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Disease-Resistant Pigs Latest Win For Gene Editing Technology (reuters.com)
schwit1 writes with news that using gene editing technology researchers have bred pigs that do not produce a protein necessary for the Porcine Reproductive and Respiratory Syndrome (PRRS) virus to spread. According to Reuters: "A British animal genetics firm, working with U.S. scientists, has bred the world's first pigs resistant to a common viral disease, using the hot new technology of gene editing. Genus, which supplies pig and bull semen to farmers worldwide, said on Tuesday it had worked with the University of Missouri to develop pigs resistant to Porcine Reproductive and Respiratory Syndrome Virus (PRRSv). The condition, also known as blue-ear disease, can be fatal as it affects the animals' immune system and costs farmers hundreds of millions of dollars a year. There is no cure. By using precise gene editing, the team from the University of Missouri was able to breed pigs that do not produce a specific protein necessary for the virus to spread in the animals. Their research was published in journal Nature Biotechnology."
This probably is the first step down the road that leads to this.
I think that's a valid concern. They say this:
By using precise gene editing, the team from the University of Missouri was able to breed pigs that do not produce a specific protein necessary for the virus to spread in the animals.
But what's the purpose of that protein in the animal? Surely the only purpose of that protein is not to allow the virus to spread, or else you think that would have a habit of being selected out of the lineage. Surely it has some beneficial purpose that has ensured it stays part of the animal. It seems a little too easy to remove disease by just deleting the part of the animal that the disease uses.
"Our two-party system is like a bowl of shit looking at itself in a mirror." - Lewis Black
I am kosher, so I don't eat pig to start. I don't tell people that they shouldn't eat pig. And if I did eat pig, I would likely not eat this pig.
The problem for me is that the "Unknown" value of the particular gene is "unknown". We know the value in removing it, but not cost involved. There are always tradeoffs, and the unknown tradeoff for me wouldn't be worth it.
Agent K: A *person* is smart. People are dumb, stupid, panicky animals, and you know it.
It seems a little too easy to remove disease by just deleting the part of the animal that the disease uses.
It depends on the path the disease is using. Think about blood type receptors and immune system response. IE this technique will probably work great on some diseases, and not at all on others.
I don't read AC A human right
"Some beneficial purpose" != "crucial to survival"
"Our two-party system is like a bowl of shit looking at itself in a mirror." - Lewis Black
I do get flu shots, employer has them provided at work for free
but, they don't always work. two years in the last five they were against wrong strains
the complete lack of information about the specific protein other than apparently it is the protein whose job it is to make sure the pig can get a virus.
No, it is not the "job" of that protein to make sure the pig can host the specific virus. The virus needs that protein to reproduce. Your statement is like saying that the job of a window is so that thieves can break into houses through them.
The protein was there for some other purpose, but apparently since the pigs don't seem hurt by it not being there, it's a truly vestigial remnant of pig evolution.
I never had the flu, and I never had a flu shot.
I figure it is because I live healthy and had luck in avoiding places/situations where people with the flu hang out to long.
Perhaps you should fugure how a flu shot works?
As long as you are mot an elderly or in an high risk environment (or a pandemic is brooming on the horizon), flu shots are pretty pointless.
It is like running a virus scanner on a PC without internet connection, no CD, Floppy and USB drive.
Cost free eBook I read (by iBook/Kobo/Amazon/ObookO/Gutenberg etc.): "The Green Odyssey" by Philip Jose Farmer.
CD163 is a relatively well described protein with very detailed functions, mostly on innate immunity. Fortunately innate immunity have many kinds pathways that interconnect and supplement each other (probably because pathogens are very good at interfering with them) so blocking one pathway at the beginning, like in this case, would have very little effect overall and interleukin 6 and 10 (and the rest of the cascade) will be still produced. For the virus of course this lack of CD163 its lethal, but for the pig it may at much represent slightly increased rates of infections of other pathogens, many of those are no longer important since the pigs are not in the wild anymore.
Mandatory labels should only be required in cases where there is an actual known problem with something. Voluntary labels can be used right now. In fact, one of the things I had for dinner had a little 'non GMO' label on it. The only reason the anti GMO nuts want mandatory labels is so they can use them to spread FUD.
As long as you don't know that there is no problem a mandatory label is what the citizens want. Not giving them that behave handwaving like you is a violation of basic human an civil rights.
I for my part wont eat any GMO food (if I know it is GMO at the first hand), regardless of true or perceived danger until the GMO MAFIA stops interfering with citizens and customers wishes to have said food labeled!
The only reason the anti GMO nuts want mandatory labels is so they can use them to spread FUD.
No, they want it because it is their choice what they eat, not somebody else choice.
But thank you that you dare to chose for me what I should eat. Remind me when we meet in person, that I shove down your throat some kind of food that you most dislike. I'm pretty sure you will figure some way to sue me imediatly.
Cost free eBook I read (by iBook/Kobo/Amazon/ObookO/Gutenberg etc.): "The Green Odyssey" by Philip Jose Farmer.
Maybe the pigs wouldn't be getting the diseases in the first place if they weren't kept cheek-by-jowl in their own filth, in pens where they can't even turn around.
But have no fear, now that there are laws against taking pictures of factory pig farms and the horrific conditions the animals are kept in even from public property, we're all going to be more safe because of genetic engineering.
http://www.greenisthenewred.co...
https://www.aspca.org/animal-c...
You are welcome on my lawn.
That's what I was getting at - the reporting completely left out all details.
And what I was getting at was that were this specific protein important enough to the life of the pig, then the modified pigs will not survive the market. Farmers aren't going to try raising pigs that won't live long enough to make it to the butcher. They won't buy the modified pigs, and this will become an interesting footnote in the history of gene editing.
But once again, it doesn't matter what the pig thinks about it. You care more about the pigs than the people who eat them, I get it. But the standard argument against GMO is not what it does to the O, it's what effect that O has on the people who eat it.
We have a very very long history of people who eat NO pork. Thus we can be sure that pork that doesn't have a specific protein will NOT have any negative effects on people who eat it, because there are no significant negative effects on all the people who already don't eat it.
I don't know what the "guy below", whoever you are referring to, is talking about. If it's the guy who is talking about blowfish toxins, well, now we can talk about when pigs swim instead of when pigs fly.
As long as you don't know that there is no problem a mandatory label is what the citizens want.
You cannot prove a negative, so you are demanding the impossible. Can you prove that crops raised by left-handed Methodists do not cause cancer? If you want to avoid GMO, then you are free to buy any of the thousands of products voluntarily labeled "non-GMO". But you have no right to use the force of law to impose your anti-science agenda on others.
"There are a lot of genes and proteins that don't have much use, perhaps they did at one time. And viruses often need those genes or proteins to reproduce"
Exactly! IOW they just patch an ancient vulnerability and the malware has no chance anymore.
At which point everything would be so inundated with labels you'd be unable to see the product.
Why single out GMO? Why not label that this product came from a new farm, with no proven track record? Why not label that they used radiation mutation to breed this pig? Why not label that the plastic wrapping isn't proven BPA-free? Why not label that the glue in the labels isn't proven to not cause cancer? Why not label that label overload present on this package can cause depression, anxiety, and paranoia, since that seems very likely to me to at least be true? Why not label that there's no proven track record of there not being a bridge troll hiding under this piece of pork?
Mandated labels are there to warn of a known or predicted danger, not to satisfy your need for advocacy. You're free to stick "non-GMO" labels on your organic food if you want, but you can't *force* GMO producers to label unless there's an identified safety issue.
Hah, an oxymoron if I've ever seen one. Humans haven't had "natural food" since the invention of agriculture.