Slashdot Mirror
Scientists Successfully Decode the Genome of Quinoa (bbc.com)
Gr8Apes writes: Scientists have successfully decoded the genome of quinoa, a hugely popular "super-food" because it is well balanced and gluten-free. They have pinpointed one of the genes that they believe control the production of saponins (bitter toxic compounds that protect the plant from predators) which can facilitate the breeding of plants without saponins, resulting in sweeter seeds without having to process them. The scientists also believe that the genetic understanding now gained will allow them to breed shorter, stockier plants that don't fall over as easily, and that these benefits could be gained without the use of genetic modification. Furthermore, the researchers believe the genetic code will rapidly lead to more productive varieties that will push down costs. "We need the price of quinoa to go down by a factor of five," said project leader Professor Mark Tester, from King Abdullah University of Science and Technology. "If we get to a similar price to wheat it can be used in processing and in bread making and in many other foods and products. It has the chance to truly add to current world food production." The study has been published in the journal Nature.
NT
Quinoa is bloody convenient, but I've never been able to warm up to the taste. A version that didn't have the saponins in it would be a huge improvement. Ain't science wonderful?
is can you slather it with cheese sauce and stuff it down your pie hole, or can you smoke it and get high?
Otherwise, Quinoa, whatever brah.
But but but, GMO? Aren't I supposed to hate science?
So what? Someone already bred a low saponin Quinoa that immediately harvested by the birds. Maybe leaving in the natural pesticide that is easy to process is a good idea?
Now if only they can filter the rocks out of it
I can't even reliably pronounce or spell its name.
Nullius in verba
And how do you cook it ?
It's the GMO rice with vitamin A precursors. Sounds like it should have a different taste than regular rice.
Have they figured out a way to prepare it that doesn't taste like crap and hippy sweat? That would be news.
This is a hacked account, for which the owner can not be held responsible.
quinoa, a hugely popular "super-food" because it is well balanced and gluten-free
Seriously, wtf? When and why did gluten become an evil boogeyman? Was there a recent research that found gluten causes cancer or something? Or is it just a new age hippie thing?
Gluten is just wheat protein. It's nutritious. It's how Roman soldiers were able to go everywhere and fight because they had a reliable, portable, long-lasting and nutritious food supply. Wheat is actually the first superfood.
Yes a tiny percentage of the population can't eat wheat because of celiac or wheat allergies. So what, peanut allergies are far more common and yet I don't see a lot of anti-peanut crusading.
Costco has really tasty pre-packaged packets of brown rice and Quinoa (under the brand Seeds of Change), that you can heat in five minutes,
I know what you are thinking. Pre-packaged? Brown rice? Quinoa? How could any of that be tasty?
Normally I hate packaged foods myself and always cook everything from raw. I've never liked brown rice, sometimes hated it, and while I like most Quinoa more, I only like it for particular uses.
But for whatever reason, these packets that Costco has are actually really tasty. Somehow the taste of the brown rice and Quinoa mesh together to make something very good, and something you can have with any protein instead of normal rice.
I imagine it's healthier too but I honestly do not care because I just find it tastier.
There's nothing un-pronouncable or strange in the ingredients either - brown rice and quinoa are the first two ingredients and it's just some spices after that.
Cook it in a skillet and it is great. The instructions say without water but I prefer cooking it as is, and you get some nice crunch in it. So tasty.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
It tastes OK, but the additional arm it's grown on my back makes sleeping inconvenient. However, it's nice to be able to type and scratch my ass at the same time.
You are welcome on my lawn.
That's why we have pesticides
No matter how its prepared the taste is always there under everything else and I find it quite unpleasant.
Only the State obtains its revenue by coercion. - Murray Rothbard
Please, stop apologizing for this shit: "and that these benefits could be gained without the use of genetic modification."
A. No it can't, selective breeding and direct genetic modification end up with the exact same result, and are both "genetic modifications" by any reasonable definition of the term.
B. This is exactly the same as saying "and these benefits could be gained without the use of wifi!" or "without the use of satellites!" to make "radiation" schizos or flat earthers feel better about themselves. They don't deserve to feel better about themselves; they're crass, ignorant halfwits and don't need their idiotic beliefs affirmed anymore than they already are. And that goes for the stupid assed "gluten free" thing too. Almost no one on earth has celiac disease, and anyone that does can take care of that themselves.
At no point should scientific results be apologetic, the universe doesn't apologize for existing the way it does, and reporting how it exists should need no apology either.
It should be pronounced kwin-oh-uh
If you pronounce it as keen-wah you should consider euthanasia immediately
What part about it containing Saponins that are bitter and toxic didn't you understand?
And what gave the two of you the idea that eating glue was a good idea?
It was already done several years ago. Quinoa farmers didn't like it because without the saponins birds devoured the crops and yields fell dramatically.
Human decisions being involved is the very definition of what is meant when people say you aren't abiding by the laws of nature or some variation. And no, we don't know what to expect. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...
The scientists also believe that the genetic understanding now gained will allow them to breed shorter, stockier plants that don't fall over as easily, and that these benefits could be gained without the use of genetic modification.
I guess plant splicing and selective breading do not count as genetic modification. Who knew? Must have meant direct genetic modification.
I try to stay away from the ramen squares, but the cup of ramen are quite tasty and convenient. Hot pockets aren't too bad, but I generally don't care for the cost/quantity ratio (at least that's what I think my issue is) I eat what amounts to single serving soup in a can. Quinoa... can't say I've really tried that.
Lately I've been fond of eating canned mini-raviolis. I eat chicken nuggets, usually Banquet, pizza rolls, not so much pizza itself lately, except for restaurant pizza. But my tastes change, and recently I've been avoiding spicier foods most of the time, though there were times where I've said lay on the spice. There's no accounting for taste or changes in tastes.
That's a workable issue. Plenty of foods have been bred out of more toxic wild ancestors, like the solanine removed from potatoes or the erucic acid removed from canola. Most plants did not evolve to have their roots or leaves eaten; domestication made them favorable to human consumption. Knowing how to make things better is the first step toward doing it.
Saponins I think are less of a concern, since they're usually pretty easy to wash off of commercially processed quinoa. I'd be more concerned with producing low oxalic acid varieties.
Before it's too late. Sweet quinoa bread fed to urban populations will mutate our youths into an rebellious army of unstoppable supernjggers.
This is about making the uncategorical claim that quinoa tastes good and is good for you after the summary just got done telling us that neither was the case. Now so far, you've made the case that quinoa after processing need not taste bad or be bad for you, but you've stopped before making the case that it tastes good and is good for you.
the summary just got done telling us that neither was the case
What? It says nothing about it being good for you or not, nor does it say it is not good tasting. There are methods for making chocolate less bitter and sometimes the less bitter versions are preferred, but that is not the same as saying dark chocolate tastes bad.
If you want vitamin A (and a whole bunch of other nutrients), eat some liver.
Alright you have me on bitter. I just equate bitter with bad tasting, but toxic?
It must have been something you assimilated. . . .
Well I think it's because Glue-ten sounds bad so it must be...
Well, beer is both bitter and toxic, but we love it, anyway.
Learning about brewing beer, by brewing beer.
Harvest the birds too, they'd taste great with a side of quinoa.
Website Just Down For Me? Find out
This is about making the uncategorical claim that quinoa tastes good and is good for you after the summary just got done telling us that neither was the case.
I eat quinoa occasionally, and I like both the taste and the (cooked) texture. I can grasp why some people might not like it, but that's true of a whole lot of different foods and beverages.
It seems rather silly to be making definitive claims about the taste, one way or the other, based on a Slashdot summary.
#DeleteChrome
It's about the flavor.
So you don't know, you have no idea what you are talking about. But, GMO SCARY and everyone should think that.
Is that your position, or was there nuance I missed ?
That's an incredibly absurd argument that could be applied to wheat, rice, shellfish, meat etc. Lots of foods either don't taste nice or require processing to be considered edible and safe for human consumption.
The BBC article isn't clear about it, but the bitter saponins are in tiny, thin shells that are around the individual quinoa seeds. The bad-tasting saponins protect the quinoa from birds.
You can get rid of the coating, but it's messy - the shells go all over the place, and they're hard to clean up. (Maybe I do it wrong.) After you remove the coating, you cook the quinoa, and it tastes good.
You can buy quinoa whose saponins have already been removed (ready to cook), but a box of that quinoa is more expensive.
Kindergarten
How is "gluten-free" an advantage outside of the ignorant hipster circlejerk?
This is amazing. Something I never expected to hear in my lifetime.
I don't really mind the taste, but it gives me terrible diarrhoea. Before anyone says I'm preparing it wrong, nobody else in the family seems to have the problem, including the kids. Luckily they've got bored with it so we don't have it so often now.
Disclaimer: totally not a hipster.
Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
Do not worry, while we are under the hood we will make sure it can absorb and much Glysophate and Sodium Fluoride as possible. Have a good day.
How is "gluten-free" an advantage outside of the ignorant hipster circlejerk?
New-agey people think we should all be gluten free, not really any evidence that they are right. That aside, Quinoa is a lot healthier than wheat or rice and has a higher protein content, it's not just empty carbs.
"That's the way to do it" - Punch
It seems rather silly to be making definitive claims about the taste, one way or the other, based on a Slashdot summary.
It would be extremely silly to make definitive claims about anything* based on a Slashdot summary.
* Even claims about Slashdot itself should be based on more than one summary.
Clearly.
You are welcome on my lawn.
If you want vitamin A (and a whole bunch of other nutrients), eat some liver.
Liver not only tastes far worse it is full of cholesterol and is part of the body that absorbs lots of toxins. Liver has the highest concentration of mercury, lead, and other harmful heavy metals of any part of the body. Pesticides eaten by the animal in the feed also tends to concentrate in the liver.
Liver tastes bad and is very bad for you. Quite the opposite of quinoa which tastes good and is good for you.
"That's the way to do it" - Punch
Seriously, wtf? When and why did gluten become an evil boogeyman?
Hey, good for you. You've won the genetic lottery and can digest gluten without ill-effect. But a lot of people cannot. I've got a little girl who was slowly wasting away, starving to death, because consuming gluten destroyed her body's ability to absorb nutrients from food. (Google: Celiac) It took a few gastroenterologists to finally crack the case and determine that gluten was causing her body to destroy itself. It took *years* of gluten-free living for her to bounce back, and even now the most trace amounts of gluten in her food (like from kitchen cross-contamination) can send her into a tailspin for up to a week or more. So STFU and eat your gluten, and respect that there are real human beings out there who have a *medical requirement* to stay far, far away from the stuff.
part of the reason I don't like GMO is that companies that patent/copywrite them (soybeans) and then control the supply. If the GMO plants were "fair use" and available to everyone that would change the equation in at least some minds.
Scientists Successfully Decode the Genome of Quinoa
Ugh. I know this is a primarily a tech site, but why can't we make more of an effort to use the actual scientific terms instead meaningless stupid phrases.
It's kind of like saying "Company develops new method to talk to computers" instead of "Company develops new programming language, Rust"
"Scientists sequence and assemble the genome of Chenopodium quinoa (aka "quinoa")"
There, much better. Heck, that's lifted almost word-for-word from the actual scientific article, so it's not like it requires a ton of effort.
The taste of liver is personal. Some like it, some don't. Dietary cholesterol has almost no effect on serum cholesterol. Most of the cholesterol in your body is actually produced by your own liver, and this production is adjusted based on how much cholesterol you eat. If you eat more, your body produces less to compensate. On top of that, cholesterol isn't as bad as people have claimed, it only becomes harmful if you already have inflammation and oxidative stress in your body. Measured values of heavy metals in farm grown animal livers is not higher than same metals in potatoes and carrots, while providing many more nutrients per weight. So, by eating a small piece of liver compared to a big bowl of vegetables, you actually get less heavy metals. Makes sense, because they feed these animals very similar food as we eat ourselves, grown from the same land.
Because of all those skinny diabetic Asians?
Unless, of course, the reason you are interested in growing Golden Rice is because you cannot afford liver. Golden rice was not developed to be a commercial product, which is why the patent licensing fees are completely waived for non-commercial plantings. It was developed to help rice farmers in the poorest countries to produce their own Vitamin A rich crop and thus prevent their kids from going blind. Liver may be a great source of vitamins, but if you cannot afford to buy liver, then that becomes completely irrelevant.
Bureaucracy expands to meet the needs of the expanding bureaucracy.-Oscar Wilde
People who can't afford liver aren't reading slashdot, so they won't see my comments. Where I live, liver is dirt cheap because nobody wants it.
It's the GMO rice with vitamin A precursors. Sounds like it should have a different taste than regular rice.
Quinoa is more akin to corn. It is like a primitive corn.
I don't drink alcohol.
I suppose if a summary just got done pointing out the unhealthy and less tasty aspects of any of those things and then someone uncategorically said they tasted good and were good for you, I might take exception at the statement then, too.
Quinoa is 70% Carbohydrate. Wheat and Rice are about 80% Carbohydrate. In addition Quinoa only has a few percentages higher protein than Wheat and Rice.
Most people who make statements like yours don't know this and spout mindless nonsense they heard someone say without any personal understanding of what they are talking about. Quinoa like any other grain has very high percentages of Carbohydrate. If your goal is to avoid Carbs you should avoid grains entirely and get the carbs you eat from Vegetables, not grains.
That was paste
Delicious, yummy paste
Fully licensed blockchain psychiatrist
The scientists also believe that the genetic understanding now gained will allow them to breed shorter, stockier plants that don't fall over as easily, and that these benefits could be gained without the use of genetic modification.
So with no genetic changes at all we will get different plants? Don't these people know that selective breeding IS genetic modification? No? Well why the hell not? Are they morons? Yes? Why the hell are we listening to them talk about science then? It's Slashdot you say? What difference should that make? Really? So these people read stupid news stories and then comment on them? Wait, what? They don't even read the stories? Wait, what?!? They don't even read the summaries of the stories?!? Well what the fuck do they talk about? Oh.
When the only tool you have is a claw hammer every problem starts to look like the back of someone's skull.
"What part about it containing Saponins that are bitter and toxic didn't you understand?"
First, they're not all bitter nor toxic or people would eat asparagus and other vegs containing massive amounts of it.
How is "gluten-free" an advantage outside of the ignorant hipster circlejerk?
There is a growing number of people with celiacs disease and with nonceliac gluten sensitivity. I wasn't able to find reliable numbers for nonceliac, but 1% of people have celiacs. There is no wide spread agreement on the increase, aside from better testing. My wife is celiacs and it is a major PITA. Many bread type items that are gluten free suck, so any more options there would be great.
A cup of brown rice has 5g of protein. Quinoa has 8g. That's quite a significant difference. Almost twice. White rice would have even less protein.
It also doesn't take into account all the other nutrients in Quinoa.
"That's the way to do it" - Punch
Additionally... Quinoa is a complete protein, it has all the essential amino acids, you don't have to mix it with a lentil or bean to get a complete protein. This is something important for someone like myself who, for medical reasons, has to limit more meat intake.
Quinoa also fares much better than rice on the glycemic index.
"That's the way to do it" - Punch
A cup of chicken has 43g of protein. That's way the fuck more than twice. It also doesn't take into account all the other nutrients in chicken.
A edible cup of BBQ pork ribs (actual delicious meat) has about 38g.
I'm all for working on this goop though, food has to eat too. Should make good pig food.
John McAfee 'It was like that time I hired that Bangkok prostitute; to do my taxes, while I fucked my accountant'
Not only that, you can use it as a fleshlight insert before cooking and it's even more nutritious.
Be it breeding, selection, splicing- it is all genetic manipulation.
That is good, actionable feedback. And yes, much of great cooking comes from meshing together two or more, sometimes unlikely, food or flavor combinations.
Why are bacon and eggs great together?
Why does grape jelly do something magical with peanut butter?
What is it about a whiskey sour or a Cuba Libre, that makes them classic drinks?
Why is béarnaise sauce such a classic French sauce?
I'm sure there are answers, but I also kind of like a bit of mystery to these questions.
Yeah, they're called pussies.
its just slower with even more random and unknown effects.
That doesn't make any sense either. If someone says chicken tastes good I don't leap to the conclusion they're referring to eating raw unplucked chicken. I make the reasonable assumption that they're talking to its taste after it has been appropriately prepared for human consumption.
I just rinse it, then toast it in the pot with some oil. That gets rid of the bitter taste. After its toasted, you add the water. No mess. It'd be great if this all leads to lower prices. It's a great substitute for brown rice, and cooks a while lot faster.
It's a great substitute for brown rice
Anything is a good substitute for brown rice. Dog biscuits, mouldy cheese, sawdust, literally anything.
To have a right to do a thing is not at all the same as to be right in doing it
Liver tastes bad and is very bad for you. Quite the opposite of quinoa which tastes good and is good for you.
Any argument which ends in "quinoa tastes good" is logically flawed.
To have a right to do a thing is not at all the same as to be right in doing it
A quick rinse with hot water before dumping in the rice cooker is all that's needed to rinse off the saponins. Doing that before packaging would be messy and expensive I imagine.
I perused the ~275 comments here, and didn't see anything about this, so here goes:
The main reason you'd want to focus on quinoa is its productivity. Sure, it's about 1/4 of corn right now, but corn is the most modified and perfected crop on the planet. Quinoa and amaranth are in the beet family, which for whatever reason (probably C4 fixation + a lot of adaptability) sets some records for edible stuff per acre, especially with limited irrigation. There's strains of quinoa and amaranth that produce close to 2 pounds of seeds per plant. Anything with remotely that potential ought to be worked up sooner or later. So, right now, a farmer can produce maybe 1 ton/acre of quinoa compared to 3.5 or so of corn, but that number is going to go way up. Since the C4 pathway is the main reason corn is so productive, I'd expect quinoa yield to be on par with corn sooner or later.
Oysters are better for that.
You are aware what "we" means, don't you? And I did say speak for yourself, not what is this beer thing you are talking about.
You can add people to your foe list for not liking the things you like, but I don't see the point.
It's about someone making a statement that's inappropriate considering what proceeded it, and hinting as to why in a manner I find amusing.
Jesus, all you have to do is rinse it in a sieve for 15 seconds. Try something new once in a while. Philistine.
Let me know when you have successfully cross-bred a tomato with a fish.
And tell us all about it, especially "who did what to whom".
Good for you, but the conversation was about golden rice specifically. The availability of liver where you are to people who can afford it is off topic. Regardless of who is reading it.
Bureaucracy expands to meet the needs of the expanding bureaucracy.-Oscar Wilde