"Medicine rice"

[Bill Sikes]

Human genes in plants?

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/americas/6422297.stm

"US mulls backing 'medicine rice'

Authorities in the United States have given preliminary approval to a plan to grow rice genetically modified to produce human proteins.
Rice plants including human genes involved in producing breast milk would be grown in the state of Kansas.

The company behind the proposal, Ventria Bioscience, says the plants could be developed into medicines for diarrhoea and dehydration in infants."

[Carl44]

stupid question bill please forgive my ignorance ,if the rice has human genes is there a reason why things that disease rice cold not then mutate to disease us , stupid i know but i just kinda wondered

[K.Snyder]

I don't think this will go through...Not without being tested further.

[spot]

Umm... this has been going on for such a long time, inserting human genetic material into other organisms. Here's an abstract from ten years ago...

Scientists have demonstrated the potential of obtaining recombinant
human hemoglobin from transgenic plants, bypassing traditional sources,
such as outdated human or cow blood, which are limited and carry risk
of infection, reported the March 6 issue of Nature. Researchers inserted
into the tobacco plant the genes for alpha- and beta-globin proteins,
which lead to the production of functional genetically engineered human
hemoglobin. Researchers identified the recombinant hemoglobin in
extracts from the seeds and roots in more than half of the transgenic
plants tested. "Although tobacco plants were used as a model system,
other species may produce higher yields with simpler purification and
sterilization steps," researchers wrote in Nature.

Dieryck, W., J. Pagnier, C. Poyart, et al. 1997. Human haemoglobin from
transgenic tobacco. Nature 386

It was said, undoubtedly as an urban legend with humorous potential, that the hemoglobin so improved the transport of oxygen from photosynthesis that the tobacco plants grew twice as fast, and that pretty soon we'd be smoking tobacco with a curious iron aftertaste. But the degree of transgenic mixing that's gone on in the last twenty years seems extensive and not nice at all. Nobody's yet got round to adding non-human genes into humans that I know of but I bet we get there eventually. Meanwhile, there's tobacco plants in someone's lab (I don't say field) with human blood components flowing in their leaves that the plant made all on its own.

[Carl44]

Originally Posted by spot

Umm... this has been going on for such a long time, inserting human genetic material into other organisms. Here's an abstract from ten years ago...

Scientists have demonstrated the potential of obtaining recombinant

human hemoglobin from transgenic plants, bypassing traditional sources,

such as outdated human or cow blood, which are limited and carry risk

of infection, reported the March 6 issue of Nature. Researchers inserted

into the tobacco plant the genes for alpha- and beta-globin proteins,

which lead to the production of functional genetically engineered human

hemoglobin. Researchers identified the recombinant hemoglobin in

extracts from the seeds and roots in more than half of the transgenic

plants tested. "Although tobacco plants were used as a model system,

other species may produce higher yields with simpler purification and

sterilization steps," researchers wrote in Nature.

Dieryck, W., J. Pagnier, C. Poyart, et al. 1997. Human haemoglobin from

transgenic tobacco. Nature 386

It was said, undoubtedly as an urban legend with humorous potential, that the hemoglobin so improved the transport of oxygen from photosynthesis that the tobacco plants grew twice as fast, and that pretty soon we'd be smoking tobacco with a curious iron aftertaste. But the degree of transgenic mixing that's gone on in the last twenty years seems extensive and not nice at all. Nobody's yet got round to adding non-human genes into humans that I know of but I bet we get there eventually. Meanwhile, there's tobacco plants in someone's lab (I don't say field) with human blood components flowing in their leaves that the plant made all on its own.

fantastic post spot as usual but in there was there a yes or a no to my stupid question

[spot]

Originally Posted by jimbo

fantastic post spot as usual but in there was there a yes or a no to my stupid question

I don't know the answer to it, and it's an answer worth knowing. So far the criticism of genetic transfer from a species to one that's wildly different is that once it's transferred it can hop into wild cousins of what you put it into, and then spread worldwide if it gives a natural advantage to the wild version. It might make a superweed, for example. Transgenic salmon have passed their growth characteristics into wild ocean fish already, and those altered wild salmon are spreading like wildfire now because they out-perform the native salmon.

Next problem, the simpler the species is that's been modified, the easier it seems to be for the change to be transferred on to a third unintended species by natural processes.

The third problem is that anyone eating the transgenic version might have a different experience compared with the original natural version, but that doesn't bother me in the least.

I'll have a think about your rather harder question and come back when I have a relevant thought.

[Richard Bell]

Originally Posted by spot

Umm... this has been going on for such a long time, inserting human genetic material into other organisms.

Exactly ! They don't call that rice "Uncle Ben" fer nuthin'!

[spot]

Originally Posted by Richard Bell

Exactly ! They don't call that rice "Uncle Ben" fer nuthin'!

That may be the most original joke I've seen in years. I'm in awe.

[Carl44]

Originally Posted by spot

That may be the most original joke I've seen in years. I'm in awe.

thanks for your reply but that last joke goes against the grain