Category Archives: Genetic Engineering

- Exacis uses proprietary mRNA-based cell engineering to develop off-the-shelf immune cell therapies for cancer treatment from induced pluripotent stem cells (iPSCs)

Published: Oct. 21, 2021 at 6:00 AM MDT|Updated: 14 hours ago

CAMBRIDGE, Mass., Oct. 21, 2021 /PRNewswire/ --Exacis Biotherapeutics, Inc., a development-stageimmuno-oncology company working to harness the immune system to cure cancer,today announcedinitiation of a strategic partnership with Toronto-based Centre for Commercialization of Regenerative Medicine (CCRM) for specialty manufacturing services related to the development of Exacis' innovative, iPSC-derived mRNA-engineered NK cell products to treat cancer. The partnership also includes a cashinvestmentinto Exacisby CCRM Enterprises Holdings Ltd., the for-profit venture investment arm of CCRM,whichwill be used to fund operations.

Exacis CEO Gregory Fiore, MD, commented, "We welcome CCRM as a key partner to allow us to rapidly advance our virus-free manufacturing processes to make novel NK cell products that are engineered for performance and to avoid rejection. CCRM is a recognized leader in iPSC-derived cell therapy development and manufacturing and we are thrilled to have them as a partner. Their confidence in Exacis is evidenced by the accompanying investment, by CCRM Enterprises Holdings Ltd., underscoring the unique value proposition offered by Exacis' differentiated platform and approach to cell therapies. We look forward to partnering with CCRM's CDMO experts to apply our mRNA based technologies to develop best-in-class products to treat challenging hematologic and solid tumors."

Cynthia Lavoie, PhD, President and CIO of CCRM Enterprises Inc. added, "We are pleased to support Exacis by way of an investment, and with our sector expertise and specialized infrastructure. This is a successful model that we have employed in the past to support promising technologies and together we will develop leading cell therapy products that utilize the substantial potential of the Exacis platform as it advances its iPSC-derived cell programs.

About Exacis Biotherapeutics

Exacis is a development stageimmuno-oncologycompany focused on harnessing the human immune system to cure cancerby engineering next generation off-the-shelf NK and T cell therapies aimed at hematologic malignanciesand solid tumors.Exacis was founded in 2020 with an exclusivegloballicense to a broad suite of patents covering the use ofmRNA based cell reprogramming and gene editing technologiesfor use in generating engineered NK and T cells for oncology applications.These patents were developed and are owned by Factor Bioscience.

Exacis' differentiated cell therapy platformavoids the use of DNA and viruses and uses instead a proprietary mRNA based technology. Exacis uses the technology to generate iPSCs and to edit their genomesto create stealthed, potent allogeneic cell products, termed ExaNK, ExaCAR-T or ExaCAR-NK cells.

About CCRM

CCRM is a global, public-private partnership headquartered in Toronto, Canada. It receives funding from the Government of Canada, the Province of Ontario, and leading academic and industry partners. CCRM supports the development of regenerative medicines and associated enabling technologies, with a specific focus on cell and gene therapy. A network of researchers, leading companies, strategic investors and entrepreneurs, CCRM accelerates the translation of scientific discovery into new companies and marketable products for patients, with specialized teams, funding and infrastructure. CCRM is the commercialization partner of the University of Toronto's Medicine by Design. CCRM is hosted by the University of Toronto. Visit us at ccrm.ca.

About CCRMEnterprises Inc.

CCRMEnterprises Inc. is the for-profit venture investment arm of the Centre for Commercialization of Regenerative Medicine (CCRM).CCRM Enterprises invests in early stage ventures and projects developing therapeutics and enabling technologies. Through an extensive network of investors, it can bring together risk capital to support these early-stage ventures as they scale up along the development pathway.By tapping into CCRM's manufacturing infrastructure and expertise, CCRM Enterprises provides capital-efficient support to accelerate and de-risk these high potential, early-stage ventures, further enabling the development of an advanced therapies ecosystem.

CCRM Enterprises Holdings Ltd.is the associated entity that holds shares in CCRM portfolio companies. Learn more about our investing strategy here.

About T and Natural Killer (NK) Cell Therapies

T and NK cells are types of human immune cells that are ableto recognize and destroy cancer cells and can be modified through genetic engineering to target specific tumors.

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SOURCE Exacis Biotherapeutics, Inc.

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Exacis Biotherapeutics Announces Strategic Partnership With CCRM For Specialty Manufacturing Of Services And Investment For Development Of...

The world's first ever gene-edited food has gone on sale, as a Japanese company has released a mutant tomato packed full of stress-busting vitamins.

The 'Sicilian Rouge High GABA' tomato was created using CRISPR, a gene-editing tool that is being used to treat everything from blindness to cancer.

The tomatoes have been altered to produce less of a protein that breaks down an amino acid called GABA, which can reduce blood pressure.

Eating them could have a positive impact on stress and sleep, as the tomatoes have four to five times the amount of GABA than a normal tomato.

Consumers in Japan are now buying the tomatoes directly from Sanatech Seed, the company that created them.

The firm began shipping the tomatoes in mid-September, and says around 4,200 gardeners have also been given gene-edited seeds. This means we could see a lot more of the tomato in future.

"This tomato represents an easy and realistic way in which consumes can improve their daily diet," said Shimpei Takeshita, president of Sanatech Seed, at the Global Tomato Congress earlier this year.

CRISPR gene editing works by altering an organism's DNA to encourage or replace certain traits.

Recently, scientists used the tool to all but cure a woman's blindness by editing the genes that caused her eye cells to malfunction.

In the case of the tomatoes, the genes that produced the amino acid which reduced the amount of GABA were edited.

Unlike genetic engineering, which adds DNA from other species, gene editing works with naturally occuring genes.

This means the tomato isn't subject to the same rules as genetically modified crops in Japan.

If you live in the UK or Europe, though, don't expect to see these futuristic tomatoes any time soon, as the rules on gene-edited foods are much stricter over here than in Japan.

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Genetically engineered mutant tomatoes with stress-busting effects now on sale in Japan - Daily Star

500 tonnes of genetically modified rice were discovered in a consignment that India exported to the European Union countries in June 2021

The discovery of 500 tonnes of genetically modified (GM) rice in a consignment that India exported to the European Union countries in June 2021 has led to the loss of reputation of India and its agricultural market, Coalition for GM Free India said October 19, 2021.

The coalition, wrote a letter to AK Jain, chairperson, Genetic Engineering Appraisal Committee (GEAC), Union Ministry of Environment, Forest & Climate Change (MoEF&CC).

Several batches of rice flour were marketed in several European countries, as well as in the United States, Iraq, Mauritius, Qatar, Dubai (United Arab Emirates), Lebanon, Senegal and Turkey. They were recalled for use in the EU after European Commission Rapid Alert System for Food and Feed (RASFF) identified illegalities in food products upon a check.

The 500 tonnes of broken Indian white rice imported into Europe was transformed into rice flour, resold and put on the market in many European countries as an ingredient in chocolate sweets from the Mars Inc company (M&Ms Crispy) and baked goods.

GM crops are those that have been modified genetically to enhance their nutrition quotient. But in India, several civil society groups have raised health- and environment-related concerns.

India is yet to approve commercial cultivation of a genetically modified food crop. It has, however, cultivated multiple GM rice varieties at various stages of confined field trials. The Coalition for GM Free India, in its letter, warned that such trials have led to contamination and leaks that have made their way to the food chain.

The letter, written by a paddy farmer from Kerala, demanded that an inter-ministerial, inter-agency body be set up with the GEAC to facilitate creation of a body to look into illegal GM imports.

It also suggested that field trials should be banned to avoid any contamination of food and seed supply chains.

The letter added:

The illegal cultivation of HTBt cotton, Bt brinjal and GM soybean gave us a clear indication that there is a trend of GM crops from field trials ending up in our farms and food. It is an unfortunate truth that our regulatory system has been found ineffective in curbing this. It is also shocking that GEAC has failed to take effective action to even identify those behind seed supply

According to news reports, farmers in Maharashtra allegedly started growing illegal HT cotton not cleared for commercial cultivation amid a downturn in agriculture due frequent bouts of drought in 2019.

In 2012, the Directorate-General Health and Consumers of the European Commission had issued a notification to the Union Ministry of Commerce and Industry, seeking a reply on an unknown and unauthorised genetically modified organisms being found in the rice exported from India.

India had denied the allegations.

The letter also sought identification of the organisation that exported the broken rice. It asked for an investigation into the supply chain as well.

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GMO rice from India withdrawn in EU: Indian coalition asks for action - Down To Earth Magazine

When candy giant Mars Wrigley carried out a mass recall of several batches of its Crispy M&Ms across Europe this August, it was due to the use of one ingredient: rice flour with genetically modified (GM) contamination that allegedly originated in India, according to notifications on the European Commissions rapid alert system.

However, the Commerce Ministry pointed out that GM rice is not grown commercially in India, let alone exported, and promised a thorough enquiry by its agricultural exports authority. The Ministry alleged that the case was a futile conspiracy to malign the image of India as a reliable food security provider.

Worried farmers groups and environmental activists, however, noted that multiple GM rice varieties have been approved for confined field trials, and warned that any cross-contamination could dampen the countrys agricultural export ambitions.

Indias annual rice exports amount to 18 million tonnes worth 65,000 crore, and reach more than 75 countries, according to the Ministry.

According to the European Commissions Rapid Alert System for Food and Feed, 500 tonnes of broken rice imported from India and converted into rice flour by a French company named Westhove was flagged during a regular check. On June 21, France issued a notification for unauthorised genetically modified rice flour, identifying India as the point of origin, and alerting Austria, Belgium, the Czech Republic, Germany, Italy, Netherlands, Poland, Spain, the United Kingdom and the United States as the possible destination of products made with the flour.

In a statement on August 4, Mars Wrigley announced that it was recalling four packaging sizes of its Crispy M&Ms product with two affected best-before dates. According to German NGO site Informationdienst Gentechnik, the European Commission announced that 144 tonnes of the contaminated rice flour had been processed by Mars, while more flour went into 11 types of baked goods manufactured in Italy and further distributed to other countries, all of which were recalled.

Commerce Ministry spokesperson D.J. Narain said that the whole issue appeared to be infructuous. He pointed out that the GM ingredient may have been added in Europe to cut costs, not in India where commercial GM cultivation is banned. The quantity involved is too big to have come from leaked output from controlled trial cultivation.

However, he also added that APEDA is collecting all the details and will enquire every aspect of it thoroughly with the technical and scientific institutions like GEAC and strictest form of action will be taken accordingly.

Farmers groups say the issue of cross contamination from field trials has been raised previously. The issue with GM field trials is that once they take place, they can contaminate crops long after the actual trials either directly or through seed leakages, said a letter from the Coalition for GM-Free India, sent on Tuesday to authorities at the Environment, Agriculture and Commerce Ministries. It pointed to a 2006 case, where a Bayer food trial contaminated rice and seeds in the U.S., leading to a plunge in exports from that country.

Back in 2007, when there was widespread concern about GM rice trials and the possibility of cross contamination, the All India Rice Exporters Association took up the issue with the Department of Biotechnology and the Genetic Engineering Appraisal Committee. A policy decision was taken that field trials would not be allowed in the basmati belt, because of worries that the export crop could be affected, said Rajesh Krishnan, a Kerala paddy farmer who is a member of the Coalition and represents a group of organic rice farmers who exported 50 tonnes last year.

At that time, Indias rice trade amounted to just 7,000 crore; today, it is more than 63,000 crore. At the end of the day, it is Indian farmers and exporters who have much to lose.

He also noted that unauthorised HtBt Cotton and Bt Brinjal are already being grown commercially, with hundreds of growers blatantly defying the governmental ban. When no action is taken against such brazen violations, it creates the image of a country which is not serious about heatth or its food supply chain and that is not good for exports, said Mr. Krishnan.

The Coalition demanded a ban on field trials, slapping liability for illegal release of GMOs into the environment on developers, and a probe to identify the source of the GM rice contamination among other steps to deal with the problem.

Commerce Ministry spokesperson Mr. Narain emphasised that there was little danger to Indias agricultural export image. It may be noted that Indias export orders remain globally growing. India is fast emerging as the worlds most trusted business partner and investment destination. Emergence of Brand India is an outcome of cumulative national endeavor towards moving to world class excellence in quality and growth, he said.

One such stand-alone said incident does not change the unprecedented positive perception of Brand India. There is nothing so sensational about it, added Mr Narain.

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EU food recall linked to GM rice exports from India - The Hindu

There are several ethical concerns in bringing an extinct species back to life, some scientists have said about the woolly mammoth; others support the move

Anamazing and never-before-heard experiment will start soon on our planet. A giant creature thathad become extinct about 4,000 years ago, is going to be resurrected.That creature is the giant woolly mammoth.

The idea of bringing extinct animals back to life was so far confined to the realm of science fiction. One such example is the Hollywood movie Jurassic Park, based on the novel of the same name.

In the case of thewoolly mammoth though, its DNA will be grown in a laboratory and then put inside aliving elephant. It is possible that in the future we may witness an animal seemingly resembling a giant woolly mammoth roaming the Arctic tundra.

Geneticist George Church of Harvard University in the United States and his colleagues will insert the mammoths genes responsible for tiny ears, subcutaneous fat and hair length and colour into living elephant skin cells.Gene-editing techniqueswill be used.

George Church and tech entrepreneur Ben Lam have founded Colossal, a new bioscience and genetics company, with the idea of bringing many extinct species back to life. Colossal has received at least $15 million from investors.

The woolly mammoth, known scientifically asMammathus premigenius, has been extinct for millennia, with the last species dying out about 4,000 years ago. The fossilised remains of many of these animals are believed to be buried in Siberias permafrost.

Scientists say it may be possible to bring these and other species back from their graves. But that will take time. According to George Church, there is a lot of work to be done.

He told The Timesthat multiplying the mammoth DNA in the cells of the Asian elephantwas the first step in a long process.

Next, they must find a process to convert the hybrid cells into specialised tissues, to determine whether they produce the desired traits. For example, researchers need to establish whether the mammoth gene can produce wool of suitable colour and texture. Looking at the progress made in genetic engineering, we can say that all this could be possible.

Next, George Churchs research team plans to grow the hybrid cells in an artificial womb or in the womb of a surrogate elephant. Many scientists and animal rights advocates have considered it immoral to grow a mammoth embryo in the womb of a living female elephant.

If George Churchs team manages to bring to life a cross between the Asian elephant and the woolly mammoth, they hope to engineer an animal that can thrive in colder climates.

Once the team is successful in bringing these hybrids to life, Colossalwill proceed with the ultimate goal of reviving the ancient extinct animals by producing more such hybrids.

The research team expects the first generation of mammoth hybrids to be ready within the next six years. Church and Lam believe that the elephant-mammoth hybrid could help slow climate change by exposing healthy, carbon-tapping grasses.

According to Church:

Our goal is to create a cold-resistant elephant, but one that will look and behave like a mammoth. Not because were trying to trick someone, but because we want something that will be functionally equivalent to a mammoth, which enjoys its time at -40 C and does all the work that mammoths used to do.

In 2003, scientists briefly cloned a frozen tissue sample of a Spanish mountain goat, the Pyrenean ibex, which had become extinct in January 2000. But the clone lived for onlyseven minutes after being born.

Church is also trying to revive a species of passenger pigeon whose flights once covered the skies of North America and which went extinct in the early 20th century.

His collaborators have extracted nearly a billion DNA characters from stuffed passenger pigeonspreservedin a 100-year-old museum and are attempting to split them into the DNA of a normal pigeon.

If successful, these effortswill also present some ethical challenges.

For example, the ability to revive once-extinct organisms in a laboratory can initiate the process of destruction of natural habitats. In the event of the reappearance of extinct mammals, the food chain of ecosystems will be affected and there may also be a threat to existing organisms.

Indeed, some scientists consider genetic engineering efforts to reintroduce extinct species to the biosphere as immoral.

At present, our world has entered the era of the Sixth Mass Extinction of species. If, instead of giving new life to animals that had disappeared thousands of years ago, biotechnology can save the existing living species from extinction, then it will be a great boon for life on earth, they say.

Victoria Herridge, an evolutionary biologist at the Natural Museum, says that regenerating the Arctic environment using a herd of mammoths is not plausible.

She argues that there were an estimated 200 million mammoths in Eurasia 21,000 years ago.Hence, the scale at which scientists experiment would have to be enormoussince it takes a mammoth 30 years to grow to maturity and 22 months to remain in gestation.

Others though, are supportive. When ethicist Karen Wendling of the University of Guelph in Canada first heard about a new companys plan to revive woolly mammoths, she was fascinated by the new possibilities.

If the woolly mammoth, which roamed the earth 4,000 years ago, can be brought to life, the dodo andother species that went extinct long ago could be brought back to life too, she said.

Beth Shapiro, a noted scientist at the University of California at Santa Cruz and author of How to Clone Mammoths: The Science of De-Extinction, finds the idea of bringing the woolly mammoth back to Earth fascinating and exciting.

The jury, thus, is still out.

Vir Singh is former professor of environmental science, GB Pant University of Agriculture and Technology

Views expressed are the authors own and dont necessarily reflect those ofDown To Earth

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The jury is still out on the de-extinction of the woolly mammoth - Down To Earth Magazine

Dune (Part One) Review: Church of the Poisoned Mind

Dune (Part One) is big. Dune is great to look at. And with its bombastic, semi-atonal score and soundtrack chanting, all with base maximized to vibrate all your molecules, it feels like a religious event. It helps that almost all the interiors have high, cathedral-like ceilings, and that director Denis Villeneuve approaches the material with all the zeal (but none of the sex appeal) of Cecil B. DeMille taking on the Bible. Walking into Dune is like entering a church service for an unfamiliar faith. Like any such ritual worthy of a mass-following, its spectacular, transcendent, at least occasionally meaningfuland yet may have you checking the time before its done. Spiritual trappings only affect a person so long without a bit more substance to hook them further.

Also, and this is important: This Dune movie is not a stand-alone story. Theres a misguided tendency to say that a movie ends on a cliffhanger just because the bad guys win; thats not it here, though. No side wins, yet. The story stops with plenty left unresolved, and audiences perhaps mentally calculating where Villeneuve could have cut part one much shorter. And anyone whos seen the David Lynch version doesnt really have to guess. Do Paul Atreides (Timothee Chalamet) and his mother Jessica (Rebecca Ferguson) really need to crash in the desert twice, to be rescued both times? Not really. However, Villeneuve does fix one significant problem: Lynch stacked the deck too easily in favor of Paul. The evil Harkonnens here actually represent an existential threat, and not stereotypical buffoons easily beaten.

Ferguson is the acting MVP of the film, imbuing her Lady Jessica with a real sense of internal conflict. Torn between her roles as a mystical nun and the dukes concubine, she must deal with the fact that her parental choices may have really messed things up. Many of the other actors are effectively objects, cast for their striking looks to stand around making iconic postures. But among them, Jessica feels like a real human. Unlike, say, Josh Brolin, who grimaces well but struggles to make author Frank Herberts prose sound like natural speech.

Its tough to assess an unfinished story like this. If Dune Part Two never gets made, this version could prove an even greater disappointment overall than Lynchs version was back in the 80s. But Lynchs has long since become a cult classic. How many fantasy franchise wanna-be first installments ending on unresolved notes get that kind of re-assessment? The Vampires Assistant? The Golden Compass? Artemis Fowl? The Dark Is Rising? Anyone?

On the other hand, the potential is there for a great payoff. But by necessity, that makes these first two and a half hours nearly all set-up.

Its easy to see why Villeneuve insists on the biggest screen possible. Unlike the Empire in Star Wars, whose spaceships look similar in construction to everyone elses, the space empire in Dune revels in totalitarian architecture. The massive, intimidating structures favored by dictators and tyrants throughout history as symbols of power pointedly dwarf the people. And said people flutter around in insect-like Ornithopters, metaphorically designating themselves as relative tiny bugs before the might of the throne. This being a Messianic story, of course a hero will come from a humble desert tribe and be undaunted by such ostentatiousness. But thats for the hypothetical part two.

Dune takes a good hour for its characters to explain the whole set-up, but by the time they do, its at least clearer than in previous versions. Profitable desert planet Arrakis, a.k.a. Dune, the Middle-East of space, is about to be governed by the noble House Atreides, after 80 years under the brutal, greedy Harkonnens. But its a set-up the Harkonnens leave sabotage in their wake, priming the Atreides to fail and get wiped out by the Harkonnens and the Emperor, whos jealous of Duke Leto Atreides (Oscar Isaac) and his rising popularity.

Meanwhile, Letos son, Paul, might just be the result of years of complicated religious genetic engineering to create a psychic Messiah who will fulfill the prophecies of Arrakis native Fremen. Call it Game of Dunes theres no throne of swords on which to sit, but rather a planet full of mind-bending spice that powers space travel. And everyone has an angle.

Like Lynch, Villeneuve clearly felt some frustration in the books lack of aliens, so he makes certain tribes near-alien. The Harkonnens all look pale and bald, while the Sardaukar make for the obligatory Klingon-like Space Vikings, complete with throat-singing. The Fremen sport a variety of vaguely foreign accents, all save for Zendayas Chani. Who attracts Paul in his dreams by sounding totally American.

Theres lots of chanting, and flying, and large simple shapes levitating. But by the time Paul finally gets around to being proactive, the movies over. Its a wonderful trance while it lasts, and thats fitting for a movie about a powerful psychedelic. Indeed, the fact that a 1965 novel depends on the concept of a Messiah using controlled amounts of drugs is as fitting as the way it depicts natives using guerilla warfare as underdogs capable of defeating an Empire. Much as George Lucas did in Return of the Jedi. But sooner or later, the trip ends, and its sometimes hard to remember exactly what was so profound about the whole experience.

This film deserves recommendation for its sights and sounds alone. But the story, so far, only gets a big fat incomplete. Call it three stars for now, with the potential for upgrade or downgrade after whatever comes next. Or doesnt.

Dune opens Friday, Oct 22, in theaters and on HBO Max.

Recommended Reading:Dune (Penguin Galaxy)

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Dune (Part One) Review: Church of the Poisoned Mind - Superherohype.com

BUFFALO, N.Y., Oct. 20, 2021 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- 22nd Century Group,Inc. (Nasdaq: XXII), a leading agricultural biotechnology company focused on tobacco harm reduction, reduced nicotine tobacco and improving health and wellness through plant science, will host a live webcast on Thursday, November 4, 2021, at 10:00 AM ET to discuss its 2021 third quarter results. 22nd Century will report the Companys third quarter 2021 results in a press release at 6:00 AM ET the same day.

During the webcast, James A. Mish, chief executive officer; Michael Zercher, chief operating officer; and John Franzino, chief financial officer, will review third quarter results and discuss progress made in each of the Companys three franchises.

Following prepared remarks by management and slide presentation, the Company will host a Q&A session, during which management will accept questions from interested analysts. Investors, shareholders, and members of the media will also have the opportunity to pose questions to management by submitting questions through the interactive webcast during the event.

The live and archived webcast, interactive Q&A and slide presentation will be accessible on the Events web page in the Company's Investor Relations section of the website, at http://www.xxiicentury.com/investors/events. Please access the website at least 15 minutes prior to the start of the webcast to register and, if necessary, download and install any required software.

About 22nd Century Group,Inc.22nd Century Group, Inc. (Nasdaq:XXII) is a leading agricultural biotechnology company focused on tobacco harm reduction, reduced nicotine tobacco and improving health and wellness through plant science. With dozens of patents allowing it to control nicotine biosynthesis in the tobacco plant, the Company has developed its proprietary reduced nicotine content (RNC) tobacco plants and cigarettes, which have become the cornerstone of theFDAs Comprehensive Planto address the widespread death and disease caused by smoking. In tobacco, hemp/cannabis, and hop plants, 22nd Century uses modern plant breeding technologies, including genetic engineering, gene-editing, and molecular breeding, to deliver solutions for the life science and consumer products industries by creating new, proprietary plants with optimized alkaloid and flavonoid profiles as well as improved yields and valuable agronomic traits.

Learn more atxxiicentury.com, on Twitter@_xxiicentury, and onLinkedIn.

Cautionary Note Regarding Forward-Looking StatementsExcept for historical information, all of the statements, expectations, and assumptions contained in this press release are forward-looking statements. Forward-looking statements typically contain terms such as anticipate, believe, consider, continue, could, estimate, expect, explore, foresee, goal, guidance, intend, likely, may, plan, potential, predict, preliminary, probable, project, promising, seek, should, will, would, and similar expressions. Actual results might differ materially from those explicit or implicit in forward-looking statements. Important factors that could cause actual results to differ materially are set forth in Risk Factors in the Companys Annual Report on Form 10-K filed on March 11, 2021. All information provided in this release is as of the date hereof, and the Company assumes no obligation to and does not intend to update these forward-looking statements, except as required by law.

Investor Relations & Media Contact:Mei KuoDirector, Communications & Investor Relations22nd Century Group, Inc.(716) 300-1221mkuo@xxiicentury.com

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22nd Century Group to Host Webcast to Provide Business Update and Discuss Third Quarter 2021 Results - GlobeNewswire

September 24, 2019

The Pew Research Center has reported that more and more people identify themselves as spiritual but not religious. How can this be explained in our highly technoscientific age? Since technoscience is taken to be secular, how can we make sense of the relationship between our radical technoscientific advances and our search for spirituality?

A group of Arizona State University researchers will explore these and other questions through a project titled Beyond Secularization: A New Approach to Religion, Science and Technology, which has received a $1.7M grant from the Templeton Religion Trust.

The Center for the Study of Religion and Conflict will serve as the lead unit for this major interdisciplinary initiative that seeks to explore the underlying assumptions about science and technology research, exploring whether religious ideas shape scientific research directions and revealing new models for understanding ideas of progress.

Conflicts at the borders of religion, science and technology have been a major research area of the centers since its inception in 2003. Partnering withHava Tirosh-Samuelson, now a Regents Professor and director of Jewish studies, the center launched a faculty seminar in 2004 that met for almost 15 years. Several externally funded projects that grew out of the seminar supported a major lecture series, international research conferences and numerous publications.

All of this work positioned the center for this latest project, which has the potential to have a major impact in how we understand not only the interplay between religion, science and technology in public life, but also how we understand ideas and meanings of progress.

Beyond Secularization builds on a small pilot project that produced over 20 articles, including a cover story in the January issue of Sojourners magazine. It will establish a collaboratory that will include graduate students, postdocs and faculty who will develop and advance new research methods and understandings over the next three to four years.

To learn more about the subject, ASU Now sat down with Tirosh-Samuelson,Ben Hurlbut,School of Life Sciences associate professor,andGaymon Bennett, School of Historical, Philosophical and Religious Studies associate director of research and associate professor,who will serve as co-principal investigators.

Question: What does the title of this project refer to?

Hurlbut: The project looks at the relationships between religion, science and technology in several important domains of public life: in environmental movements, in shifting ideas of the spiritual self that draw upon science, in arenas of high-technology innovation that are reshaping how we live and in the ways societies debate and govern the ethical implications of biotechnological transformation of life, including human life. We want to understand how science, technology and religion are related in those domains, including how lines are drawn between them. There is a pretty widespread assumption that as scientific knowledge and technological capacity increase, religion retreats into the background. And yet, if you look at how people think and talk, things are a lot messier. Go to Silicon Valley and you will encounter a lot of people who are imagining a technological future in terms of its potential to bring a kind of redemption and transcendence, a kind of eschatology. In other domains, like in public debate about biotechnologies, like human genome editing, there is a lot of drawing of lines between scientifically-grounded ethical views versus religious ones. But in all these areas, the boundaries are less clear than we tend to assume. They are a lot more mixed, a lot more hybrid, a lot fuzzier. And understanding that is important for how we think about the relationships between science, technology and religion in contemporary public life.

Q: How is this project unique?

Tirosh-Samuelson: The core work of this project will be done by a collaborative lab (co-lab, for short), which will include the three principal investigators, invited faculty, postdoctoral fellows and graduate students. This group will be studying together and will host visiting scholars from other universities around the world who will help enrich the discussion about big picture questions. The work of the co-lab will be distinctly interdisciplinary, crossing boundaries between history, science and technology studies, religious studies, sociology and anthropology. Our basic conviction is that to understand the interplay between religion, science and technology, we need to pose new questions and engage new methods. The artificial dichotomy between science and religion is no longer valid and even talking about a dialogue between religion and science is insufficient. We need to develop deeper ways to understand how these domains operate in our public life, and to do so, we must engage new disciplines that previously have not been applied to this field of inquiry. Since the project engages religion, science and technology in public life, it will have a public component, including public lectures that will involve the entire ASU community as well as an outreach program to people outside the ASU community, such as high-tech innovators in various innovations enclaves (e.g. Silicon Valley). The public aspect of the project exemplifies ASUs commitment to social embeddedness and to breaking the boundaries between the academy and the community.

"Theres been this sort of assumption that as technology progresses, as knowledge progresses, we get less religious, we become more secular."

Ben Hurlbut,School of Life Sciences associate professor

Q: Why do we see such pronounced boundaries between the religious and the secular in academia?

Hurlbut: Theres been this sort of assumption that as technology progresses, as knowledge progresses, we get less religious, we become more secular. That assumption has also been built into the way some fields study modern life, whether or not that actually corresponds with people's lived experience. So one of the things that we want to do is ask, "What are the things that we're overlooking?" Because we have operated in the social sciences, to a very significant degree, under the assumption that secularization is an inevitable result of modernization and progress, religion is either left behind or pushed to the side. It drops out of public life and becomes privatized. So, the disciplines have sort of carved themselves up in ways that are mapped onto assumptions about the world and knowledge that may not actually be correct.

Q: How have the boundaries between the religious and the secular changed over time?

Bennett: Theres this widespread belief today that if you want to transform the world, you don't really need religion. Your just need science and technology. And yet if you go someplace like Silicon Valley and you walk down Sand Hill Road and walk into a coffee shop and you sit and listen to innovators talk about what they're doing, theyre all talking about transforming the most fundamental aspects of what it means to be human. And if you tune in closely, all sorts of kinds of topics that we used to associate with religion or spirituality are being talked about in relation to technology. Questions like what does it mean to be a being with a finite body? Can we overcome our own frailty and even cure aging? What does it mean to be connected to other people and to our environments? What does it mean for us to be able to build infrastructures in the world that promised to united us together but have become the engine for so much division?

"When we study religious environmentalism, we have to think anew about terms such as 'secular,' 'religious,' 'worldliness' and 'otherworldliness.'"

Hava Tirosh-Samuelson, Regents Professor and director of Jewish studies

Q: What are some other areas where we see this happening?

Tirosh-Samuelson: The area that I work on is religious environmentalism. This movement emerged in the U.S. in the 1960s when people began to be aware of the ecological crisis. Interestingly, some of the scientists who were first to note the crisis were religious practitioners who considered the environmental crisis an assault on Gods created world. The interreligious movement of religious environmentalism and the academic discourse on religion and ecology illustrate the porous boundaries between science and religion or between the religious and secular aspects of life. For religious environmentalists, the natural world, or the environment, is not simply inert matter that can be known only through science, but rather the expression of divine creativity. When we study religious environmentalism, we have to think anew about terms such as secular, religious, worldliness and otherworldliness. Our analysis of religious environmentalism is not only historically grounded, it is also attentive to religious diversity and religious differences. The way we think about the relationship between religion and science reflects the legacy of Christianity. But other world religions, for example Judaism, Islam, Hinduism or Buddhism approach these issues quite differently. In addition to religious diversity, we are going to interrogate the category of spirituality as a hybrid category that fuses the secular and the religious. We can see it in regard to environmentalism but also in other domains such as medicine and the wellness industry. But what does it mean to be spiritual but not religious and how does spirituality express itself? We will seek to address these questions.

"What does it mean to alter a world our children will inherit?"

Gaymon Bennett,School of Historical, Philosophical and Religious Studies associate director of research

Q: How are these questions relevant to peoples everyday lives?

Bennett: It's not incidental that the three research areas for this project are three areas that are some of the major areas of collective crisis in the world today. On one level, these areas seem so timely, so current the question of bioengineering will transform our bodies, or how digital innovation will change our sense of ourselves. But on another level, these are really old, really fundamental questions: What does it mean to alter a world our children will inherit? How do our religious and spiritual views of reality shape what gets to count as important, or desirable or dangerous? Our lives are saturated with science and technology. Its fundamentally changing how we relate to ourselves our bodies, our planet, our food, our lovers, our sense of a higher reality. And then of course theres the environmental crisis and the question of what we modern people have done to our relationship with nature, whether it has intrinsic meaning and what that might be. All of these areas cut across time, place, culture and tradition, and are some of the most pressing issues that humanity is facing today.

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ASU event to address human dignity and technoscience - ASU Now

NYC demonstrators rally against COVID-19 vaccine requirements

NY Gov. Kathy Hochul has said she will take steps to replace medical personnel who refuse to meet the vaccination requirement.

USA TODAY, Associated Press

As COVID-19 vaccine mandates take effect across the U.S., one article circulating on social media claims getting jabbed in the arm may no longer be necessary.

"Vaccine Hesitant?" reads the headline of the Sept. 21 article published by an online outlet called Vision Times. "US Researchers Are Engineering Lettuce and Spinach to Carry mRNA COVID Jabs."

A University of California, Riverside research group, in collaboration with the University of California San Diego and Carnegie Mellon University, is reported as spearheading the scientific effort. The article details the study's research plans but makes no additional mention of the headline's reference to COVID-19 vaccines aside from describing how the mRNA vaccines work.

Fact check: Inhaling hydrogen peroxide for COVID-19 is dangerous, experts warn

The potential for splicing COVID-19 vaccines into food was echoed by former National Security Adviser Michael Flynn during a recent appearance on a podcast called "Thrivetime Show: Business School Without the B.S." In a viral clip shared to Twitter on Sept. 22, Flynn says he read an article where "they're talking about putting the (COVID-19) vaccine into salad dressings or salad."

As far-fetched as vaccine-infusedspinach and lettuce sounds, the claim is not entirely unfounded.

Researchers at UC Riverside and its collaborating universities are working on potentially turning plants into edible vaccine factories. But they'renot doing itfor COVID-19 specifically, and such foods won't be available in your local supermarket anytime soon.

USA TODAY reached out to Vision Times and Flynn for comment.

The National Science Foundation gave a UC Riversideresearch group $500,000 to study genetically engineering plants with mRNA, a molecule contained in the Pfizer-BioNTech and Moderna COVID-19 vaccines that isnormally used by our cells to make protein.

The effort was announced in a Sept. 16 press release.

Fact check: COVID-19 vaccination has no effect on blood color

But the study is looking generally toward all mRNA vaccines not COVID-19 specifically andwon't be available for human useanytime soon, said lead researcher Juan Pablo Giraldo, associate professor in the department of botany and plant sciences.

"This research will take a couple of years to show proof of concept of the technology," he wrote in an email to USA TODAY. "If successful, it will need more studies and several more years for people to use leafy greens as mRNA vaccine factories."

The idea behind using plantshas to do with mRNA vaccines' temperature requirements. Because the molecule needs to be transported and stored under cold conditions to maintainstability, researchers hope their study will help overcome this challenge and enable storage at room temperatures, according to the press release.

Fact check: False claim that cancer has spiked as a result of COVID-19 vaccines

In order to achieve this, genetic material contained in mRNA vaccines will be inserted into small, disk-like structures within plant cells called chloroplasts, solar panel-like structures that convert sunlight into chemical energy.

"Ideally, a single plant would produce enough mRNA to vaccinate a single person," Giraldo said in the release. "We are testing this approach with spinach and lettuce and have long-term goals of people growing it in their own gardens. Farmers could also eventually grow entire fields of it."

Based on our research, we rate PARTLY FALSE the claim spinach and lettuce are being genetically engineered with COVID-19 mRNA vaccines. Researchers at UC Riverside are indeed studying whether edible plants like spinach and lettuce can be genetically engineered to produce genetic material contained in mRNA vaccines. But thestudy isn't geared specifically toward COVID-19 vaccines. And the effort is in its infancy,meaning a product in this vein is years away from becoming reality.

Thank you for supporting our journalism. You can subscribe to our print edition, ad-free app or electronic newspaper replica here.

Our fact-check work is supported in part by a grant from Facebook.

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Fact check: Genetically engineering your salad with the COVID-19 vaccines? We're not there yet. - USA TODAY

Olly Mannand The Week delve behind the headlines and debate what really matters.

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In this weeks episode, we discuss:

The UK government has announced plans to allow gene-editing to be used in agricultural crops, diverging from an EU-wide ban on any genetic modification. Proponents of the technique say that it is more like accelerated selective breeding than genetic engineering - and that it could help farmers grow more produce while using fewer pesticides. But its opponents are worried that it will pave the way for riskier experiments.

A landmark legal case has begun between two stand-up comedians over who owns the rights to a comedy routine. One has hired Harbottle & Lewis, the lawyers best known for representing the Queen, to argue his case. So are we going to see lots of comedians taking one another to court? And how can you really establish who owns a joke anyway?

TikTok videos with the manifestation hashtag have been viewed a whopping ten billion times on TikTok, making it a buzzword of 2021. Its the latest incarnation of cosmic ordering - the practice of asking the universe to deliver what you expect from it, whether thats exam success or romantic fulfilment. Is it just harmless fun, or does it have a darker side to it?

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Gene editing, joke theft and manifesting - The Week UK