and it wasn't that hard to "discover").

Re:GMOs have so many different problems

[ChromeAeonium]

Yep. People oppose the various big company made ones, claiming they don't like big companies. But then they'll also oppose things like the Arctic Apple (developed by a small company), the Rainbow papaya (developed by the University of Hawai'i), Golden Rice (developed by non-profit International Rice Research Institute), and Honeysweet plum (developed by the USDA), among plenty of other examples. Many will oppose university, NGO, and government developed GE crops, then say it's just about Monsanto...not buying that. Even this wheat in question was publicly funded and developed by Rothamsted Research,and what happened? This group called Take the Flour Back wanted to destroy it, which is better than what happened to CSIRO's publicly funded GE wheat research in Australia, where some book burners from Greenpeace successfully did destroy the research. All that aside, there are plenty of patented non-GE plants which vary rarely encounter controversy. The only consistent thing that gets controversy it genetic engineering, not public or private, patented or not. This controversy is not about patents, or quite bluntly any of the other common excuses for opposition to genetic engineering for that matter.

Re:GMOs have so many different problems

[Ol Olsoc]

If you don't like patented plants, no one is forcing you to use them. Problem solved.

You have some research to do in biology. GMO genes do have a bit of a tendency to spread out. Nature and all.Eventually it will be a bit difficult to avoid the altered genes.

http://www.gmocompass.org/eng/...

Then comes the question of who owns the now altered plant.

I'm pro GMO by the way, just wanted to make a little correction.

The Monsanto donnybrook muddies the waters of GMO, because their particular version is not per se to increase yields, but to have plants that resist Roundup get big doses of Roundup to kill other plants. That's arguably an irresponsible use of GMO. Certainly it makes Roundup a short lived herbicide, as plants develop resistance to it. And they will.

But plants with increased nutrition, resistance to diseases, with more energy put into seed or fruit production than stalks or other inedible parts simply makes sense.

We also have to encourage "heirloom" crop growing in order to have as much genetic stock as possible. Everyone can win at this game. As long as they aren't asshats about it.