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CRISPR represents a new frontier in gene editing. In comparison to other currently available technologies, it is a less expensive, more specific and simpler-to-use gene editing tool but is not without its criticism or concerns.

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Gene editing is often discussed and presented in the context of revolutionizing treatment and diagnostics. In 2012, Jennifer Doudna and Emmanuelle Charpentier demonstrated the potential of CRISPR, which made the promise of gene editing therapies more tangible.

However, COVID-19 has brought to the fore additional applications, most notably exploring how CRISPR can be used as a mechanism to develop non-gene based therapies. Once the process is refined, it could represent another notable step forward for the healthcare sector, although several regulatory hurdles still remain before CRISPR manufactured non-gene editing therapies are widespread.

The CRISPR technology works by coding for a specific gene sequence using guide RNA. When the appropriate DNA sequence is found, the Cas9 protein, working as a pair of scissors, cuts the DNA at the desired location. Once the cut has been made, the gene can be disabled, or missing genetic information can be inserted or replaced.

Due to its characteristics, CRISPR represents a new frontier in gene editing; in comparison to other currently available technologies, it is a less expensive, more specific and simpler-to-use gene editing tool.

The technology is not without its criticism or concerns. Most notably, there is the possibility of off-target mutations, whereby cuts are made in unintended DNA sequences. Additionally, ethical questions related to gene editing as a technology overall remain pervasive among policy makers and the public alike. Fortunately, increased study and greater exposure to the technology are lessening some of these concerns, and it continues to represent a potential and long-awaited therapeutic option for many genetic, and often rare, diseases, for many of which treatments have remained elusive.

COVID-19 and the Ebola epidemic in the mid-2010s illustrated the lengthy time lag of developing preventative therapies. CRISPR technology has the potential to overcome this challenge by significantly accelerating the development of vaccines or therapeutic options to respond to pandemics. This is because CRISPR technology is based on a naturally occurring gene editing system that is found in bacteria, which can be used to fight viruses.

Increased urbanization and contact between different world regions is likely to lead to an increase in the frequency of epidemics, and this new reality has spurred increased interest in CRISPR as a means to quickly respond to disease outbreaks, or even unpredictable seasonal infections. A quick response can help protect healthcare professionals in the short term, and embrace the promise of prevention is better than treatment.

There are a range of different applications for using CRISPR in the development of therapeutic solutions.

Traditional vaccines typically consist of a weakened or dead strand of the virus that it is meant to inoculate patients from viruses. When developing a vaccine, the manufacturer must select viral strands, which are then either grown and incubated in hen eggs or cells.

CRISPR can be used to modify the incubator to increase viral products, which reduces the number of eggs or cells needed in the manufacturing process.

CRISPR technology can be used to engineer B cells, a white blood cell that produces the antibodies that in turn combat pathogens. Using CRISPR, B cells can be injected into patients and provide them with the antibodies to an infection, such as COVID-19, without ever being exposed to the disease itself.

This CRISPR technique effectively skips the step in traditional vaccines of introducing a version of the virus to effectively stimulate the development of an antibody. If the platform, rather than a specific vaccine, can receive authorization, it will allow companies to respond to viral outbreaks in a matter of months, as opposed to years, by simply engineering the appropriate B cells to respond to the viral threat.

The major drawback from this approach is that in the limited studies conducted thus far, it has only offered protection for a very short period of time.

Our increased understanding of genes has given rise to a new class of vaccine known as mRNA vaccines. The concept has become increasingly popular over the last few years, especially during COVID-19, and is the basis of CureVacs approach. The vaccines work by triggering cells to develop antibodies to a specific virus, e.g. SARS-CoV-2,without needing to introduce the virus itself.

Finally, beyond vaccination, there are plenty of other potential uses of CRISPR to combat COVID-19 and viral pandemics in the future. A recent Stanford study used CRISPR to directly target COVID-19 virus (SARS-CoV-2) and disable disease at an RNA level.

Beyond the current pandemic, CRISPR has potential applications to combat other viruses that humanity has been struggling with, ranging from the seasonal flu to HIV. Currently, influenza vaccinations are developed based on hypothesizing about next years viral strain. Due to the manufacturing process, companies cannot quickly respond to a change in the external environment. However, CRISPR introduces a more agile and cheaper manufacturing process, either by improving and reducing the incubation process or aiming to leverage the human body to produce its own antibodies,

Policy has already begun to respond to the potential implications of gene editing as part of a healthcare systems pandemic response mechanism. In a bold step, suggesting a softening of European Union regulations, the European Parliament and Council of the European Union adopted a regulation introducing a temporary derogation to the GMO regulation for clinical trials on vaccines for COVID-19 utilizing gene editing technologies.

This decision could have wider implications for the future use of gene editing for therapeutic use in the EU, especially as the EU looks to review its pharmaceutical strategy for the coming years, where personalized and gene therapies will be a significant component.

COVID-19 has brought the potential of CRISPR-based therapies to combat viral infections further to the foreground and encouraged research in the field. COVID-19 has also played an important role in helping to demystify gene editing to a broader audience. These developments are surely to lead to increased interest and investment in gene editing as a therapeutic solution or manufacturing mechanism outside of the rare and genetic disease space.

The EUs decision to provide an exemption to the GMO regulation could be the first step in a renewed understanding of CRISPR, or it could lead to political backlash. The coming months and years are likely to shape the future of CRISPR and gene editing as a therapeutic solution.

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CRISPR and the Fight Against COVID-19 BRINK News and Insights on Global Risk - BRINK

Could gene therapy provide a solution to HIV? A new research project aims to find out.

The National Institutes of Health(NIH) has backed researchers at the University of Southern California and the Fred Hutchison Cancer Center with a five-year, $14.6 million grant to develop a gene therapy that could potentially control HIV without the need for daily medications. Most HIV patients take a well-regimented cocktail of medications each day to control the virus. This therapy could change that. According to an announcement from the Keck School of Medicine at USC, the goal will be to develop a therapy that prepares patients for a stem cell transplantation using their own cells with little to no toxicity, engineers their own stem cells to fight HIV and stimulates those cells to quickly produce new and engineered immune cells once they're reintroduced into the patient. The hematopoietic stem cell transplants, also known as bone marrow transplants, have been used to treat some blood cancers. The idea is to infuse an HIV patient withhealthy donor blood stem cells that can grow into any type of blood or immune cell.

The gene therapy strategy has been inspired by three cases where leukemia patients who also had HIV received blood stem cell transplants from donors who also carried a mutation that confers immunity to HIV. The mutation was in the CCR5 gene, which encodes a receptor that HIV uses to infect immune cells and is present in about 1 percent of the population, USC said.

The program will engineer blood cells to remove CCR5 from a patient's own stem cells.That will be combined with other genetic changes so that the progeny of engineered stem cells will release antibodies and antibody-like molecules that block HIV.

In addition to the potential gene therapy treatment, researchers are also assessing whether or not CAR-T treatments will benefit HIV patients. Researchers from Harvard University developed a Dual CAR T-cell immunotherapy that can potentially help fight HIV infection. First reported by Drug Target Review, the HIV-specific CAR-T cell is being developed to not only target and eliminated HIV-infected cells, but also reproduce in vivo to enable the patients to fight off the infection. HIVs primary target it T cells, which are part of the bodys natural immune response.

Todd Allen, a professor of Medicine at Harvard Medical School, said the Dual CAR-T cell immunotherapy has so far provided a strong, long-lasting response against HIV-infection while being resistant to the virus itself.

According to the report, theDual CAR T cell was developed through the engineering of two CARs into a single T cell. Each of the CARs contained a CD4 protein that allowed it to target HIV-infected cells and a costimulatory domain, which signaled the CAR T cell to increase its immune functions. As DTR reported, the first CAR contained the 4-1BB co-stimulatory domain, which stimulates cell proliferation and persistence, while the second has the CD28 co-stimulatory domain, which increases its ability to kill infected cells.

To protect the CAR-T cells from HIV, the team added the protein C34-CXCR4, which prevents HIV from attaching to and infecting cells. When that was added, the researchers found in animal models that the treatment was long-lived, replicated in response to HIV infection, killed infected cells effectively and was partially resistant to HIV infection.

Still, other researchers are looking to those rare individuals who are infected with HIV but somehow on their own are able to suppress the virus without the need for any treatment. Researchers have sought to replicate what this small percentage of patients can naturally do in other patients who require those daily regimens of medications. Through the sequencing of the genetic material of those rare individuals, researchers made an interesting discovery.

The team discovered large numbers of intact viral sequences in the elite controllers chromosomes. But in this group, the genetic material was restricted to inactive regions, where DNA is not transcribed into RNA to make proteins, MedNewsToday reported.

Now the race is on to determine how this can be replicated and used to treat the nearly 38 million people across the globe who have been diagnosed with HIV.

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New HIV Gene Therapy, CAR-T Treatments Could be on the Horizon for Patients - BioSpace

When Ralph Fisher, a Texas cattle rancher, set eyes on one of the world's first cloned calves in August 1999, he didn't care what the scientists said: He knew it was his old Brahman bull, Chance, born again. About a year earlier, veterinarians at Texas A&M extracted DNA from one of Chance's moles and used the sample to create a genetic double. Chance didn't live to meet his second self, but when the calf was born, Fisher christened him Second Chance, convinced he was the same animal.

Scientists cautioned Fisher that clones are more like twins than carbon copies: The two may act or even look different from one another. But as far as Fisher was concerned, Second Chance was Chance. Not only did they look identical from a certain distance, they behaved the same way as well. They ate with the same odd mannerisms; laid in the same spot in the yard. But in 2003, Second Chance attacked Fisher and tried to gore him with his horns. About 18 months later, the bull tossed Fisher into the air like an inconvenience and rammed him into the fence. Despite 80 stitches and a torn scrotum, Fisher resisted the idea that Second Chance was unlike his tame namesake, telling the radio program "This American Life" that "I forgive him, you know?"

In the two decades since Second Chance marked a genetic engineering milestone, cattle have secured a place on the front lines of biotechnology research. Today, scientists around the world are using cutting-edge technologies, from subcutaneous biosensors to specialized food supplements, in an effort to improve safety and efficiency within the $385 billion global cattle meat industry. Beyond boosting profits, their efforts are driven by an imminent climate crisis, in which cattle play a significant role, and growing concern for livestock welfare among consumers.

Gene editing stands out as the most revolutionary of these technologies. Although gene-edited cattle have yet to be granted approval for human consumption, researchers say tools like Crispr-Cas9 could let them improve on conventional breeding practices and create cows that are healthier, meatier, and less detrimental to the environment. Cows are also being given genes from the human immune system to create antibodies in the fight against Covid-19. (The genes of non-bovine livestock such as pigs and goats, meanwhile, have been hacked to grow transplantable human organs and produce cancer drugs in their milk.)

But some experts worry biotech cattle may never make it out of the barn. For one thing, there's the optics issue: Gene editing tends to grab headlines for its role in controversial research and biotech blunders. Crispr-Cas9 is often celebrated for its potential to alter the blueprint of life, but that enormous promise can become a liability in the hands of rogue and unscrupulous researchers, tempting regulatory agencies to toughen restrictions on the technology's use. And it's unclear how eager the public will be to buy beef from gene-edited animals. So the question isn't just if the technology will work in developing supercharged cattle, but whether consumers and regulators will support it.

* * *

Cattle are catalysts for climate change. Livestock account for an estimated 14.5 percent of greenhouse gas emissions from human activities, of which cattle are responsible for about two thirds, according to the United Nations' Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO). One simple way to address the issue is to eat less meat. But meat consumption is expected to increase along with global population and average income. A 2012 report by the FAO projected that meat production will increase by 76 percent by 2050, as beef consumption increases by 1.2 percent annually. And the United States is projected to set a record for beef production in 2021, according to the Department of Agriculture.

For Alison Van Eenennaam, an animal geneticist at the University of California, Davis, part of the answer is creating more efficient cattle that rely on fewer resources. According to Van Eenennaam, the number of dairy cows in the United States decreased from around 25 million in the 1940s to around 9 million in 2007, while milk production has increased by nearly 60 percent. Van Eenennaam credits this boost in productivity to conventional selective breeding.

"You don't need to be a rocket scientist or even a mathematician to figure out that the environmental footprint or the greenhouse gases associated with a glass of milk today is about one-third of that associated with a glass of milk in the 1940s," she says. "Anything you can do to accelerate the rate of conventional breeding is going to reduce the environmental footprint of a glass of milk or a pound of meat."

Modern gene-editing tools may fuel that acceleration. By making precise cuts to DNA, geneticists insert or remove naturally occurring genes associated with specific traits. Some experts insist that gene editing has the potential to spark a new food revolution.

Jon Oatley, a reproductive biologist at Washington State University, wants to use Crispr-Cas9 to fine tune the genetic code of rugged, disease-resistant, and heat-tolerant bulls that have been bred to thrive on the open range. By disabling a gene called NANOS2, he says he aims to "eliminate the capacity for a bull to make his own sperm," turning the recipient into a surrogate for sperm-producing stem cells from more productive prized stock. These surrogate sires, equipped with sperm from prize bulls, would then be released into range herds that are often genetically isolated and difficult to access, and the premium genes would then be transmitted to their offspring.

Furthermore, surrogate sires would enable ranchers to introduce desired traits without having to wrangle their herd into one place for artificial insemination, says Oatley. He envisions the gene-edited bulls serving herds in tropical regions like Brazil, the world's largest beef exporter and home to around 200 million of the approximately 1.5 billion head of cattle on Earth.

Brazil's herds are dominated by Nelore, a hardy breed that lacks the carcass and meat quality of breeds like Angus but can withstand high heat and humidity. Put an Angus bull on a tropical pasture and "he's probably going to last maybe a month before he succumbs to the environment," says Oatley, while a Nelore bull carrying Angus sperm would have no problem with the climate.

The goal, according to Oatley, is to introduce genes from beefier bulls into these less efficient herds, increasing their productivity and decreasing their overall impact on the environment. "We have shrinking resources," he says, and need new, innovative strategies for making those limited resources last.

Oatley has demonstrated his technique in mice but faces challenges with livestock. For starters, disabling NANOS2 does not definitively prevent the surrogate bull from producing some of its own sperm. And while Oatley has shown he can transplant sperm-producing cells into surrogate livestock, researchers have not yet published evidence showing that the surrogates produce enough quality sperm to support natural fertilization. "How many cells will you need to make this bull actually fertile?" asks Ina Dobrinski, a reproductive biologist at the University of Calgary who helped pioneer germ cell transplantation in large animals.

But Oatley's greatest challenge may be one shared with others in the bioengineered cattle industry: overcoming regulatory restrictions and societal suspicion. Surrogate sires would be classified as gene-edited animals by the Food and Drug Administration, meaning they'd face a rigorous approval process before their offspring could be sold for human consumption. But Oatley maintains that if his method is successful, the sperm itself would not be gene-edited, nor would the resulting offspring. The only gene-edited specimens would be the surrogate sires, which act like vessels in which the elite sperm travel.

Even so, says Dobrinski, "That's a very detailed difference and I'm not sure how that will work with regulatory and consumer acceptance."

In fact, American attitudes towards gene editing have been generally positive when the modification is in the interest of animal welfare. Many dairy farmers prefer hornless cows horns can inflict damage when wielded by 1,500-pound animals so they often burn them off in a painful process using corrosive chemicals and scalding irons. In a study published last year in the journal PLOS One, researchers found that "most Americans are willing to consume food products from cows genetically modified to be hornless."

Still, experts say several high-profile gene-editing failures in livestock and humans in recent years may lead consumers to consider new biotechnologies to be dangerous and unwieldy.

In 2014, a Minnesota startup called Recombinetics, a company with which Van Eenennaam's lab has collaborated, created a pair of cross-bred Holstein bulls using the gene-editing tool TALENs, a precursor to Crispr-Cas9, making cuts to the bovine DNA and altering the genes to prevent the bulls from growing horns. Holstein cattle, which almost always carry horned genes, are highly productive dairy cows, so using conventional breeding to introduce hornless genes from less productive breeds can compromise the Holstein's productivity. Gene editing offered a chance to introduce only the genes Recombinetics wanted. Their hope was to use this experiment to prove that milk from the bulls' female progeny was nutritionally equivalent to milk from non-edited stock. Such results could inform future efforts to make Holsteins hornless but no less productive.

The experiment seemed to work. In 2015, Buri and Spotigy were born. Over the next few years, the breakthrough received widespread media coverage, and when Buri's hornless descendant graced the cover of Wired magazine in April 2019, it did so as the ostensible face of the livestock industry's future.

But early last year, a bioinformatician at the FDA ran a test on Buri's genome and discovered an unexpected sliver of genetic code that didn't belong. Traces of bacterial DNA called a plasmid, which Recombinetics used to edit the bull's genome, had stayed behind in the editing process, carrying genes linked to antibiotic resistance in bacteria. After the agency published its findings, the media reaction was swift and fierce: "FDA finds a surprise in gene-edited cattle: antibiotic-resistant, non-bovine DNA," read one headline. "Part cow, part bacterium?" read another.

Recombinetics has since insisted that the leftover plasmid DNA was likely harmless and stressed that this sort of genetic slipup is not uncommon.

"Is there any risk with the plasmid? I would say there's none,'' says Tad Sonstegard, president and CEO of Acceligen, a Recombinetics subsidiary. "We eat plasmids all the time, and we're filled with microorganisms in our body that have plasmids." In hindsight, Sonstegard says his team's only mistake was not properly screening for the plasmid to begin with.

While the presence of antibiotic-resistant plasmid genes in beef probably does not pose a direct threat to consumers, according to Jennifer Kuzma, a professor of science and technology policy and co-director of the Genetic Engineering and Society Center at North Carolina State University, it does raise the possible risk of introducing antibiotic-resistant genes into the microflora of people's digestive systems. Although unlikely, organisms in the gut could integrate those genes into their own DNA and, as a result, proliferate antibiotic resistance, making it more difficult to fight off bacterial diseases.

"The lesson that I think is learned there is that science is never 100 percent certain, and that when you're doing a risk assessment, having some humility in your technology product is important, because you never know what you're going to discover further down the road," she says. In the case of Recombinetics. "I don't think there was any ill intent on the part of the researchers, but sometimes being very optimistic about your technology and enthusiastic about it causes you to have blinders on when it comes to risk assessment."

The FDA eventually clarified its results, insisting that the study was meant only to publicize the presence of the plasmid, not to suggest the bacterial DNA was necessarily dangerous. Nonetheless, the damage was done. As a result of the blunder,a plan was quashed forRecombinetics to raise an experimental herd in Brazil.

Backlash to the FDA study exposed a fundamental disagreement between the agency and livestock biotechnologists. Scientists like Van Eenennaam, who in 2017 received a $500,000 grant from the Department of Agriculture to study Buri's progeny, disagree with the FDA's strict regulatory approach to gene-edited animals. Typical GMOs are transgenic, meaning they have genes from multiple different species, but modern gene-editing techniques allow scientists to stay roughly within the confines of conventional breeding, adding and removing traits that naturally occur within the species. That said, gene editing is not yet free from errors and sometimes intended changes result in unintended alterations, notes Heather Lombardi, division director of animal bioengineering and cellular therapies at the FDA's Center for Veterinary Medicine. For that reason, the FDA remains cautious.

"There's a lot out there that I think is still unknown in terms of unintended consequences associated with using genome-editing technology," says Lombardi. "We're just trying to get an understanding of what the potential impact is, if any, on safety."

Bhanu Telugu, an animal scientist at the University of Maryland and president and chief science officer at the agriculture technology startup RenOVAte Biosciences, worries that biotech companies will migrate their experiments to countries with looser regulatory environments. Perhaps more pressingly, he says strict regulation requiring long and expensive approval processes may incentivize these companies to work only on traits that are most profitable, rather than those that may have the greatest benefit for livestock and society, such as animal well-being and the environment.

"What company would be willing to spend $20 million on potentially alleviating heat stress at this point?" he asks.

* * *

On a windy winter afternoon, Raluca Mateescu leaned against a fence post at the University of Florida's Beef Teaching Unit while a Brahman heifer sniffed inquisitively at the air and reached out its tongue in search of unseen food. Since 2017, Mateescu, an animal geneticist at the university, has been part of a team studying heat and humidity tolerance in breeds like Brahman and Brangus (a mix between Brahman and Angus cattle). Her aim is to identify the genetic markers that contribute to a breed's climate resilience, markers that might lead to more precise breeding and gene-editing practices.

"In the South,'' Mateescu says, heat and humidity are a major problem. "That poses a stress to the animals because they're selected for intense production to produce milk or grow fast and produce a lot of muscle and fat."

Like Nelore cattle in South America, Brahman are well-suited for tropical and subtropical climates, but their high tolerance for heat and humidity comes at the cost of lower meat quality than other breeds. Mateescu and her team have examined skin biopsies and found that relatively large sweat glands allow Brahman to better regulate their internal body temperature. With funding from the USDA's National Institute of Food and Agriculture, the researchers now plan to identify specific genetic markers that correlate with tolerance to tropical conditions.

"If we're selecting for animals that produce more without having a way to cool off, we're going to run into trouble," she says.

There are other avenues in biotechnology beyond gene editing that may help reduce the cattle industry's footprint. Although still early in their development, lab-cultured meats may someday undermine today's beef producers by offering consumers an affordable alternative to the conventionally grown product, without the animal welfare and environmental concerns that arise from eating beef harvested from a carcass.

Other biotech techniques hope to improve the beef industry without displacing it. In Switzerland, scientists at a startup called Mootral are experimenting with a garlic-based food supplement designed to alter the bovine digestive makeup to reduce the amount of methane they emit. Studies have shown the product to reduce methane emissions by about 20 percent in meat cattle, according to The New York Times.

In order to adhere to the Paris climate agreement, Mootral's owner, Thomas Hafner, believes demand will grow as governments require methane reductions from their livestock producers. "We are working from the assumption that down the line every cow will be regulated to be on a methane reducer," he told The New York Times.

Meanwhile, a farm science research institute in New Zealand, AgResearch, hopes to target methane production at its source by eliminating methanogens, the microbes thought to be responsible for producing the greenhouse gas in ruminants. The AgResearch team is attempting to develop a vaccine to alter the cattle gut's microbial composition, according to the BBC.

Genomic testing may also allow cattle producers to see what genes calves carry before they're born, according to Mateescu, enabling producers to make smarter breeding decisions and select for the most desirable traits, whether it be heat tolerance, disease resistance, or carcass weight.

Despite all these efforts, questions remain as to whether biotech can ever dramatically reduce the industry's emissions or afford humane treatment to captive animals in resource-intensive operations. To many of the industry's critics, including environmental and animal rights activists, the very nature of the practice of rearing livestock for human consumption erodes the noble goal of sustainable food production. Rather than revamp the industry, these critics suggest alternatives such as meat-free diets to fulfill our need for protein. Indeed, data suggests many young consumers are already incorporating plant-based meats into their meals.

Ultimately, though, climate change may be the most pressing issue facing the cattle industry, according to Telugu of the University of Maryland, which received a grant from the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation to improve productivity and adaptability in African cattle. "We cannot breed our way out of this," he says.

* * *

Dyllan Furness is a Florida-based science and technology journalist. His work has appeared in Quartz, OneZero, and PBS, among other outlets.

This article was originally published on Undark. Read the original article.

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Biotechnology could change the cattle industry. Will it succeed? - Salon

The physical characteristics of a plant can reveal a lot about its underlying genetics. How many kernels of wheat does a single plant produce? How quickly does a corn plant grow? How much water does it use? Understanding a plants physical traits, and linking those traits to specific genes, ultimately drives development of improved crops, higher yields for farmers and greater food securityworldwide.

The science of capturing the characteristics of plants is called phenotyping, and until recently, it has been extremely time- and labor-intensive. Historically, trained researchers relied largely on the sight, touch and feel of a plant to record and understand the phenotype. Nowadays, technologies such as drones, robots, cameras and laser scanners can measure far greater numbers of plantsinstantly.

Plant phenotypes vary from region to region, in large part because plants are good at adapting to environmental variables, such as rainfall and soil composition. However, this variation can also be attributed, in part, to inconsistent protocols, technologies or algorithms used by researchers, said Yufeng Ge, an associate professor in the University of NebraskaLincolns Department of Biological Systems Engineering. Plant phenotyping efforts, although rapidly burgeoning, are still localized and isolated. This creates a series of problems, including difficulty in comparing and interpreting results, underused research data and unknowingly duplicated activities, Gesaid.

With the help of a new $3 million grant from the U.S. Department of Agricultures National Institute of Food and Agriculture, Ge is leading a team of researchers from three universities who are working to changethat.

The grant will bring together researchers from Nebraska, Texas A&M University and Mississippi State University to continue to expand phenotyping research already in progress; to expand the use of drone-based and other high-tech phenotyping methods; to create nationwide standards for collecting, cataloguing and analyzing phenotyping data; to teach the next generation of plant scientists how to organize, understand and effectively use the massive amount of information that high-tech phenotyping practices produce; and to make connections between a plants physical and geneticproperties.

Ultimately, were trying to accelerate the discovery of genes and gene networks in plants that have significance in the production of food, feed, fiber and fuel, Gesaid.

At Nebraska, Ge and other researchers have been using drones and other technology to develop and refine new ways of phenotyping since 2014. In a greenhouse on Nebraska Innovation Campus, plants move along a conveyer belt into different chambers, where theyre photographed by cameras that can identify traits beyond those that can be seen by the naked eye for example, nitrogen content and leaf temperature. At the Eastern Nebraska Research and Extension Center near Mead, a Spidercam on cables moves over a test field, capturing images of plants as they grow and, just as at the Innovation Campus greenhouse, measuring both seen and unseentraits.

The images, measurements and other data that researchers are able to capture using these research methods are invaluable, Ge said, but the technology is cost-prohibitive for widespread use. The grant will allow engineers involved in the project to work toward the development of more affordableversions.

The project also calls for the creation of standards for the types of sensors used and information collected, which will allow researchers from across the United States to easily analyze phenotyping data capturedanywhere.

Ge and others will also collaborate with the Genome to Fields Initiative, which brings together researchers from an array of organizations, including Iowa State University, the University of Wisconsin and the Iowa Corn Growers Association, to better understand the function of corn genes across differentenvironments.

The project paves the way for a nationwide, drone-based phenotyping network where tools and protocols are standardized, experiments are coordinated and efforts are concerted, and data can be seamlessly shared, Gesaid.

For the potential of a nationwide phenotyping network to be fully realized, Ge said there must also be a nationwide network of researchers equipped to work with the vast amounts of data such a network would produce. To meet that need, Ge and others involved in the project are creating a curriculum that teaches the next generation of plant scientists the tools they will need to understand and use the data successfully. Students will need to understand the sensors that collect the measurements, as well as the measurements and images themselves. They also will need to know how to use phenotyping data with other data sets sequencing data, weather and precipitation data, soil data and more that together can provide a clear picture of how genes and outside factors work together to determine a plantscharacteristics.

Archie Clutter, director of the Agricultural Research Division at Nebraska, said the award takes the universitys already renowned phenotyping program to the nextlevel.

This project has the potential to change the entire discipline of phenotyping, starting with the way data are collected all the way through the way that data are analyzed and shared, Clutter said. Its an impressive, ambitious and very important project that could have a huge impact on how new crop lines aredeveloped.

Husker researchers involved in the project include Ge, James Schnable, Stephen Baenziger, Yeyin Shi, Leah Sandall, Vikas Belamkar and Frank Bai. The team at Texas A&M University is led by Seth Murray and Amir Ibrahim, and the team at Mississippi State University is led by AlexThomasson.

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Husker-led project to advance, standardize field of phenotyping - Nebraska Today

GAITHERSBURG, Md., Sept. 02, 2020 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Novavax, Inc. (Nasdaq: NVAX), a late stage biotechnology company developing next-generation vaccines for serious infectious diseases, today announced the publication in The New England Journal of Medicine of Phase 1 data from its Phase 1/2 clinical trial of NVXCoV2373, its COVID19 vaccine candidate adjuvanted with MatrixM, in healthy adults 18-59 years of age. The publication offers further detail on the previously announced results, in which NVXCoV2373 demonstrated a reassuring safety and reactogenicity profile and induced robust antibody responses numerically superior to that seen in human convalescent sera. The manuscript is available at https://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMoa2026920?query=featured_coronavirus.

The rapid publication of Phase 1 results from our trial in a prestigious peer-reviewed journal reflects both the importance of the data and the urgent need for an effective vaccine to slow the COVID-19 pandemic, said Gregory M. Glenn, M.D., President of Research and Development at Novavax. Based on the positive Phase 1 results, we have begun multiple Phase 2 clinical trials, from which we expect to collect preliminary efficacy. Novavax is committed to generating the safety, immunogenicity and efficacy data that will support confident usage of the vaccine, both in the US and globally, and the data published today further bolsters our conviction that this is possible.

The Phase 1 portion of the Phase 1/2 clinical trial was randomized, observer-blinded, and placebo-controlled.

NVX-CoV2373 is currently in multiple Phase 2 clinical trials. The Phase 2 portion of the Phase 1/2 clinical trial to evaluate the safety and immunogenicity of NVX-CoV2373 began in August inthe United StatesandAustralia, and expands on the age range of the Phase 1 portion by including older adults 60-84 years of age as approximately 50 percent of the trial population. Secondary objectives include preliminary evaluation of efficacy. In addition, a Phase 2b clinical trial to assess efficacy began inSouth Africain August.

The trial was supported by funding from the Coalition for Epidemic Preparedness Innovations (CEPI) and was conducted at two sites in Australia.

Phase 1 Results Summary

Further details may be found in Novavax August 4 announcement of Phase 1 results and may be accessed here.

About NVX-CoV2373

NVXCoV2373 is a vaccine candidate engineered from the genetic sequence of SARSCoV2, the virus that causes COVID-19 disease. NVXCoV2373 was created using Novavax recombinant nanoparticle technology to generate antigen derived from the coronavirus spike (S) protein and contains Novavax patented saponin-based Matrix-M adjuvant to enhance the immune response and stimulate high levels of neutralizing antibodies. In preclinical trials, NVXCoV2373 demonstrated indication of antibodies that block binding of spike protein to receptors targeted by the virus, a critical aspect for effective vaccine protection. In its Phase 1 portion of the Phase 1/2 clinical trial, NVXCoV2373 was generally well-tolerated and elicited robust antibody responses numerically superior to that seen in human convalescent sera. Phase 2 clinical trials began in August 2020. Novavax has secured $2 billion in funding for its global coronavirus vaccine program, including up to $388 million in funding from the Coalition for Epidemic Preparedness Innovations (CEPI).

About Matrix-M

Novavax patented saponin-based Matrix-M adjuvant has demonstrated a potent and well-tolerated effect by stimulating the entry of antigen-presenting cells into the injection site and enhancing antigen presentation in local lymph nodes, boosting immune response.

About Novavax

Novavax, Inc. (Nasdaq:NVAX) is a late-stage biotechnology company that promotes improved health globally through the discovery, development, and commercialization of innovative vaccines to prevent serious infectious diseases. Novavax is undergoing clinical trials for NVX-CoV2373, its vaccine candidate against SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes COVID-19. NanoFlu, its quadrivalent influenza nanoparticle vaccine, met all primary objectives in its pivotal Phase 3 clinical trial in older adults. Both vaccine candidates incorporate Novavax proprietary saponin-based Matrix-M adjuvant in order to enhance the immune response and stimulate high levels of neutralizing antibodies. Novavax is a leading innovator of recombinant vaccines; its proprietary recombinant technology platform combines the power and speed of genetic engineering to efficiently produce highly immunogenic nanoparticles in order to address urgent global health needs.

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Novavax Forward-Looking Statements

Statements herein relating to the future of Novavax and the ongoing development of its vaccine and adjuvant products are forward-looking statements. Novavax cautions that these forward-looking statements are subject to numerous risks and uncertainties, which could cause actual results to differ materially from those expressed or implied by such statements. These risks and uncertainties include those identified under the heading Risk Factors in the Novavax Annual Report on Form 10-K for the year ended December 31, 2019, and Quarterly Report on Form 8-K for the period ended June 30, 2020, as filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). We caution investors not to place considerable reliance on forward-looking statements contained in this press release. You are encouraged to read our filings with the SEC, available at sec.gov, for a discussion of these and other risks and uncertainties. The forward-looking statements in this press release speak only as of the date of this document, and we undertake no obligation to update or revise any of the statements. Our business is subject to substantial risks and uncertainties, including those referenced above. Investors, potential investors, and others should give careful consideration to these risks and uncertainties.

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Novavax Announces Publication of Phase 1 Data for COVID-19 Vaccine Candidate in The New England Journal of Medicine - GlobeNewswire

Using biotechnology, researchers have developed cassava crops that are resistant to brown streak and mosaic, and have been tested in research stations across the country, to understand their adaptability to different agro-ecologies, with the participation of farmers.

Yes it works, Barisiyoy Jemimah contrasts the diseased Nase 13 Cassava with a resistant Nase 13 GMO. PHOTOS: Prossy Nandudu

Using biotechnology, researchers have developed cassava crops that are resistant to brown streak and mosaic, and have been tested in research stations across the country, to understand their adaptability to different agro-ecologies, with the participation of farmers.

Five years ago, Jemima Barisiyoyi cleared her five acres of land to plant cassava. She aimed to sell cuttings to the National Agriculture Advisory Services (NAADS) and also keep some for home use.

Using planting materials from neighbours and friends, she raised enough seeds for the five acres. At the start, cassava stems looked healthy with no sign of disease.

"I started planning on how I would use the money because of the assured market I had with the NAADS team that was procuring seed for distribution," said Barisiyoyi in an interview at the National Crop Resources Research Institute recently.

After four months, she realised some plants were not growing taller; some had white things like ash which were spreading faster.

Disturbed by what she saw, she contacted the Wakiso district extension officer, who connected her to researchers at Namulonge.

Upon inspecting her garden, they informed her that the garden had been infested by cassava diseases spread by whiteflies.

Diseases spread by the whitefly include brown streak and mosaic diseases that cause 100% yield loss. To bypass such diseases, she had to look out for disease-free planting materials. According to her, the option which is NASE 14 can only resist such diseases for three years.

She narrated her experience on Wednesday during the harvest of GMO cassava, organized by SCIFODE with support from the VIRCA Plus cassava project and the National Crop Resources Research Institute in Namulonge.

"I have been participating in these harvests which all show that there are cassava seeds that resist diseases, but when the law will come into place," said Barisiyoyi.

She was backed by Nakanwagi Aida, another farmer who wondered whether NARO cannot use other laws to release the varieties to farmers as they wait for the pending the law. The importance of involving farmers in the GMO harvests is part of the recommendations by the Cartagena Protocol on Biosafety that encourages participation of stakeholders like farmers who are direct beneficiaries of biotechnology research products.

The importance of involving farmers in the GMO harvests is part of the recommendations by the Cartagena Protocol on Biosafety that encourages participation of stakeholders like farmers who are direct beneficiaries of biotechnology research products.

For the two farmers and others to get resistant varieties, they will have to wait for varieties developed through biotechnology. With biotechnology, traits for resistance to a particular disease are taken from one crop and introduced into another to increase its ability to resist diseases and pests, explained Dr. Titus Alicai from NaCRRI.

Using biotechnology, researchers have developed cassava crops that are resistant to brown streak and mosaic, and have been tested in research stations across the country, to understand their adaptability to different agro-ecologies, with the participation of farmers.

Although farmers are demanding for resistant varieties, those developed through biotechnology can only be released under a clear regulatory framework, he added.

The Genetic Engineering Regulatory Act (GERA) that was meant to provide a unifying regulatory framework is currently in parliament after it was sent back by the President for the second time, added Isaac Ongu, the executive director of SCIFODE.

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Wakiso Farmers Want Naro To Fast Track The Release Of Disease Free Cassava Seeds - New Vision