This is significant:

Transgenes vacation in a remote area

This will have a large impact on our economy and the way we grow food.

Best Wishes,,,,,

Z

-- Z1X4Y7 (Z1X4Y7@aol.com), November 29, 2001

Answers

Spermicidal rice in Asia maybe. There are quite a few who'd think that might be a good idea. Would be better than forcing abortions on Chinese peasants I guess.

-- Carlos (riffraff@cybertime.net), November 29, 2001.

"Just think if that gets out into the environment and has a negative impact on people's fertility," he said.

This is excellent news! There are too many people now. A negative impact on people's fertility is exactly what is needed.

-- (anti-globalist@Berkely.mobilization), November 29, 2001.

Yeah, i think there are plenty of people on earth, already, but i wouldn't like to see all sperm die.

joj

-- joj (joj@home.org), November 30, 2001.

You aren't getting this are you?

Best Wishes,,,,,

Z

-- Z1X4Y7 (Z1X4Y7@aol.com), November 30, 2001.

Z1X4Y7, just an aside to begin. I find the 'enticing blurb' and a link approach doesn't often get me to follow the link. With just a few words of blurb, the link looks like an invitation to stick my head down an unknown rabbit hole. I much prefer a three sentence 'executive summary' with the link. Enough to get me started.

As for the contents of the article, it is dynamite. Those bioengineered genes must have migrated at least 60 miles and two-thirds of the maize samples taken that far away showed the engineered genes!

Gawd! Mexico is the foremost repository of 'heirloom' and 'native' genetic stocks for maize, if I recall correctly. I believe that was one major reason why they outlawed GE corn in Mexico. Talk about putting the toothpaste back in the tube - how are you going to safeguard that gene pool now?

I love you, Monsanto! But not much.

-- Little Nipper (canis@minor.net), November 30, 2001.

LN:

I will remember your request in the future. By-the-by, I am just Z. It is nice to know that someone GI [always wanted to say that ;o)]

Best Wishes,,,,,

Z

-- Z1X4Y7 (Z1X4Y7@aol.com), November 30, 2001.

Looks like we had better get moving on cloning females.

-- Cherri (jessam5@home.com), November 30, 2001.

Not a DGI here Z but the cat's out of the bag for good. Stephen Hawking recently opined that in terms of human survival physics has created about as much misery as it can but that biology has just begun. The splicing is so routine and the techniques so well known that strains of wheat, rice & corn that a rougue Armageddon booster or nilist might introduce could devastate world food supply. A reverse Kazinski type. Brave new world indeed.

-- Carlos (riffraff@cybertime.net), November 30, 2001.

I don't get it. If genetic modifications threaten diversity, then why not bioengineer the "crowded out" flora back into existence?

-- (lars@indy.net), December 01, 2001.

It's a different birds and bees deal Lars. Once the GE stuff gets out there unless it's designed to be infertile God's little pollinators will scatter it wherever they fly or crawl.

-- Carlos (riffraff@cybertime.net), December 01, 2001.

"why not bioengineer the "crowded out" flora back into existence?"

The technology doesn't exist to manufacture genes from scratch. What they do is take genes from one organism and splice them into the gene sequence in another organism. That is why it is called recombitant DNA.

Also, even if you could build the genes from scratch, if the crowded out flora didn't exist, what would you use for a blueprint and how would you know when you got it right?

-- Little Nipper (canis@minor.met), December 01, 2001.

I recombitanted DNA once. I got 'NAD.

-- (nemesis@awol.com), December 01, 2001.

LN:

The technology doesn't exist to manufacture genes from scratch. What they do is take genes from one organism and splice them into the gene sequence in another organism. That is why it is called recombitant DNA.

Also, even if you could build the genes from scratch, if the crowded out flora didn't exist, what would you use for a blueprint and how would you know when you got it right?

You are essentially correct. We can synthesize sequences as large as the coding sequence and, indeed, that has been done. But that is not a gene. There are all of the regulatory sequences. I remember one fungal gene with a coding sequence of 1000 bp. Its most important regulatory sequence was separated by 2000 bp of non-coding sequence. The distance was taken-up by complicated secondary structure.

In the case of the disease resistance genes. They fall into two classes. One group, termed LRR's, are associated with a large class of gene for gene systems. No one has the slightest idea what they do and how they make a plant resistant in a gene for gene system. What makes the wild relatives different from domesticated varieties and different from each other. No one knows.

You are correct: that is why recombinant technology is used.

Best Wishes,,,,,

Z

-- Z1X4Yl7 (Z1X4Y7@aol.com), December 01, 2001.

LN:

To go beyond the article, since so little is understood, one doesn't know what will happen when one moves a new gene into a different genetic background. It can be lethal; thus eliminating genetic groups by mechanisms other than competition [this is unlikely to happen with the BT gene].

In contrast, we have plants that all of the accrued wisdom says should die. It turns out that they are happier than the recipient population used in transformation. Lots to learn. ;o)))

Best Wishes,,,,

Z

-- Z1X4Y7 (Z1X4Y7@aol.com), December 01, 2001.

This is a scary situation. It has been a concern among organic farmers here in the U.S. for years. GE crops have been developed that have sterile seed; thus farmers must buy new every year.

I read a year ago that GE sterile rice was developed for sale to 3rd world countries.

-- John Littmann (johntl@mtn.org), December 02, 2001.

John:

thus farmers must buy new every year.

Explain to me why this is different than hybrid seeds.

Actually, if one is worried about the spread of trans-genes, the terminator gene is a good idea. I am sure that you get that one.

Best Wishes,,,

Z

-- Z1X4Y7 (Z1X4Y7@aol.com), December 02, 2001.