List of GMO-free Foods & allergies and genetically modified food
strawchicago z5
10 years ago
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grainlady_ks
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Is cross-breeding even comparable to genetically modified?
Comments (32)"There is no method of cross breeding that can insert bacteria DNA into a vegetable plant like transgenic corn and cotton has" You've clearly never heard of retroviruses, which do exactly that. "GMO crops then are no longer technically corn or soy or sugar beets but mutants" Mutation is the single most important thing in evolution, and the adaptation of life (which is a two part process - mutation expands the genome, natural selection winnows it down to what is useful). It's not a bad thing. Genetic Engineering is also DRASTICALLY more predictable than traditional crossbreeding. You want to pull the genes from a Geneva roostock that code for fireblight resistance and put it in a different apple? Trivial. You want to cross one of the geneva lines with a Braeburn apple and try to get an apple that tastes right and isn't very susceptible to fireblight? Almost impossible. Predictability also leads to safety. You want to try and get a resistance gene from a wild solanum into a tomato? Easy with gene splicing. Via traditional breeding? You're very likely to end up with something that will kill you if you eat it....See MoreAbout Genetically Engineered foods
Comments (32)Oh come on Marcia that just isn't fair. I was never implying that anyone was stupid and I worded that very carefully so no one would think that I did. If anyone else feels that I was calling them stupid I am sorry and that was not my intention. I do however feel that the subject of genetic engineering is getting an unjustified bad reputation. Since you have brought up education I will reveal mine. I have a BS in bioinformatics and computational biology with minors in computer science, statistics and chemistry. I am currently working on my MS in biotechnology. There is more than a few people eating GM crops currently and they aren't dying. Many people mention that the long term effects of GM produce should be studied and I agree with that and if they find a reason to remove the products they will. But at this current time I see no reason to have a concern. Tests are performed on the plants to look for toxic substances and allergens what more do you need. If anyone doesn't want to eat GM crops I am sure they can greatly reduce their intake of them by shopping at local farm stands. I have read a lot of the remarks against genetic engineering and they are all full of unsubstantiated claims and misleading experiments. Marcia, since you have studied biology I am sure you are familiar with the ames test. The ames test wasn't around in the time of cyclamate, our technology has come a very long way since then. Before the ames test scientists had to feed mice a lot of the compound and then dissect the mice and examine every inch of tissue for cancer. Now with the ames test all you need to do put the compound on a special agar plate and incubate for less than 2 days. And there are other countless advances to ensure safety. Even if the genes were able to somehow get into every organism within a species knocking out genes is not even as hard as putting them in. If you are interested here is one article about RNA interference . Also if you have taken genetics you know that you would never see the gene taking over a population it would reach Hardy-Weinberg equilibrium within the population. Also here is the FDA position on labeling genetically engineered food: Labeling Issues FDA has received many inquiries asking about the labeling of genetically engineered foods. Congress has provided FDA a limited basis on which to require labeling. Generally, for FDA to require labeling there must be something tangibly different about the food. In general, this means most genetically engineered foods will not need special labeling because they will be similar to traditionally bred varieties. But there are exceptions, such as when a gene from a food that could cause an allergic reaction--peanuts, for example--is transferred into another food. In that case, FDA policy places the burden on the developer. "The food will have to be labeled so everyone will know it contains an allergen, unless the developer can show scientifically that the allergenicity has not been transferred," says Laura Tarantino, Ph.D., deputy director of FDA's Office of Premarket Approval. Fortunately, the products in front of us right now don't raise those issues." FDA also will require labeling if a company uses genetic engineering techniques to change a food's composition significantly. For example, when one manufacturer modified canola to produce increased levels of lauric and myristic acids in the seed oil, FDA agreed that the common or usual name for this oil would be "laurate canola oil" in order to distinguish it from traditional canola oil....See MoreIf you had a choice to eat GMO foods, would you? Yes/No
Comments (76)The following was stated: "Glyphosate breakdown via heat produces mostly aminomethylphosphonic acid, carbon monoxide/dioxide, amino acids, and water/vapor...similar to microbe breakdown, but a lot faster. ." H.Kuska comment. I am aware of the microbe breakdown products, but I am not aware of any references that state that the thermal breakdown is similar. The melting point of glyphosate is nearly 230 degrees C. That would be nearly 446 degrees F. This is the main thermal paper that I have been able to find so far. Unfortunately it does not identify the glyphosate decomposition products. Howver, it appears to me that very little glyphosate would actually decompose in normal hosehold use. The first observed decomposition product is: "By analyzing the infrared spectrum of the sample which is processed by rising temperature to 260 C at the heating rate of 6 C min-1, the most possible group loss in this stage may be methylene. Moreover, the mass loss in the first stage by TGA is in accordance with the mass loss of a group of methylene in the molecular of glyphosate." Then. "With the temperature increased, the second stage appeared the exothermic peak after a smaller main endothermic peak, and the lost mass had continued, which indicated that this stage might occur burning phase, thus exothermic phenomenon occurred. By analyzing the infrared spectrum of the sample which is processed by rising temperature to 360 C at the heating rate of 6 Cmin-1, the most possible group loss in this stage may be the group of carbonyl. Moreover, the mass loss in the second stage by TGA is in accordance with the mass loss of a carbonyl in the molecular of glyphosate." Now Canola Oil has a smoke point of around 238 degrees C, so I doubt that the glyphosate is breaking down very much in normal Canola Oil use. http://www.culinary-yours.com/frying_oil.html Of course, if you can document your answer, I am willing to look at the reference. Here is a link that might be useful: link to thermal study...See MoreGMO in the food supply (follow-up to previous post)
Comments (102)I posted this in another forum, but since the person who dug up this old thread to talk about "gene 6" in multiple forums... In case anyone wants some information about "gene 6"...better/correctly known as "P6"...as it pertains to current discussion based on a study by the EFSA... This is a very wide range of proteins found in virus encoding from HIV to mosaic virus...these proteins are also found in the smoke of burning meat and tobacco. It's a very wide range. In this case, one of the biggest dangers would be a chance encoding to re-invigorate the "dead" version of cauliflower mosaic virus (or P6 residues) that's very commonly used as a carrier string for DNA/RNA insertion that it's inserted into. This could lead to some allergy problems, too, even if it doesn't fully express the mosaic virus but still overlaps enough to express P6 proteins. P6 is a known allergen, though it's not one that everyone is sensitive to. The expression of this gene is highly unlikely, though...and would be regulated to a single (or very small groups) of plants doing this replication rather than entire seed source or a field suddenly replicating mosaic virus or P6 residues. If it is the case that encoding suddenly made it large-scale available it would show up heavily in the research stage and it wouldn't make it out into the consumer market since it's showing inferior/bad genetic expression. One of the biggest parts of GMO research is tossing out 99%+ of everything you're actually trying to create because positive effects of expression aren't stable enough to sell it as seed...or it's showing "bad" expressions. There's a lot of otherwise harmful viruses (to plants or humans) used to insert GMO traits for start/end points into a genetic change that are made inert (and distinctly different) from their original genetic package, but still contain large parts of what makes up the virus, itself. Viruses can easily carry genetic information and they're ideal vehicles for transferring it. The genetic carriers of the virus are merely vehicles. Once you change the "genetic package" inside a virus it's not even what you started with. The "guts" are changed dramatically. If you put a Dodge Neon engine in a Porsche very few people would still consider it a Porsche. That's the level of dramatic change in sequencing going on inside of these packages. You can take certain virus types, depending on what you're trying to achieve, and precisely insert genetic information with start/termination points into existing DNA/RNA...totally turning it's genetic information into something totally different in both makeup and application. Btw, to those with P6 protein sensitivities...this would be a big deal. I'm not trying to knock the research at all. I'm just saying it's overlapping expression would most likely be contained to a very few plants in a field, not widespread. While genetic start/termination points are very good with insertion and replication once stable, nothing is perfect when you're exchanging genes...we see it even natural breeding. The major problem with this particular chain of insertion is the overlapping of the 2 sequences given as example in the paper and what could happen as a consequence of them being genetically linked so closely together...even if there's a very small chance of it happening as defined. It's also worth mentioning we're talking a single virus carrier, not the 100s of types (or the 20-ish most commonly used) carriers. It would also be greatly influenced by the new information inserted, what was cut out, and where the start/termination points overlap (if there is any replication overlap). There's more than 1 way to insert genetic information into virus and the chances of overlap encoding or reversion is different depending on the type of method used....See Morestrawchicago z5
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