Category Archives: Genetic Engineering

dr franklins island genetic engineering

By: Phyllis Humphrey

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dr franklins island genetic engineering - Video

Lecture 10: Genetic Engineering
I would like to welcome you to Lecture 10 of the subject Genetic Engineering. This subject is a component of the BACHELOR OF AGRICULTURE AND TECHNOLOGY offered at both NMIT Melbourne...

By: Nicky Cooley

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Lecture 10: Genetic Engineering - Video

The science of indirectly manipulating an organism's genes using techniques like molecular cloning and transformation to alter the structure and nature of genes is called genetic engineering. Genetic engineering can bring about a great amount of transformation in the characteristics of an organism by the manipulation of DNA, which is like the code inscribed in every cell determining how it functions. Like any other science, genetic engineering also has pros and cons. Let us look at some of them.

Pros of Genetic Engineering

Better Taste, Nutrition and Growth Rate Crops like potato, tomato, soybean and rice are currently being genetically engineered to obtain new strains with better nutritional qualities and increased yield. The genetically engineered crops are expected to have the capacity to grow on lands that are presently not suitable for cultivation. The manipulation of genes in crops is expected to improve their nutritional value as also their rate of growth. Biotechnology, the science of genetically engineering foods, can be used to impart a better taste to food.

Pest-resistant Crops and Longer Shelf life Engineered seeds are resistant to pests and can survive in relatively harsh climatic conditions. The plant gene At-DBF2, when inserted in tomato and tobacco cells is seen to increase their endurance to harsh soil and climatic conditions. Biotechnology can be used to slow down the process of food spoilage. It can thus result in fruits and vegetables that have a greater shelf life.

Genetic Modification to Produce New Foods Genetic engineering in food can be used to produce totally new substances such as proteins and other food nutrients. The genetic modification of foods can be used to increase their medicinal value, thus making homegrown edible vaccines available.

Modification of Genetic Traits in Humans Genetic engineering has the potential of succeeding in case of human beings too. This specialized branch of genetic engineering, which is known as human genetic engineering is the science of modifying genotypes of human beings before birth. The process can be used to manipulate certain traits in an individual.

Boost Positive Traits, Suppress Negative Ones Positive genetic engineering deals with enhancing the positive traits in an individual like increasing longevity or human capacity while negative genetic engineering deals with the suppression of negative traits in human beings like certain genetic diseases. Genetic engineering can be used to obtain a permanent cure for dreaded diseases.

Modification of Human DNA If the genes responsible for certain exceptional qualities in individuals can be discovered, these genes can be artificially introduced into genotypes of other human beings. Genetic engineering in human beings can be used to change the DNA of individuals to bring about desirable structural and functional changes in them.

Cons of Genetic Engineering

May Hamper Nutritional Value Genetic engineering in food involves the contamination of genes in crops. Genetically engineered crops may supersede natural weeds. They may prove to be harmful for natural plants. Undesirable genetic mutations can lead to allergies in crops. Some believe that genetic engineering in foodstuffs can hamper their nutritional value while enhancing their taste and appearance.

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Pros and Cons of Genetic Engineering - Buzzle

Genetic engineering could restore the once profuse North American bird after a century or more of extinction

PASSENGER PIGEON: The numerous bird went from abundant to extinct in less than 100 years. Louis Agassiz Fuertes

The last lonely bird of a species that once numbered three billion or more died on September 1, 1914. Martha, as she was known, had been the last passenger pigeon since her mate George died in 1910. The last of a social species, she lived out her days in solitary confinement in a cage in the Cincinnati Zoo. Her corpsestuffed and primpedcan now be seen at the Smithsonian Institution. But what if the passenger pigeon could be brought back? That's the idea behind de-extinction. Take DNA harvested from specimens stuffed in museum drawers, like Martha. Figure out which genes matter and then use the fast growing field of genetic engineering to edit the DNA of a closely related species into some version of the extinct species. If all goes well, a chimera of the long-lost Martha could be born and, one day, flocks of passenger pigeons could be restored to the regrown eastern North American woodlands. Would-be de-extinction pioneer Ben Novak is working at the University of California, Santa Cruz, to make this exact scenario come true. A joint venture between the Revive and Restore effort of The Long Now Foundation (an organization dedicated to long-term thinking) and the ancient DNA lab at U.C. Santa Cruz, Novak's effort is focused on acquiring genetic information from stuffed passenger pigeons and sequencing the genome of the closely related band-tailed pigeon. So far, 32 samples have had the genetic code in their mitochondria sequenced. All of the samples come from birds killed between 1860 and 1898, according to Novak. "That's right in the range when the bird was going extinct," he notes. Outside efforts have helped as well, including nearly complete sequencing of three individuals that showed passenger pigeons have been through booms and busts before. "If passenger pigeons survived through several population bottlenecks during their evolutionary history, perhaps we don't need to create billions of them in order for their populations to be sustainable," notes paleogenomicist Beth Shapiro of U.C. Santa Cruz, whose lab hosts Novak and this effort.

"All of our birds are all very, very similar to each otherlike everybody being cousins, essentiallywhich is the effect of this recent rapid population expansion," Novak adds. "What we're really interested in is figuring out when that population expansion happened." If the population explosion happened more than 400 years ago, then it is unlikely that the European arrival in North America precipitated the boom that produced billions of birds, as some have suggested. To figure out when the last boom occurred will require finding DNA from fossil samples thousands of years olda few of which Novak has begun to examine. With ancient samples and those from the 19th century, Novak and his peers could begin to piece together the actual ecology of the bird in the wild. And understanding how the passenger pigeon existed makes it more likely people could bring the bird back and have the species thrive in the woods that are available today as well as in the future as the climate changes. "Nothing in the data so far to shout at us to turn back now and not bring back the passenger pigeon," Novak says. The team has not yet completed the band-tailed pigeon sequencing required to begin resurrecting the passenger pigeon, but experiments in cell cultures from the band-tailed pigeon may begin as soon as next year, Novak says. This work would be similar to experiments being done at Harvard Medical School to see if the woolly mammoth might be resurrected through its still living relative, the Asian elephant. And the passenger pigeon work may be helped along by similar germ cell efforts in the chicken and houbara bustarda rare bird prized by oil sheikhs with the funds to attempt a genetic rescue. If cell cultures thrive and genetic engineering works, the only remaining challenge would then be to teach the resulting hybrid band-tailed and passenger pigeons how to be passenger pigeons. This will likely even more challenging than the genetic work, given experience from rearing California condors with puppets or teaching cranes to migrate with ultralight airplanes. Thats why Revive and Restore, for one, is not putting all its de-extinction eggs in the passenger pigeon basket (as it were). The foundation-funded outfit might undertake a similar effort to revive the heath hen in Martha's Vineyard, if they can get funding from outside donors. But, assuming breeding, sequencing and cell-culture experiments go well, birds that carry the now extinct genes of the passenger pigeon could be flapping around a California facility by the end of the decade, according to Novak. These de-extinction projects may prove too ambitious, however. Similar efforts that stretch back 30 years have so far failed to produce a quagga, an extinct species of zebra, although acquiringquagga genetics from museum specimens did kick off the entire ancient DNA field in 1984. And the 2003 experiment that resurrected a bucardo for seven minutes has yet to be repeated. Nevertheless, even the International Union for Conservation of Nature has set up a committee to examine how the genetics used for de-extinction might be used to preserve endangered animals and plants or bring them back if they die out. De-extinction is not just for extinct species, after all. It could also be used to save a plant or animal that is on the verge of extinction. The black-footed ferret has been bred back from just seven viable individuals in the 1980s to thousands today, but the species may need a genetic transfusion to protect the new animals from the perils of inbreeding, which include reproductive problems, susceptibility to disease and genetic drift. So Revive and Restore has sequenced four ferret genomes, including two that had been stored in cell cultures from deep freeze at the Zoological Society of San Diego for the Frozen Ark Consortium, a global project to save the DNA and viable cells of endangered species. If genetic information from such frozen samples could be used to infuse robust genetics into a living population, it would be a first in the annals of conservation. "The northern white rhino has only four living individuals left. They are not viable," says Ryan Phelan of Long Now, who has petted the last individuals of this functionally extinct species. "Do we use genomic techniques and advanced genetic technology to keep that species alive or let it march over to the right on the continuum of extinction and become extinct?" But there are advantages to work with an animal that is already extinct, not least of which is the absence of urgency. After all, Martha died 100 years ago. "If we succeed, the world gets a new organism," Novak says. "If we fail, we learn things that are valuable and the world isn't left with another extinct species."

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Ancient DNA Could Return Passenger Pigeons to the Sky

Genetic engineering is the deliberate, controlled manipulation of the genes in an organism with the intent of making that organism better in some way. This is usually done independently of the natural reproductive process. The result is a so-called genetically modified organism (GMO). To date, most of the effort in genetic engineering has been focused on agriculture.

Proponents of genetic engineering claim that it has numerous benefits, including the production of food-bearing plants that are resistant to extreme weather and adverse climates, insect infestations, disease, molds, and fungi. In addition, it may be possible to reduce the amount of plowing necessary in the farming process, thereby saving energy and minimizing soil erosion. A major motivation is the hope of producing abundant food at low cost to reduce world hunger, both directly (by feeding GMOs to human beings) and indirectly (by feeding GMOs to livestock and fish, which can in turn be fed to humans).

Genetic engineering carries potential dangers, such as the creation of new allergens and toxins, the evolution of new weeds and other noxious vegetation, harm to wildlife, and the creation of environments favorable to the proliferation of molds and fungi (ironically, in light of the purported advantage in that respect). Some scientists have expressed concern that new disease organisms and increased antibiotic resistance could result from the use of GMOs in the food chain.

The darkest aspect of genetic engineering is the possibility that a government or institution might undertake to enhance human beings by means of genetic engineering. Some see the possibility of using this technology to create biological weapons.

Genetic engineering is also known as genetic modification.

This was last updated in May 2007

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What is genetic engineering? - Definition from WhatIs.com

By Tom Abate, Stanford School of Engineering

A decade-long effort in genetic engineering is close to creating yeast that makes palliative medicines in stainless steel vats.

For centuries poppy plants have been grown to provide opium, the compound from which morphine and other important medicines such as oxycodone are derived.

Now bioengineers at Stanford have hacked the DNA of yeast, reprograming these simple cells to make opioid-based medicines via a sophisticated extension of the basic brewing process that makes beer.

Led by Associate Professor of Bioengineering Christina Smolke, the Stanford team has already spent a decade genetically engineering yeast cells to reproduce the biochemistry of poppies with the ultimate goal of producing opium-based medicines, from start to finish, in fermentation vats.

We are now very close to replicating the entire opioid production process in a way that eliminates the need to grow poppies, allowing us to reliably manufacture essential medicines while mitigating the potential for diversion to illegal use, said Smolke, who outlines her work in the August 24th edition of Nature Chemical Biology.

In the new report Smolke and her collaborators, Kate Thodey, a post-doctoral scholar in bioengineering, and Stephanie Galanie, a doctoral student in chemistry, detail how they added five genes from two different organisms to yeast cells. Three of these genes came from the poppy itself, and the others from a bacterium that lives on poppy plant stalks.

This multi-species gene mashup was required to turn yeast into cellular factories that replicate two, now-separate processes: how nature produces opium in poppies, and then how pharmacologists use chemical processes to further refine opium derivatives into modern opioid drugs such as hydrocodone.

From Plants to Pills Today

Plant-derived opium has been used and abused for centuries, but a good place to begin the modern story is with the use of morphine during World War II.

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Bioengineers Close To Creating Painkillers Without Using Opium From Poppies

PUBLIC RELEASE DATE:

25-Aug-2014

Contact: Kathryn Ryan kryan@liebertpub.com 914-740-2100 Mary Ann Liebert, Inc./Genetic Engineering News

New Rochelle, NY, August 25, 2014In a closed-loop control approach to managing type 1 diabetes, glucose sensors placed under the skin continuously monitor blood sugar levels, triggering the release of insulin from an implantable insulin pump as needed. The aim of this closed-loop insulin delivery system is improved control of blood glucose levels throughout the day and night. But a new study in adults and adolescents found that mean blood glucose levels remained at safe levels 53-82% of the time, according to the results published in Diabetes Technology & Therapeutics (DTT), a peer-reviewed journal from Mary Ann Liebert, Inc., publishers. The article is available free on the DTT website at http://online.liebertpub.com/doi/full/10.1089/dia.2014.0066 until September 25, 2014.

Howard Zisser, MD and an international team of researchers representing the Control to Range Study Group measured plasma glucose levels every 15-30 minutes in a group of individuals with type 1 diabetes who participated in the "Control to Range" multinational artificial pancreas study. They monitored the adults and teens over 22 hours, including three meals and periods of day and night. The authors describe the risks of hypo- and hyperglycemia, the variability between participants, and the differences in daytime/nighttime results, and also propose improvements needed in the design and implementation of closed-loop systems in the article "Multicenter Closed-Loop Insulin Delivery Study Points to Challenges for Keeping Blood Glucose in a Safe Range by a Control Algorithm in Adults and Adolescents with Type 1 Diabetes from Various Sites".

"It appears that we are getting closer to an Artificial Pancreas option for patients with type 1 diabetes," says DTT Editor-in-Chief Satish Garg, MD, Professor of Medicine and Pediatrics at the University of Colorado Denver. "The first version may need to be a hybrid system in which meals and exercise are announced with necessary dose adjustments along with Automatic Threshold Suspend for hypoglycemia."

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About the Journal

Diabetes Technology & Therapeutics (DTT) is a monthly peer-reviewed journal that covers new technology and new products for the treatment, monitoring, diagnosis, and prevention of diabetes and its complications. Led by Editor-in-Chief Satish Garg, MD, Professor of Medicine and Pediatrics at the University of Colorado Denver, the Journal covers topics that include noninvasive glucose monitoring, implantable continuous glucose sensors, novel routes of insulin administration, genetic engineering, the artificial pancreas, measures of long-term control, computer applications for case management, telemedicine, the Internet, and new medications. Tables of content and a sample issue may be viewed on the Diabetes Technology & Therapeutics (DTT) website at http://www.liebertpub.com/DTT. DTT is the official journal of the Advanced Technologies & Treatments for Diabetes (ATTD) Conference.

About ATTD

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Do closed-loop insulin delivery systems improve blood glucose control in type 1 diabetes?

Genetically modified foods should not require distinguishing labels by Nazar Aljassar | Aug 28 2014 | 08/28/14 10:57pm

A new brand of Luddism has erupted in America. In spite of ample scientific evidence that corroborates the biosafety of genetic modification of crops, over half of Americans believe genetically modified foods are unsafe, with 93 percent in favor of mandatory labels on genetically modified food.

Part of the objection to genetically modified crops stems from a belief that natural foods are superior to unnatural foods a naturalistic fallacy. Nothing is intrinsically virtuous about consuming food crops that are grown naturally. Unfortunately, appeals to nature and tradition have hijacked the discourse surrounding genetic modification.

Its important to note that all agriculture is unnatural. Any claim about the extent to which food crops are natural is meaningless. Agriculture is the largest and most enduring human intervention into the natural world. Through selective breeding, farmers have artificially created several crops for human consumption. Kale and kohlrabi were developed from wild mustard after decades of careful heredity manipulation. Artificial selection has given rise to high-quality strains of soybeans, wheat and corn, all of which have been a boon to civilization. Artificial selection and artificial mutation through genetic engineering both alter food crops on the same microbiological level. The primary distinction is that the latter method can be used to obtain desired traits with greater speed and efficiency.

Genetic modification of organisms is not a novel concept. We have been doing it for thousands of years. Genetic modification through DNA extraction, gene cloning, gene design, transformation and backcross breeding is simply a faster, better way to achieve the results sought through traditional artificial selection.

Despite left-wing insistence that the right wing is anti-science, some of the most strident opposition to genetic modification of food crops comes from progressives. Although liberals are often stalwart supporters of clean energy laws and evolution education, many are fervently in favor of mandating labels on genetically modified foods. Vermont became the first state to enact such legislation, and pressure currently mounts for similar laws in liberal states such as New York, California, Oregon and Massachusetts.

Vermont Governor Peter Shumlin defended his states GMO labeling law, maintaining that consumers have the right to know what they buy. The problem with this line of thought lies in the fact that it suggests dangers immanent in genetically modified food. The scientific consensus, according to the American Association for the Advancement of Science, is that crop improvement by the modern molecular techniques of biotechnology is safe. After allocating over 300 million to research, the European Union revealed in a report its findings on the safety of genetically modified crops: the main conclusion to be drawn from the efforts of more than 130 research projectsis that biotechnology, and in particular GMOs, are not per se more risky than e.g. conventional plant breeding technologies. Among other organizations that have affirmed the biosafety of genetically modified crops are the World Health Organization, the American Medical Association, the U.S. National Academy of Sciences and the British Royal Society.

For liberal legislators to yield to the publics fears about genetic modification only advances scientific misinformation about an agricultural innovation that provides plants resistant to infectious disease, superior foods with longer shelf lives and large crop yields to permit more efficient land use.

There are legitimate criticisms of genetic modification. Economically, introducing genetically modified food to market demands significant time and cost, endangering smaller farms that cannot afford to compete with large agricultural biotechnology companies. Genetic modification also presents a few environmental risks such as reduced biodiversity through genetic homogeneity and resulting from extensive monoculture crop production.

But we shouldnt ignore its efficiency because of these few flaws. Like any scientific advancement, genetic modification will continue to improve with research for which public and political support is crucial. In the face of concerns about genetic modification, we should not jettison the benefits of genetic modification of crops, nor should we propagate the falsehoods that infect scientific discussion by encouraging labels that imply biohazards associated with genetic modification.

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ALJASSAR: The merits of GMOs

Object Oriented Programming
In object oriented programming, "Objects" usually refer to bundles of information. For example, you can describe a Car as having #39;number_of_wheels = 4 #39; and #39;license_plate = 4BIUO11 #39;, and this...

By: J. Christopher Anderson

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Object Oriented Programming - Video

PUBLIC RELEASE DATE:

26-May-2014

Contact: Philippa Walker 44-117-928-8086 University of Bristol

An international team of scientists has made a major step forward in our understanding of how enzymes 'edit' genes, paving the way for correcting genetic diseases in patients.

Researchers at the Universities of Bristol, Mnster and the Lithuanian Institute of Biotechnology have observed the process by which a class of enzymes called CRISPR pronounced 'crisper' bind and alter the structure of DNA.

The results, published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS) today, provide a vital piece of the puzzle if these genome editing tools are ultimately going to be used to correct genetic diseases in humans.

CRISPR enzymes were first discovered in bacteria in the 1980s as an immune defence used by bacteria against invading viruses. Scientists have more recently shown that one type of CRISPR enzyme Cas9 can be used to edit the human genome - the complete set of genetic information for humans.

These enzymes have been tailored to accurately target a single combination of letters within the three billion base pairs of the DNA molecule. This is the equivalent of correcting a single misspelt word in a 23-volume encyclopaedia.

To find this needle in a haystack, CRISPR enzymes use a molecule of RNA - a nucleic acid similar in structure to DNA. The targeting process requires the CRISPR enzymes to pull apart the DNA strands and insert the RNA to form a sequence-specific structure called an 'R-loop'.

The global team tested the R-loop model using specially modified microscopes in which single DNA molecules are stretched in a magnetic field. By altering the twisting force on the DNA, the researchers could directly monitor R-loop formation events by individual CRISPR enzymes.

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Breakthrough shows how DNA is 'edited' to correct genetic diseases