Customizing Organisms

Cambrian Genomics is a company that creates custom DNA sequences, but their founder, Austen Heinz, has recently expressed interest in another goal: he wants to produce new organisms.

However, if humans were to create entirely new organisms, and should they either mistakenly or purposely realeased into the environment, they would compete with already existing organisms for survival. They would potentially function as invasive species and  harm populations of native species by competing for resources.

Heinz explains that every organism is capable of becoming more useful to human kind: even human cells. One of his ideas mentioned in the article is to manipulate the DNA of humans to be resistent to disease. However, this raises the question who would have access to this technology? It would be unrealistic to say that they would administer this procedure to every human on the planet, so how would you choose who gets to live longer? Who would be qualified to choose who gets to live longer?

Heinz says that there would be a board of ethics for this technology where modified creatures would have to be approved, but in the field of genetic engineering there are always a way to escape regulation (an example is discussed in this article).

Genetic Engineering Can Help Conserve the Population of Endangered Species

Florida panther

This article introduces three options where the genetic manipulation of endangered populations could be a viable and less risky solution to other methods of conservation like relocation.

It discusses how editing the genes of certain species to have more adaptive traits or hybridizing them with different breeds from the same species would increase biodiversity which leads to healthier animals and more viable offspring. Whereas relocation can lead to the introduction of invasive species and diseases.

Scientists aim to transfer genes like disease resistance or heat tolerance from one isolated population to another to make animals better-adapted to their environment, and thus more likely to survive long enough to reproduce.

How to Tell if Your Food is Genetically Engineered

The Food Scores database grading Doritos Tapatio Salsa Picante Hot Dsuce

Thanks to a new online database called Food Scores , consumers can now access details about the nutritional value and ingredients on more than 80,000 products commonly found in grocery stores.

The Food Scores database can inform a consumer about anything ranging from how processed the food item is to what products contain brominated vegetable oil.

Through a combination of taking into consideration nutritional value and processing, the Environmental Working Group assigns each item a score from 1 to 10, with 1 being the highest in nutritional value and the least processed.

Because food providers are not required to label products that contain genetically modified ingredients, this database is essential for customers who are concerned with the health and environmental effects of GMOs and wish to avoid consuming them.

The president an founder of the Environmental Working group, Ken Cook, got the idea for Food Scores from another project called Skin Deep that caused some cosmetic makers to change their products, and he hopes that Food Scores will do the same..

Spacial Distribution of DNA Could Predict Neuropsychiatric Disorders

While scientists already know that some mental disorders are genetic, researchers from the Nencki Institute of Experimental Biology in Warsaw and the Spanish Instituto de Neurociencias de Alicante have discovered that the link between genes and mental health is more subtle that previously suggested.

The team of investigators has found that changes in the distribution of genetic information an lead to neuropsychiatric disorders. In genetically modified laboratory mice, they found that changes in the spatial distribution of genetic material fibers in neurons were accompanied by disturbances in behavior.

A custom-made software for image analysis, created by Dr. Blazej Ruszczycki from the Nencki Institute, allowed the researchers to transform a sequence of microscopic images to three-dimensional visualization. This visualization allowed Polish scientists to find marked differences in the spatial structure of the chromatin in transgenic mice. They found that the modified spatial configuration of chromatin affects the production of certain proteins, which in turn leads to different than normal behavior of the mice.

Upon further inspection, the researchers found that transgenic mice were found to have significantly lower levels of serotonin and dopamine receptors, (both proteins are involved in emotional processes, including depressive disorders) and compared to wild mice, the transgenic mice were hyperactive, showed signs of autism, and had trouble with remembering and making new interactions with other individuals.

These results are invaluable to the field of medicine because they provide a new direction for the study and treatment of mental disorders such as autism and depression in humans.

Bacteria Prevent Obesity in Mice

Vanderbilt University investigators have discovered that in mice, a probiotic bacteria produces a therapeutic compound that prevents some of the adverse effects of a high fat diet such as weight gain and insulin resistance.

"The types of bacteria you have in your gut influence your risk for chronic diseases," said senior investigator Sean Davies, but it may be possible to manipulate the bacterial residents of the gut (microbiota) to treat obesity and other chronic diseases.

The team genetically engineered the E. coli Nissle stain to produce a compound known as NAPE that reduces both food intake and weight gain.

The investigators observed that the experimental group of mice that were exposed to NAPE-producing bacteria in their drinking water had dramatically lower food intake, body fat, insulin resistance, and fatty liver compared to mice receiving control bacteria.

The ultimate goal for this team is  to do one treatment and then never have to administer the bacteria again. Thanks to their research, a probiotic that prevents obesity could be in reach.

Genetic Engineering Could Save Crops From Pests

Mediterranean fruit fly

The Mediterranean fruit fly is a serious agricultural pest which causes extensive damage to crops, but New research reveals how the release of genetically engineered male flies could be used as an effective population suppression method.

These genetically engineered flies are not sterile, but they are only capable of producing male offspring.

Researchers at the University of East Anglia and Oxitec Ltd. simulated a wild environment within secure eight-meter greenhouses containing lemon trees to study the impact of releasing Oxitec flies."We found that they were capable of producing rapid population collapse in our closed system," says Lead researcher Dr Philip Leftwich.

“This method presents a cheap and effective alternative to irradiation. We believe this is a promising new tool to deal with insects which is both environmentally friendly and effective.”

Another method of pest control is the use of pheromones to attract or repel crops, but rather than relying on industrial labs to synthesize pheromones, researchers have genetically engineered plants to do such work for them.

Tobacco plant

Plant biologists report on genetically engineered tobacco plants that produce a pheromone that once extracted from the plant, can be used to trap male moths. If scientists were to engineer plants to produce other pheromones, it would result in the trapping of other pests that endanger crops.

According to Steve Seybold of the US Department of Agriculture Forest Service’s Pacific Southwest Research Station in Davis, California, "It will change the way that commercial pheromone outfits do business." 

Pheromone producing plants will not only increase the quality and lower the price of commercial pheromone products,but also reduce the use of harmful chemicals in pheromone production. 

Genetically Engineered Mice Could Help Prevent Illnesses Associated with Aging

Age related illnesses result from mutations accumulated by our DNA as we age.  Recently, biologists from the University of Rochester have discovered that one of the reasons that DNA is damaged is because the repair process begins to fail as animals age. As we age, DNA is replaced with a copy that is less accurate.

"Scientists have had limited tools to accurately study how DNA repair changes with age," said Gorbunova, but she and her team were able to observe the DNA repair process by working with genetically-modified mice whose cells produce green fluorescent protein that glows each time the breaks are repaired.

Through their observations, the team discovered that when mice are young, the breaks in DNA strands are repaired through a process called non-homologous end joining, but as they age this process begins to fail. This failure allows a less reliable DNA repair process known as microhomology-mediated end joining to take place: this process leads to loss of DNA segments and the wrong pieces being stitched together.

By studying these mice, Gorbunova and her team aim to discover new ways to prevent illnesses associated with aging.

Tracking Pollutants in the Body

Charles Tyler  and his group of scientists have genetically modified zebrafish that glow green to help illuminate what pollutants do inside the body.

Tyler and his team of scientists exposed the zebrafish to varying levels of endocrine disruptors (chemicals known to affect the hormone estrogen) including nonylphenol which is present in paints and industrial detergents and bisphenol A which is a component of many plastics.

These substances have become common freshwater pollutants that are connected to various reproductive problems in both people and animals. Previous research has shown that by mimicking the actions of sexual hormones, the chemicals cause fish to change gender, and in people, endocrine disruptors have been associated with lower sperm counts and breast and testicular cancers.

Yet scientists have had difficulty tracking what endocrine disruptors do inside a person or an animal's body. So Tyler and his colleagues genetically engineered zebrafish to glow where an endocrine-disrupting chemical is present, and therefore show where it may be harming the body.

The researchers exposed the fish to different endrocrine disruptors at varying concentrations, and then used a microscope to see which of the fish's organs glowed, and thus responded to the chemicals.

The data should help identify to what extent the chemicals affect various tissues and organs in the body.

Although it's been thought that these chemicals only impact the liver, testes, or ovaries, the chemicals also illuminated other parts of the fish's anatomy, including its eyes, skeletal muscles, and parts of the brain.  However,  the impact of endocrine disruptors to these parts of the body are unknown.

For now, the observation of fluorescent technology is limited to fish younger than six days old, because after that their skin develops pigmentation that interferes with viewing the fluorescence.

In the future, Tyler hopes to breed the zebrafish with a strain that lacks pigment in the skin which would allow the team to observe the fluorescent reactions in adult fish as well.


Because the article did not provide a link to the research findings of Tyler and his team, I am still left with multiple questions:
What evidence is there that supports the author's claim that endocrine disruptors have been associated with lower sperm counts and breast and testicular cancers?
Although this experiment was a great start for studying the effects of pollutants, will future models for this experiment include test subjects that are more similar to humans?
How do the pollutants enter the bodies of the fish? (Are they ingested, are they absorbed through the skin, etc?)
Does the mode in which the pollutant enters the body change it's affects on certain organs and tissues? (For example, do the affects of the pollutant vary depending on whether it is ingested or if it is inhaled?)
Do pollutants enter the body of a fish and the body of a human using different modes? (For example, fish absorb the pollutants through their skin while humans ingest the pollutants.)
If the two previous questions were found to be true, would the validity of the experiment in this article be compromised seeing as the affects of the endocrine disruptors might be too different on each organism to predict any correlation between the data collected from the zebrafish and possible affects on humans.