freedombunker--2019-11-26--Genetically Modified Babies Are Ethically OK

Outrage was the general researcher and media response to the Chinese bioengineer He Jiankui's announcement last November that he had used CRISPR gene-editing technology to modify the genomes of several human embryos with the goal of making them resistant to HIV infection. The result was the birth of twin girls; one with the genetic modification in all of her body's cells and another whose body is a mosaic of modified and unmodified cells. He did certainly cut both scientific and ethical corners in applying CRISPR technology to human embryos. Happily, a preliminary study in June that suggested the He's modifications might shorten the twins' lifespans appears to be wrong.  Setting aside He's moral shortcomings, is it ever ethical to use CRISPR and other gene-editing technologies to modify the genomes of human embryos? Yes, argues Abertay University bioethicist Kevin Smith in the journal Bioethics. Smith addresses the question using a rigorously applied utilitarian ethics approach. He details recent advances in CRISPR gene-editing safety and concludes that the benefits of preventing heritable diseases already outweigh the risks of using the technology.  In his article, Smith deals with "several well‐rehearsed positions and arguments" against permitting parents to use CRISPR gene-editing to fix genetic flaws in their prospective offspring. These include "claims of unnaturalness, the alleged interests of embryos, questions of identity, fears of eugenics, and simply the 'yuck factor.'" Smith points out that critics once denounced in vitro fertilization (IVF) on the grounds of that it was "unnatural." Millions of parents have freely chosen unnatural IVF techniques to overcome their natural infertility. Some 8 million children have been born via assisted reproduction since the first IVF baby was born in 1979.  Some opponents argue using CRISPR would be unethical because embryos can't give their consent to being genetically modified. A requirement for prenatal consent is obvious ethical nonsense. No one has ever given their consent to be born much less to be born the specific complement of genes they bear. In addition, it's hard to imagine that a child will later feel morally aggrieved that his or her parents had prevented them from suffering a debilitating genetic disease. Providing parents with the ability to choose to prevent heritable disease and disability in their progeny using biotechnology is not to be equated with morally pernicious state-imposed eugenics. And lots of biomedical treatments and reproductive technologies have gone from yuck to yippee as their significant benefits became evident. CRISPR gene-editing will do the same.  Smith persuasively argues that not only would the early application of the technology improve the welfare of prospective parents and their progeny now, it will usher in a human germline genetic modification (HGGM) revolution that will greatly benefit future generations. As Smith explains, "The longer we wait until commencing the HGGM revolution and moving towards a world of increased utility, the greater will be the quantity of suffering accrued meantime through genetically influenced disease."  When should CRISPR and even better gene-editing technologies be made available to parents seeking to prevent genetic diseases in their offspring? Given that some folks are still spooked by He's announcement last November, Smith prudentially suggests that "we kickstart the next biomedical revolution by proceeding not immediately but within around 1–2 years to intervene in the human germline."  The revolution, however, may start sooner than that. Russian researcher Denis Rebrikov says that he hopes to gain permission in the near future from the appropriate authorities to gene-edit embryos to repair a gene that causes congenital deafness.


naturalnews--2019-02-13--Traditional farming methods in Mexico help keep the maize industry alive

(Natural News) Modern biotech has made a lot of promises when it comes to agriculture, and although those in the industry might claim they have revolutionized it in recent years, the changes haven’t exactly been for the better. In fact, when you take a look at traditional farming methods like those used in Mexico, it’s clear that the “old” ways of approaching agriculture are a lot more valuable than people realize.  Scientific American recently profiled a Mexican farmer named Edilberto Garcia Cuenca, who is one of many there using traditional methods to keep the maize industry alive. He grows maize on a five-acre plot handed down from his family, and he plants beans there to help ensure the soil stays fertile. He lets the rain irrigate his crops, and in the rainy season, he plants the seeds he stored away during the previous cycle and takes care of the seedlings. With millions of other Mexican “campesinos” carrying out the same process on their own farms, there are billions of maize plants there that are genetically different and exposed to all manner of environments and selection practices.  It’s a revolution of its own, and it’s been taking place for thousands of years. According to a recent study, this largely un-scientific approach is responsible for most of corn’s genetic diversity across the North American continent. Not only are they preserving maize’s genetic diversity, but experts say they are generating more of it.  According to the study, which was published in Proceedings of the Royal Society B, campesinos accounted for planting more than 11.5 million acres of corn during the rainy season of 2010, the last season for which they had census data available, while commercial corn farmers planted just 3.2 million acres.  100% organic essential oil sets now available for your home and personal care, including Rosemary, Oregano, Eucalyptus, Tea Tree, Clary Sage and more, all 100% organic and laboratory tested for safety. A multitude of uses, from stress reduction to topical first aid. See the complete listing here, and help support this news site.  The researchers calculated that Mexican family farmers grew roughly 138 billion genetically different maize plants that year across a range of different altitudes and temperatures, which means rare mutations were able to emerge that would have disappeared otherwise.  Social scientist Mauricio Bellon, one of the researchers, said: “Campesinos are generating an evolutionary service that is essential for them, for the country and, given the global importance of maize, for the world.”  The variety is incredible, with colors ranging from white and pink to orange and deep purple. This is in stark contrast to the millions of genetically identical corn plants you’d see in a place like Iowa. Farmers in America buy their seeds rather than cultivating their own, which means evolution doesn’t get a chance to work its magic.  University of California Davis Plant Geneticist Jeffrey Ross-Ibarra, who wasn’t part of the study, believes this practice is essential for feeding a growing population as it’s a system that is able to adapt to the changing conditions of our environment and world. Although there are some helpful new technologies, he said that “we shouldn’t ignore this pretty impressive and amazing resource that’s been around for thousands of years.”  Garcia Cuenca is familiar with the other side of the coin; he worked on a Minnesota farm for eight years. After returning to Mexico, he said he refuses to use any hybrid seeds. Not only are they too costly, but he said they need more care and water than his native maize. Across India, farmers who have been disappointed by the newer commercial farming techniques are largely returning to the traditional, organic approaches used there for centuries.  Time and time again, traditional farming continues to prove its superiority when it comes to providing sustainable yields in specific areas. Mixed crops and crop timing are approaches that have stood the test of time, and as more information comes to light about the damage biotechnology like genetic engineering is causing the environment and humanity, it’s likely that these traditional methods will soon become more prevalent yet again.  Read FoodScience.news for daily updates on the science of food and agriculture.


naturalnews--2019-02-16--NASA scientists discover FIVE new previously unknown strains of antibiotic-resistant bacteria in SPA

NASA scientists discover FIVE new previously unknown strains of antibiotic-resistant bacteria in SPACE

(Natural News) While cleaning the washrooms on the International Space Station (ISS), scientists from NASA reportedly discovered five new strains of antibiotic-resistant bacteria that have never before been identified, suggesting that deadly “superbugs” have the capacity to mutate and proliferate, even in outer space.  Publishing its findings in the journal BMC Microbiology, the National Aeronautics and Space Administration’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) analyzed multiple bacterial samples collected from the ISS, including four samples collected from the vessel’s lavatory waste and hygiene compartment, as well as one sample taken from the foot platform of a piece of resistance-training exercise equipment.  Upon analysis, the team identified five previously unknown strains of Enterobacter bacteria, a genus known for its heavy resistance to antibiotics, and that commonly infects hospital patients with compromised immune systems.  “To show which species of the bacteria were present on the ISS, we used various methods to characterize their genomes in detail,” stated Kasthuri Venkateswaren, a senior research scientist with the JPL Biotechnology and Planetary Protection Group and study co-author, in a statement.  “We revealed that genomes of the five ISS Enterobacter strains were genetically most similar to three strains newly found on Earth.”  After comparing these newly-discovered strains of Enterobacter to more than 1,200 strains that have already been collected on Earth, the team concluded that the novel space strains most closely resemble those within the classification of Enterobacter bugandensis, which was recently discovered in three different hospitals – one in Africa, one in Washington state, and one in Colorado.  Mother Nature's micronutrient secret: Organic Broccoli Sprout Capsules now available, delivering 280mg of high-density nutrition, including the extraordinary "sulforaphane" and "glucosinolate" nutrients found only in cruciferous healing foods. Every lot laboratory tested. See availability here.  These Earth-based strains are said to be dangerous to humans and resistant to existing antibiotics. However, while the strains identified on the ISS contain more than 100 genes tied to these Earth-based strains, researchers say they’re not a threat.  “It is important to understand that the strains found on the ISS were not virulent, which means they are not an active threat to human health, but [still] something to be monitored,” stated Nitin Singh, the study’s lead author.  At the same time, there is a 79 percent chance that these space-based strains could eventually mutate and become a threat to humans, should an astronaut arriving back from a mission carry them with him as he exits a spacecraft.  Experts say more research is needed to determine the true potential for these ISS strains of Enterobacter to become a human threat – particularly in a living body in space, which has yet to be done.  That’s because, as to be expected, conditions in space are much different than they are on here on Earth, meaning microbes tend to behave differently as a factor of things like microgravity, radiation, and constant interaction with humans.  Last summer, NASA made an attempt at testing how antibiotic-resistant E. coli would fare in space, sending the bacteria into hostile conditions as part of a greater experiment.  “If we find resistance is higher in microgravity, we can do something, because we’ll know the gene responsible for it, and be able to design countermeasures,” stated A.C. Matin, head of the so-called “E. coli Anti-Microbial Satellite” project, or EcAMSat.  “If we are serious about the exploration of space, we need to know how human vital systems are influenced by microgravity.”  Others believe that the chances of space-based superbugs mutating and becoming deadly to humans is highly unlikely.  “These are stressful, harsh conditions,” says Erica Hartmann, lead author of another paper on the same subject published in the journal mSystems.  “Does the environment select for superbugs because they have an advantage? The answer appears to be ‘no.'”  For more related news, be sure to check out Superbugs.news.


naturalnews--2019-07-24--Can apple cider vinegar improve your blood pressure

Can apple cider vinegar improve your blood pressure?

(Natural News) According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), a third of the U.S. population suffers from high blood pressure, also known as hypertension. Some studies suggest that the consumption of apple cider vinegar may help manage blood pressure.  ACV has been a remedy for numerous ailments, like sore throat. In ancient times, the Greek doctor Hippocrates used ACV to treat wounds. While not many studies are available about the effect of ACV on people, numerous animal studies suggest that apple cider vinegar may lower blood pressure. (Related: Apple cider vinegar for acne? Folk remedy actually works better than chemicals.)  High amounts of cholesterol in the blood can cause fat buildup in the arteries. When this occurs, the heart needs to work harder to increase blood flow and provide nutrients to the entire body. This condition is commonly referred to as high blood pressure.  Research published in the British Journal of Nutrition studied the effect of ACV on mice fed with a high cholesterol diet. To investigate, the researchers treated mice with either ACV or a placebo. The results of the study showed that the treated mice had significantly lower cholesterol levels than the control group.  In another study published in the journal of Bioscience, Biotechnology, and Biochemistry, researchers looked at the effect of ACV on rats with high blood pressure. The result of their experiment revealed that long-term treatment of ACV in mice helped lower blood pressure. Moreover, it also decreased the activity of an enzyme called renin. The researchers believed that the reduction of renin caused a decrease in blood pressure.  The Holistic Health Expert of Disabled World, Brenda Skidmore, said that apple cider vinegar could help manage and treat various illnesses, including high blood pressure, because of its ability to maintain pH balance in the body. Moreover, ACV can loosen fat and phlegm deposits in the body and improve circulation.  ACV is a product of a two-step fermentation process. Apples are combined with yeast to convert sugar into alcohol. Then, it is exposed to air to encourage the growth of acetobacter. These bacteria will then convert alcohol into acetic acid.  ACV is easy to make at home. All you need are apples, sugar, and water. Apples contain naturally occurring yeast in their skin that will jump-start the fermentation process.  To learn more about the medicinal wonders of apple cider vinegar, visit Food.news.


naturalnews--2019-09-06--Just like humans plants also have an immune system and we might be poisoning it

Just like humans, plants also have an immune system – and we might be poisoning it

(Natural News) Plants do more than just beautify gardens and lawns. Fruit-bearing plants, herbs, and vegetables provide the nutrients that you need to stay healthy, while all plants provide oxygen. But according to a study, plant breeding and pesticide use negatively affects the immune system of plants.  The study, which was published in the journal Science, involved a collaboration between researchers from the University of Basel, the VIB-UGent Center for Plant Systems Biology, and the VIB-UGent Center for Medical Biotechnology.  During the course of the study, the researchers found that metacaspases (a class of proteolytic enzymes) are crucial for the activation of immune response in plants. They warned that common plant breeding strategies and the use of pesticides may be impeding this natural response.  When multicellular organisms, like humans, are hurt, their damaged cells transmit signals to alert the surrounding tissue of the wound. These signals can then trigger the immune system to respond to the injury and promote tissue regeneration. These signals also result in wound healing.  The same thing happens to plants, albeit with certain differences.  Peptides (short protein fragments) in plants are essential for the proper functioning of their immune system. These peptides are produced from precursor proteins that have been “cut into shape” by proteases (proteolytic enzymes).  But since there are a lot of proteases, it is necessary to identify those with roles in the plant immune system.  For their study, the researchers wounded thale cress (Arabidopsis thaliana) leaves and found that metacaspases play a crucial role in the plant’s response. The response also involves the release of calcium and PROPEP1, a peptide precursor protein.  Support our mission to keep you informed: Discover the extraordinary benefits of turmeric gummy bears and organic "turmeric gold" liquid extract, both laboratory tested for heavy metals, microbiology and safety. Naturally high in potent curcuminoids. Delicious formulations. All purchases support this website (as well as your good health). See availability here.  The scientists verified their initial findings by producing a plant with a mutation in the gene coding for a crucial metacaspase. They noted that the plant was incapable of releasing the immune signal following injury.  Simon Stael, one of the authors of the study, explained that damage elevates calcium levels in the plant cell interior. High calcium levels activate metacaspases, which then work on PROPEP1, the protein that regulates the immune response and other related efforts to limit further damage.  Standard plant breeding practices and the use of pesticides could negatively affect the immune system of plants. An impaired immune system could result in slower recovery from damage.  Plant breeding refers to a technique that combines plant seeds to produce nutrient-rich, high-quality fruits and vegetables that will grow well in ideal planting conditions. However, since farmers aren’t familiar with metacaspases, they could unknowingly be limiting plant resilience due to damage caused to their immune system by plant breeding. (Related: Health Basics: Understanding GMO engineering and why altering plant DNA in laboratories becomes so DANGEROUS to human health.)  The research team remains hopeful that their findings can be used in future studies. Proteases often cleave more than one protein. New research can look into different plant processes that require metacaspases and are linked to wound response and immunity.  If you have a home garden, refrain from using pesticides to maintain optimum plant health. Use the following alternatives in place of harmful pesticides.  Try using natural alternatives to keep your plants healthy and avoid using pesticides that contain harmful chemicals.


naturalnews--2019-09-24--You wont believe whats in the vaccines being discussed for mandatory vaccinations

You won’t believe what’s in the vaccines being discussed for mandatory vaccinations

(Natural News) As government continues to speak about things we’ve not authorized them to be dealing with, namely mandatory vaccinations, a brief report has come out by Families 4 Vaccine Choice that illuminated us as to what is in vaccines and RNA.  If you have a weak stomach, brace yourself.  In a report posted earlier this year, the group pulled from a few sources, including the Center for Disease Control’s own website to provide the following information.  “What exactly is RNA and what does it have to do with vaccines? To understand this, we must first understand that vaccines are considered a biologic,” the report reads.  They then cite Biotechnology Innovation Organization for how a biologic is defined.  A biologic is manufactured in a living system such as a microorganism, or plant or animal cells. Most biologics are very large, complex molecules or mixtures of molecules. Many biologics are produced using recombinant DNA technology. …it is difficult, and sometimes impossible, to characterize a complex biologic by testing methods available in the laboratory, and some of the components of a finished biologic may be unknown. Therefore, for biologics, “the product is the process.” Because the finished product cannot be fully characterized in the laboratory, manufacturers must ensure product consistency, quality, and purity by ensuring that the manufacturing process remains substantially the same over time. The living systems used to produce biologics can be sensitive to very minor changes in the manufacturing process. Small process differences can significantly affect the nature of the finished biologic and, most importantly, the way it functions in the body.”  The report then goes on to ask what is “recombinant DNA technology,” or RNA.  In fact, the report makes mention of the fact that most people have no idea as to how RNA is produced.  Yet, The Encyclopedia Britannica provides the answer.  “Recombinant DNA technology, joining together of DNAmolecules from two different species that are inserted into a host organism to produce new genetic combinations that are of value to science, medicine, agriculture, and industry. Since the focus of all genetics is the gene, the fundamental goal of laboratory geneticists is to isolate, characterize, and manipulate genes. Although it is relatively easy to isolate a sample of DNA from a collection of cells, finding a specific gene within this DNA sample can be compared to finding a needle in a haystack. Consider the fact that each human cell contains approximately 2 metres (6 feet) of DNA. Therefore, a small tissue sample will contain many kilometres of DNA. However, recombinant DNA technology has made it possible to isolate one gene or any other segment of DNA, enabling researchers to determine its nucleotide sequence, study its transcripts, mutate it in highly specific ways, and reinsert the modified sequence into a living organism.”  So, what does that mean when it is added to a variety of vaccines?  Families 4 Vaccine Choice illustrated the various DNA in our modern vaccines, and each of them can be discovered, along with the vaccines they are put into at the CDC website.  Here’s where you may want to hold your lunch.  Now we learn that with RNA, as stated above, “DNA molecules from two different species that are inserted into a host organism to produce new genetic combinations”. So that means they are splitting human DNA with the DNA of animals and aborted fetuses and then injecting it back into our bodies with the hopes that it will cause us to create the antigen needed to immunize us against a virus. Did you notice that most of those with animal and human DNA are on the schedule for our children to be injected with before they start school and throughout our lives?  Not only is this highly unethical and even criminal, but there’s billions of dollars to be made from it while at the same time engaging in a global population control agenda.  One of the people financially backing quite a bit of this is none other than Microsoft’s Bill Gates.  However, listen to this little talk he gave at TED 2010 with reference to climate change and emissions and depopulation.  “First, we’ve got population,” Gates said.  “The world today has 6.8 billion people. That’s headed up to about nine billion. Now, if we do a really great job on new vaccines, health care, reproductive health services, we could lower that by, perhaps, 10 or 15 percent. ”  So, isn’t Gates talking about either using vaccines to sterilize or to possibly kill 10 or 15 percent of the population?  How else am I or anyone else supposed to understand such a statement?  The report also reminds us that Gates is responsible for pushing Common Core into the public school system.


newsweek--2019-02-02--Genetically Engineered Biotech Trees Could Save Americas Forests

Genetically Engineered ''Biotech' Trees Could Save America's Forests

Compared to gene-edited babies in China and ambitious projects to rescue woolly mammoths from extinction, biotech trees might sound pretty tame.  But releasing genetically engineered trees into forests to counter threats to forest health represents a new frontier in biotechnology. Even as the techniques of molecular biology have advanced, humans have not yet released a genetically engineered plant that is intended to spread and persist in an unmanaged environment. Biotech trees—genetically engineered or gene-edited—offer just that possibility.  One thing is clear: The threats facing our forests are many, and the health of these ecosystems is getting worse. A 2012 assessment by the U.S. Forest Service estimated that nearly seven percent of forests nationwide are in danger of losing at least a quarter of their tree vegetation by 2027. This estimate may not sound too worrisome, but it is 40 percent higher than the previous estimate, made just six years earlier.  In 2018, at the request of several U.S. federal agencies and the U.S. Endowment for Forestry and Communities, the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine formed a committee to “examine the potential use of biotechnology to mitigate threats to forest tree health.” Experts, including me, a social scientist focused on emerging biotechnologies, were asked to “identify the ecological, ethical, and social implications of deploying biotechnology in forests, and develop a research agenda to address knowledge gaps.”  Our committee members came from universities, federal agencies and NGOs and represented a range of disciplines: molecular biology, economics, forest ecology, law, tree breeding, ethics, population genetics and sociology. All of these perspectives were important for considering the many aspects and challenges of using biotechnology to improve forest health.  Climate change is just the tip of the iceberg. Forests face higher temperatures and droughts and more pests. As goods and people move around the globe, even more insects and pathogens hitchhike into our forests.  We focused on four case studies to illustrate the breadth of forest threats. The emerald ash borer arrived from Asia and causes severe mortality in five species of ash trees. First detected on U.S. soil in 2002, it had spread to 31 states as of May 2018. Whitebark pine, a keystone and foundational species in high elevations of the U.S. and Canada, is under attack by the native mountain pine beetle and an introduced fungus. Over half of whitebark pine in the northern U.S. and Canada have died.  Poplar trees are important to riparian ecosystems as well as for the forest products industry. A native fungal pathogen, Septoria musiva, has begun moving west, attacking natural populations of black cottonwood in Pacific Northwest forests and intensively cultivated hybrid poplar in Ontario. And the infamous chestnut blight, a fungus accidentally introduced from Asia to North America in the late 1800s, wiped out billions of American chestnut trees.  Can biotech come to the rescue? Should it?  Although there are many potential applications of biotechnology in forests, such as genetically engineering insect pests to suppress their populations, we focused specifically on biotech trees that could resist pests and pathogens. Through genetic engineering, for example, researchers could insert genes, from a similar or unrelated species, that help a tree tolerate or fight an insect or fungus.  It’s tempting to assume that the buzz and enthusiasm for gene editing will guarantee quick, easy and cheap solutions to these problems. But making a biotech tree will not be easy. Trees are large and long-lived, which means that research to test the durability and stability of an introduced trait will be expensive and take decades or longer. We also don’t know nearly as much about the complex and enormous genomes of trees, compared to lab favorites such as fruit flies and the mustard plant, Arabidopsis.  In addition, because trees need to survive over time and adapt to changing environments, it is essential to preserve and incorporate their existing genetic diversity into any “new” tree. Through evolutionary processes, tree populations already have many important adaptations to varied threats, and losing those could be disastrous. So even the fanciest biotech tree will ultimately depend on a thoughtful and deliberate breeding program to ensure long-term survival. For these reasons, the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine committee recommends increasing investment not just in biotechnology research, but also in tree breeding, forest ecology and population genetics.  The committee found that the U.S. Coordinated Framework for the Regulation of Biotechnology, which distributes federal oversight of biotechnology products among agencies such as EPA, USDA and FDA, is not fully prepared to consider the introduction of a biotech tree to improve forest health.  Most obviously, regulators have always required containment of pollen and seeds during biotech field trials to avoid the escape of genetic material. For example, the biotech chestnut was not allowed to flower to ensure that transgenic pollen wouldn’t blow across the landscape during field trials. But if biotech trees are intended to spread their new traits, via seeds and pollen, to introduce pest resistance across landscapes, then studies of wild reproduction will be necessary. These are not currently allowed until a biotech tree is fully deregulated.  Another shortcoming of the current framework is that some biotech trees may not require any special review at all. The USDA, for example, was asked to consider a loblolly pine that was genetically engineered for greater wood density. But because USDA’s regulatory authority stems from its oversight of plant pest risks, it decided that it did not have any regulatory authority over that biotech tree. Similar questions remain regarding organisms whose genes are edited using new tools such as CRISPR.  The committee noted that U.S. regulations fail to promote a comprehensive consideration of forest health. Although the National Environmental Policy Act sometimes helps, some risks and many potential benefits are unlikely to be evaluated. This is the case for biotech trees as well as other tools to counter pests and pathogens, such as tree breeding, pesticides and site management practices.  The National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine report suggests an “ecosystem services” framework for considering the various ways that trees and forests provide value to humans. These range from extraction of forest products to the use of forests for recreation to the ecological services a forest provides – water purification, species protection and carbon storage.  The committee also acknowledged that some ways of valuing the forest do not fit into the ecosystem services framework. For example, if forests are seen by some to have “intrinsic value,” then they have value in and of themselves, apart from the way humans value them and perhaps implying a kind of moral obligation to protect and respect them. Issues of “wildness” and “naturalness” also surface.  Paradoxically, a biotech tree could increase and decrease wildness. If wildness depends upon a lack of human intervention, then a biotech tree will reduce the wildness of a forest. But perhaps so would a conventionally bred, hybrid tree that was deliberately introduced into an ecosystem.  Which would reduce wildness more—the introduction of a biotech tree or the eradication of an important tree species? There are no right or wrong answers to these questions, but they remind us of the complexity of decisions to use technology to enhance “nature.”  This complexity points to a key recommendation of the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine report: Dialogue among experts, stakeholders and communities about how to value forests, assess the risks and potential benefits of biotech, and understand complex public responses to any potential interventions, including those involving biotechnology. These processes need to be respectful, deliberative, transparent and inclusive.  Such processes, such as a 2018 stakeholder workshop on the biotech chestnut, will not erase conflict or even guarantee consensus, but they have the potential to create insight and understanding that can feed into democratic decisions that are informed by expert knowledge and public values.  Jason A. Delborne is Associate Professor of Science, Policy, and Society in the Department of Forestry and Environmental Resources at North Carolina State University.  This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.  The views expressed in this article are the author's own.


npr--2019-08-13--Is Grass-Fed Beef Really Better For The Planet Heres The Science

Is Grass-Fed Beef Really Better For The Planet? Here's The Science  For the environmentally minded carnivore, meat poses a culinary conundrum. Producing it requires a great deal of land and water resources, and ruminants such as cows and sheep are responsible for half of all greenhouse gas emissions associated with agriculture, according to the World Resources Institute.  That's why many researchers are now calling for the world to cut back on its meat consumption. But some advocates say there is a way to eat meat that's better for the planet and better for the animals: grass-fed beef.  But is grass-fed beef really greener than feedlot-finished beef? Let's parse the science.  What's the difference between grass-fed and feedlot beef?  Feedlot calves begin their lives on pasture with the cow that produced them. They're weaned after six to nine months, then grazed a bit more on pasture. They're then "finished" for about 120 days on high-energy corn and other grains in a feedlot, gaining weight fast and creating that fat-marbled beef that consumers like. At about 14 to 18 months of age, they are sent to slaughter. (One downside of the feedlot system, as we've reported, is that a diet of corn can lead to liver abscesses in cattle, which is why animals who eat it receive antibiotics as part of their feed.)  In a grass-fed and finished scenario, cattle spend their entire lives on grass. Since their feed is much lower in energy, they are sent to slaughter later — between 18 to 24 months of age, after a finishing period, still on grass, of 190 days. Their weight at slaughter averages about 1,200 pounds compared with about 1,350 pounds for feedlot animals.  The grass-fed movement is based on a large idea, one known as regenerative agriculture or holistic management. It holds that grazing ruminant populations are key to a healthy ecosystem.  Think of the hordes of bison that once roamed the prairies. Their manure returned nutrients to the soil. And because these animals grazed on grass, the land didn't have to be plowed to plant corn for feed, so deep-rooted grasses that prevent erosion flourished. Had those iconic herds still been around in the 1930s, the argument goes, they would have helped prevent the catastrophe of the Dust Bowl.  Fourth-generation Oregon rancher Cory Carman runs a 5,000-acre grass-fed beef cattle operation, where grazing is key to restoring ecosystem balance. "Agricultural livestock are this incredible tool in promoting soil health," she says. "The longer you can manage cattle on pasture range, the more they can contribute to ecosystem regeneration."  Returning cattle and other ruminants to the land for their entire lives can result in multiple benefits, according to organizations like the Savory Institute, including restoring soil microbial diversity, and making the land more resilient to flooding and drought. It can boost the nutrient content and flavor of livestock and plants. And because grasses trap atmospheric carbon dioxide, the grass-fed system can also help fight climate change. But it does require more land to produce the same amount of meat.  As Shauna Sadowski, head of sustainability for the natural and organic operating unit at General Mills, puts it, "Our current model is an extractive one that has left our environment in a state of degradation — eroded soil, polluted water. We have to change the entire paradigm to use natural ecological processes to gather nutrients and build the soil."  Which type of beef has the smaller environmental footprint?  To measure the environmental impact of a farming system, scientists rely on studies known as life-cycle assessments (LCAs), which take into account resources and energy use at all stages.  A number of past studies have found lower greenhouse gas emissions associated with the feedlot system. One reason is that grass-fed cows gain weight more slowly, so they produce more methane (mostly in the form of belches) over their longer lifespans.  Paige Stanley, a researcher at the University of California, Berkeley, says many of these studies have prioritized efficiency — high-energy feed, smaller land footprint — as a way of reducing greenhouse gas emissions. The larger the animal and the shorter its life, the lower its footprint. But she adds, "We're learning that there are other dimensions: soil health, carbon and landscape health. Separating them is doing us a disservice." She and other researchers are trying to figure out how to incorporate those factors into an LCA analysis.  Stanley co-authored a recent LCA study, led by Jason Rowntree of Michigan State University, that found carbon-trapping benefits of the grass-fed approach. Another recent LCA study, of Georgia's holistically managed White Oak Pastures, found that the 3,200-acre farm stored enough carbon in its grasses to offset not only all of the methane emissions from its grass-fed cattle, but also much of the farm's total emissions. (The latter study was funded by General Mills.)  Linus Blomqvist, director for conservation, food and agriculture for the Oakland, Calif.-based Breakthrough Institute, however, defends feedlot finishing, pointing out that the difference between the two systems is only the last third of the grass-fed cattle's life. Does the extra amount of pasture time sequester so much carbon that it offsets the advantage of the feedlot? "We don't actually have very good evidence for that," he says.  Alison Van Eenennaam, a specialist in animal genomics and biotechnology at the University of California, Davis, says grass-fed makes more sense in a country like Australia, which has a temperate climate, large tracts of grassland and no corn belt. But in the U.S., which does have a corn belt that suffers from cold winters, she believes grain finishing is the more efficient way to produce beef.  Which brings us to our next point.  Do you know where your grass-fed beef came from?  About 75% to 80% of grass-fed beef sold in the U.S. is grown abroad, from Australia, New Zealand and parts of South America, according to a 2017 report from the Stone Barns Center for Food and Agriculture. Those countries have the advantage of "vast expanses of grassland, low-input beef that is not finished to a high level and is very inexpensive," says Rowntree — even with the cost of shipping it halfway around the world. Most of what comes from Australia is ground beef, not steaks, because the end result of their finishing process tends to be tough.  Many U.S. customers who want to support local food are likely unaware of the foreign origin of most grass-fed beef. By law, if meat is "processed," or passes through a USDA-inspected plant (a requirement for all imported beef), it can be labeled as a product of the U.S.  "But does it benefit the American farmer?" Rowntree asks, comparing this market to the sheep industry, "which lost out to imports from Australia and New Zealand."  The popularity of grass-fed beef is pulling U.S.-based multinational companies into the market as well, which will drive prices down further. Meat processor JBS now has a grass-fed line, Tyson is planning a Texas grass-fed program and earlier this year Perdue announced it was getting into the market.  Which system is better for animal welfare?  To many grass-fed advocates, this is one of the main reasons for switching to grass-fed beef. After all, cows evolved to live this way.  "I've been on feedlots farms that have outstanding animal welfare, and I've been on small farms that would make you cringe," Rowntree says. But he adds, "Managing cattle on pasture in a grass-finishing system to me epitomizes animal welfare."  Nancy Matsumoto is a journalist based in Toronto and New York City who writes about sustainability, food, sake and Japanese American culture. You can read more of her work here.


npr--2019-12-03--Raiders Of The Lost Crops: Scientists Race Against Time To Save Genetic Diversity

Raiders Of The Lost Crops: Scientists Race Against Time To Save Genetic Diversity  Call it a tale of science and derring-do. An international team of researchers has spent six years fanning across the globe, gathering thousands of samples of wild relatives of crops. Their goal: to preserve genetic diversity that could help key crops survive in the face of climate change. At times, the work put these scientists in some pretty extreme situations.  Just ask Hannes Dempewolf. Two years ago, the plant geneticist found himself in a rainforest in Nepal, at the foot of the Himalayas. He was riding on the back of an elephant to avoid snakes on the ground — and to scare away any tigers that might be lurking about. Then all of a sudden came an attack from above.  "There were leeches dropping on us from all directions," Dempewolf recalls — "bloodsucking leeches."  Now, this is far from where he thought he'd be when he got his Ph.D. But as a senior scientist and head of global initiatives at the Crop Trust, Dempewolf has been overseeing an ambitious international collaboration. More than 100 scientists in 25 countries have been venturing out to collect wild relatives of domesticated crops — like lentils, potatoes, chickpeas and rice — that people rely on around the world. The Crop Trust has just released a report detailing the results of this massive effort, which secured more than 4,600 seed samples of 371 wild relatives of key domesticated crops that the world relies on.  The "collecting teams are heading out into wild places and hard-to-reach corners within their countries to try to find and track down some of these wild species that have either never been collected before or are very underrepresented in seed banks," Dempewolf explains. So he says it's not surprising that many of the stories coming out of the project have an Indiana Jones-like sense of adventure to them.  Take, for example, an effort to collect Oryza glumaepatula, a wild rice species found in Latin America. Griselda Arrieta Espinoza, a crop genetics and biotechnology researcher at the University of Costa Rica, was part of a collecting team that set out to northern Costa Rica to collect a particular population of this wild rice that grows in a river. "Collecting it was quite the adventure," she tells me in Spanish — because the river is also home to crocodiles.  While the effort was dangerous, Arrieta says it was also worth it, because Oryza glumaepatula is known to be resistant to a fungus that attacks domesticated rice grown around the world. And she notes that researchers in Brazil have already managed to cross Oryza glumaepatula with domesticated rice to improve crop yields.  The overall goal of the Crop Trust project is to make sure that this kind of valuable genetic diversity is preserved in seed banks before wild crop relatives disappear as urban development encroaches on once wild habitats. Dempewolf says that this is already happening.  "Some of the populations that the [research teams] were hoping to collect, when they reached the areas where they had seen populations before, they had disappeared," Dempewolf says.  Steven Tanksley, a professor emeritus of plant breeding at Cornell University, who was not involved in the Crop Trust project, praised the effort. He notes that the domesticated crops we eat today were selected from wild plants over thousands of years. He says this "natural reservoir of diversity ... has allowed plant breeding to attempt to keep pace with the demands of the growing human population."  That diversity took shape over millions of years, molded by natural selection, so "when you lose it, you really can't repeat that process," says Tanksley, who is also chief technology officer for Nature Source Improved Plants, which focuses on the genetic improvement of plants.  In the past, he notes, breeders have used wild crop relatives to improve disease resistance in many domesticated crops, including tomatoes, potatoes, rice and wheat.  A growing global population and changing environmental conditions because of climate change present urgent new challenges for crop breeders, Tanksley says.  "If we're going to have a sustainable world with a sustainable environment, we have to produce a lot more food per hectare than we ever have in the past," he says, adding, "I think people don't really grasp that — the urgency of it."  And without the genetic diversity of wild crop relatives, he says, the world will have little chance of keeping up with growing demand for food.


prepareforchange--2019-09-24--How genetic engineering will reshape humanity

A book excerpt and interview with Jamie Metzl, author of “Hacking Darwin”  NEW GENETIC technologies are exhilarating and terrifying. Society might overcome diseases by tweaking individual genomes or selecting specific embryos to avoid health problems. But it may also give rise to “superhumans” who are optimised for certain characteristics (like intelligence or looks) and exacerbate inequalities in society.  What is certain is that people will be able to make decisions about their lives in ways that were impossible in the past, when we relied more on random evolution than deliberation. In the words of Jamie Metzl, we are “Hacking Darwin,” the title of his latest book. It is a thoughtful romp through new genetic technologies, with insights on what it means for individuals, society and even great-power politics.  The theme draws together discrete strands of Mr Metz’s diverse background. He’s worked for the United Nations on humanitarian issues in Cambodia and served on America’s National Security Council under President Bill Clinton. He’s been an executive at a biotechnology company, a partner at large investment fund in New York and a candidate for Congress from Missouri. But perhaps even more relevantly, he is the author of two sci-fi novels on genetics, “Genesis Code” and “Eternal Sonata.”  As part of The Economist’s Open Future project, we asked Mr Metzl about genetic engineering, inequality and the new “liberal agenda”. Below the interview is an excerpt from his book, on the history of eugenics.  The Economist: What are the ways in which people are able to “hack Darwin” today and over the next 15 years or so?  Jamie Metzl: We have always fought against the inherent cruelty of natural selection, one of the two essential pillars of Darwinian evolution. We are now beginning to hack away at the second pillar, random mutation. Our growing understanding of how genes and biology function is opening the door to incredible medical applications like using genome sequencing and gene therapies to fight cancer and other diseases. But the healthcare applications of genetic technologies are only a station along the way to where these technologies are taking us.  Our ability to select embryos during in vitro fertilisation (IVF)—based on informed genetic predictions of both health-related traits and intimate characteristics like height, IQ and personality style—will grow over the coming years. We’ll use stem cell technologies to expand the number of eggs that prospective mothers can use in IVF and therefore the range of reproductive options for parents. We’ll deploy gene editing tools far more precise than today’s CRISPR systems to make heritable genetic changes to our future offspring. Over the coming decades, Darwin’s original concept of random mutation and natural selection will gradually give way to a process that is far more self-guided than anything Darwin could have imagined.  The Economist: Changing the nature of what it means to be human has huge consequences. What are the main ones?  Mr Metzl: We have internalised the idea that information technology is variable, which is why we expect each generation of our phones and computers to be better than the last. It’s harder for us to come to grips with the idea that our biology could be as variable as our IT, even though we understand intellectually that somehow we evolved from single cell organisms to complex humans over the past 3.8 billion years. Starting to see all of life, including our own, as increasingly manipulable will force us to think more deeply about what values will guide us as we begin altering biology more aggressively.  If we want to avoid dividing our species into genetic have and have-nots—a dangerous reduction in our diversity—or a genetic determinism that undermines our humanity, we’ll need to start living our values. But though we need to be mindful of the dangers, we must also keep in mind that these technologies have the potential to do tremendous good. Someday they might well help us avoid extinction level events like dangerous synthetic pathogens, a warmer climate, the fallout from a nuclear war or the eventual expiration of our sun.  The Economist: Do we have the ethical framework to handle this? If not, what might it look like if things go wrong?  Mr Metzl: We create beautiful art, philosophy and universal concepts like human rights but wipe out millions of each other in wars and genocides and still today invest massive amounts of our collective wealth in tools of mass murder. The “better angels of our nature” remain primary drivers in our development of genetic technologies, but the dark side of human nature could also be empowered through these same tools. We need a very strong ethical and cultural framework to increase the odds that we’ll use these technologies wisely, not least because access to them will be decentralised and democratised.  Although the positive possibilities far outweigh the negatives, it would be crazy to ignore the many ways things could go wrong. Like Icarus, we could fly too close to the sun and get burned if we hubristically assume we know more than we actually do. Our gene drives could crash ecosystems. We could use these tools to undermine our common identity as a species and social cohesion. The good news is that while the technologies are new, the values we’ll need to use them wisely are often old.  The Economist: What sort of regulations need to be in place to “enable” these technologies—and what rules should “constrain” them?  Mr Metzl: Genetic technologies touch the source code of what it means to be human and must be regulated. This job is all the more difficult because the technology is racing forward faster than the governance structures around them can keep up. On both the national and international levels, we’ll need enough governance and regulation to prevent abuses and promote public safety while not so much to impede beneficial research and applications.  To avoid dangerous medical tourism, every country should have a national regulatory system in place that aligns with international best practices and the country’s own values and traditions. We also have to start developing global norms that can ultimately underpin flexible international standards and regulations. These systems must be guided by core values rather than inflexible rules because what may now seem unthinkable, like actively selecting and even editing our future offspring, will increasingly become normalised over time. We urgently need to start preparing for what is coming.  The Economist: This takes the issue of human liberty to a new level (people should be free to change themselves or offspring), as well as the potential for unbridgeable inequalities (not just of wealth or life outcomes, but of capabilities encoded in oneself and family). How must the idea of liberalism adapt to address this? What does the “liberal agenda” look like for the 21st century vis-à-vis “hacking Darwin”?  Mr Metzl: If and when it becomes possible for some parents to give their children enhanced IQs, lifespans and resistance to disease, we will have to ask what this means for everyone else. Some will see these parents as first-adopters paving the way for everyone else, like the first privileged people buying smartphones. Others will call them usurpers laying the foundation for dangerously divided societies.  Whatever the case, differences within and between societies, fuelled by competition, will drive adoption of these technologies and present societies with stark choices. Too few regulations could lead to a dangerous genetic engineering free-for-all and arms race. But trying to ban genetic manipulations would increasingly require the trappings of the most oppressive police states. Some liberal societies may choose to provide a basic level of access to assisted reproduction and genetic-engineering services to everyone, not least to save the expense of lifetime care for people who would otherwise be born with preventable genetic diseases.  Societies already struggling to define the balance between the parental and state interests in the context of abortion will have an even tougher time drawing this line for parent-driven assisted reproduction. But if we thought the debates over abortion and genetically modified crops were contentious, wait until the coming debate over genetically modified people arrives. If we don’t want this to tear us asunder, we must all come together in a public process to figure out the best ways forward.  Excerpted from “Hacking Darwin: Genetic Engineering and the Future of Humanity” by Jamie Metzl (Sourcebooks, 2019)  The term eugenics combines the Greek roots for good and birth. Although coined in the nineteenth century, the concept of selective breeding and human population culling has a more ancient history. Infanticide was written into Roman law and practiced widely in the Roman Empire. “A father shall immediately put to death,” Table IV of the Twelve Tables of Roman Law stated, “a son who is a monster, or has a form different from that of the human race.” In ancient Sparta, city elders inspected newborns to ensure that any who seemed particularly sickly would not survive. The German tribes, pre-Islamic Arabs, and ancient Japanese, Chinese, and Indians all practiced infanticide in one form or another.  The 1859 publication of Darwin’s The Origins of Species didn’t just get scientists thinking about how finches evolved in the Galapagos but about how human societies evolved more generally. Applying Darwin’s principles of natural selection to human societies, Darwin’s cousin and scientific polymath Sir Francis Galton theorized that human evolution would regress if societies prevented their weakest members from being selected out. In his influential books Hereditary Talent and Character (1885) and then Hereditary Genius (1889), he outlined how eugenics could be applied positively by encouraging the most capable people to reproduce with each other and negatively by discouraging people with what he considered disadvantageous traits from passing on their genes. These theories were embraced by mainstream scientific communities and championed by luminaries like Alexander Graham Bell, John Maynard Keynes, Woodrow Wilson, and Winston Churchill.  Although his work was partly in the spirit of the Victorian England times, Galton was then and even more now what we would call a racist. “The science of improving stock,” he wrote, “takes cognizance of all the influences that tend in however remote degree to give the more suitable races or strains of blood a better chance of prevailing speedily over the less suitable than they otherwise would have had.” In 1909, Galton and his colleagues established the journal Eugenics Review, which argued in its first edition that nations should compete with each other in “race-betterment” and that the number of people in with “pre-natal conditions” in hospitals and asylums should be “reduced to a minimum” through sterilization and selective breeding.  Galton’s theories gained increasing prominence internationally, particularly in the New World. Although eugenics would later accrue sinister connotations, many of the early adopters of eugenic theories were American progressives who believed science could be used to guide social policies and create a better society for all. “We can intelligently mold and guide the evolution in which we take part,” progressive theologian Walter Rauschenbusch wrote. “God,” Johns Hopkins economic professor Richard Ely asserted, “works through the state.” Many American progressives embraced eugenics as a way of making society better by preventing those considered “unfit” and “defective” from being born. “We know enough about eugenics so that if that knowledge were applied, the defective classes would disappear within a decade,” University of Wisconsin president Charles Van Hise opined.  In the United States, the “science” of eugenics became intertwined with disturbing ideas about race. Speaking to the 1923 Second International Congress of Eugenics, President Henry Osborn of New York’s American Museum of Natural History argued that scientists should:  “ascertain through observation and experiment what each race is best fitted to accomplish… If the Negro fails in government, he may become a fine agriculturist or a fine mechanic… The right of the state to safeguard the character and integrity of the race or races on which its future depends is, to my mind, as incontestable as the right of the state to safeguard the health and morals of its peoples. As science has enlightened government in the prevention and spread of disease, it must also enlighten government in the prevention of the spread and multiplication of worthless members of society, the spread of feeblemindedness, of idiocy, and of all moral and intellectual as well as physical diseases”.  Major research institutes like Cold Spring Harbor, funded by the likes of the Rockefeller Foundation, the Carnegie Institution of Washington, and the Kellogg Race Betterment Foundation, provided a scientific underpinning for a progressive eugenics movement growing in popularity as a genetic determinism swept the country. The American Association for the Advancement of Science put its full weight behind the eugenics movement through its trend-setting publication, Science. If Mendel showed there were genes for specific traits, the thinking went, it was only a matter of time before the gene dictating every significant human trait would be found. Ideas like these moved quickly into state policies.  Indiana in 1907 became the first U.S. state to pass a eugenics law making sterilization mandatory for certain types of people in state custody. Thirty different states and Puerto Rico soon followed with laws of their own. In the first half of the twentieth century, approximately sixty thousand Americans, mostly patients in mental institutions and criminals, were sterilized without their acquiescence. Roughly a third of all Puerto Rican women were sterilized after providing only the flimsiest consent. These laws were not entirely uncontroversial, and many were challenged in courts. But the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in its now infamous 1927 Buck v. Bell decision, that eugenics laws were constitutional. “Three generations of imbeciles,” progressive Supreme Court justice Oliver Wendell Holmes disgracefully wrote in the decision, “are enough.”  As the eugenics movement played out in the United States, another group of Europeans was watching closely. Nazism was, in many ways, a perverted heir of Darwinism. German scientists and doctors embraced Galton’s eugenic theories from the beginning. In 1905, the Society for Racial Hygiene was established in Berlin with the express goal of promoting Nordic racial “purity” through sterilization and selective breeding. An Institute for Hereditary Biology and Racial Hygiene was soon opened in Frankfurt by a leading German eugenicist, Otmar Freiherr von Verschuer.  Eugenic theories and U.S. efforts to implement them through state action were also very much on Adolf Hitler’s mind as he wrote his ominous 1925 manifesto, Mein Kampf, in Landsberg prison. “The stronger must dominate and not mate with the weaker,” he wrote:  “Only the born weakling can look upon this principle as cruel, and if he does so it is merely because he is of a feebler nature and narrower mind; for if such a law did not direct the process of evolution then the higher development of organic life would not be conceivable at all… Since the inferior always outnumber the superior, the former would always increase more rapidly if they possessed the same capacities for survival and for the procreation of their kind; and the final consequence would be that the best in quality would be forced to recede into the background. Therefore a corrective measure in favor of the better quality must intervene…for here a new and rigorous selection takes place, according to strength and health”.  One of the first laws passed by the Nazis after taking power in 1933 was the Law for the Prevention of Hereditary Defective Offspring, with language based partly on the eugenic sterilization law of California. Genetic health courts were established across Nazi Germany in which two doctors and a lawyer helped determine each case of who should be sterilized.  Over the next four years, the Nazis forcibly sterilized an estimated four hundred thousand Germans. But simply sterilizing those with disabilities was not enough for the Nazis to realize their eugenic dreams. In 1939, they launched a secret operation to kill disabled newborns and children under the age of three. This program was then quickly expanded to include older children and then adults with disabilities considered to have lebensunwertes leben, or lives unworthy of life.  Making clear the conceptual origins of these actions lay in scientifically and medically legitimated eugenics, medical professionals oversaw the murder of an ever-widening group of undesirables in “gassing installations” around the country. This model then expanded from euthanizing the disabled and people with psychiatric conditions to criminals and to those considered to be racial inferiors, including Jews and Roma, as well as homosexuals. It was not by accident that Joseph Mengele, the doctor who decided who would be sent to the gas chambers at Auschwitz, was a former star student of von Verschuer at the Frankfurt Institute for Hereditary Biology and Racial Hygiene.  By the mid-1930s, the American scientific community was pulling away from eugenics. In 1935, the Carnegie Institution concluded the science of eugenics was not valid and withdrew its funding for the Eugenics Records Office at Cold Spring Harbor. Reports of Nazi atrocities amplified by the 1945–46 Nuremberg trials put the nail in the coffin of the eugenics movement in the West. Although eugenics laws were finally scrapped from the books only in the 1960s in the United States and the 1970s in Canada and Sweden, very few people were forcibly sterilized after the war.  But as new technologies more recently began to revolutionize the human reproduction process and create new tools for assessing, selecting, or genetically engineering preimplanted embryos, many critics raised the specter of eugenics.  The parallels between the ugly eugenics of the late nineteenth century and the first half of the twentieth and what’s beginning to happen today are not insignificant. In both cases, a science at an early stage of development and with sometimes uncertain accuracy was or is being used to make big decisions—forced sterilization of the “feeble-minded” in the old days, not selecting a given embryo for implantation or terminating a pregnancy based on genetic indications today. In both cases, scientists and government officials seek to balance individual reproductive liberty with broader societal goals. In both cases, future potential children lose the opportunity to be born. In both cases, societies and individuals make culturally biased but irrevocable decisions about which lives are worth living and which are not. These parallels offer us a powerful warning.  But if we collectively paint all human genetic engineering with the brush of Nazi eugenics, we could kill the incredible potential of genetics technologies to help us live healthier lives. […] That there probably is an element of eugenics in decisions being made today on the future of human genetic engineering should push us to be careful and driven by positive values, but the specter of past abuses should not be a death sentence for this potentially life-affirming technology or the people it could help.  It’s not that hard to imagine future scenarios when humans would need to genetically alter ourselves in order to survive a rapid change in our environment resulting from global warming or intense cooling following a nuclear war or asteroid strike, a runaway deadly virus, or some kind of other future challenge we can’t today predict. Genetic engineering, in other words, could easily shift from being a health or lifestyle choice to becoming an imperative for survival. Preparing responsibly for these potential future dangers may well require we begin developing the underlying technologies today, while we still have time.  Thinking about genetic choice in the context of imagined future scenarios is, in many ways, abstract. But potentially helping a child live a healthier, longer life is anything but. Every time a person dies, a lifetime of knowledge and relationships dissolves. We live on in the hearts of our loved ones, the books we write, and the plastic bags we’ve thrown away, but what would it mean if people lived a few extra healthy years because they were genetically selected or engineered to make that possible? How many more inventions could be invented, poems written, ideas shared, and life lessons passed on? What would we as individuals and as a society be willing to pay, what values might we be willing to compromise, to make that possible? What risks would we individually and collectively be willing to take on? Our answers to these questions will both propel us forward and present us with some monumental ethical challenges.  Excerpted from “Hacking Darwin: Genetic Engineering and the Future of Humanity.” Copyright © 2019 by Jamie Metzl. Used with permission of Sourcebooks. All rights reserved.  Disclaimer: We at Prepare for Change (PFC) bring you information that is not offered by the mainstream news, and therefore may seem controversial. The opinions, views, statements, and/or information we present are not necessarily promoted, endorsed, espoused, or agreed to by Prepare for Change, its leadership Council, members, those who work with PFC, or those who read its content. However, they are hopefully provocative. Please use discernment! Use logical thinking, your own intuition and your own connection with Source, Spirit and Natural Laws to help you determine what is true and what is not. By sharing information and seeding dialogue, it is our goal to raise consciousness and awareness of higher truths to free us from enslavement of the matrix in this material realm.


slate--2019-12-10--We Are Not Ready to Deal With Gene-Edited Athletes

New technologies can help athletes push boundaries and test physical limits. Sometimes, they challenge deeply held notions about the “spirit of sport” and what it means to compete on a fair and equitable playing field. In the past decade, we’ve seen debates over the fairness of everything from cutting-edge swimwear to “running blades.”  But those technologies may seem like nothing compared with fast-approaching methods of using tools like CRISPR, a method of genetic editing, to design future athletes. With the taboo on human gene editing in the process of being shattered, children whose genomes have been modified before birth in order to give them a competitive advantage later in life could be born in the next few years. Some of these individuals could conceivably be of age to compete in the 2040 Olympics. (For many events, the minimum age ranges from 14 to 17 years old. Others, like swimming, have no age requirement.) Those cases would be outliers, to be sure—but they may nevertheless emerge, and we are neither ready for gene-edited athletes nor prepared for how individuals and/or countries might start taking unknown and undefinable risks to get there.  In theory, gene editing could enable fine control over how the human body grows and where someone’s maximum potential lies. It could increase muscle mass or the proportion of the body’s muscle designed for bursts of energy—a big potential advantage in many track events, swimming, or gymnastics. For endurance events like cycling or long-distance running, athletes could go farther and for longer before getting tired if their genes enable the blood to carry more oxygen. Many of these possibilities are still hypothetical and the science is still relatively immature, but they’re worth thinking about now.  And gene-editing technologies are developing at a breathtaking pace. Just over a year ago, twins whose genes had been edited with CRISPR were born in China. In October, other researchers unveiled “prime editing,” a new technique that is more accurate than CRISPR. And despite global calls for caution, Russian scientist Denis Rebrikov and others have continued to move ahead with plans to continue testing gene editing in humans. The field is almost as competitive, though probably not as richly rewarding, as the world of international sport, which has a history of state-sanctioned doping programs. That may mean that in the 2040 Olympics or soon after, every conceivable record could be broken. But that’s only half of the problem. Those records would only be shattered if the edits work as planned. The mere assumption of what is achievable often drives the use and misuse of new technologies. If people, whether parents or governments, believe that gene editing can easily add or remove specific traits, it will likely end in attempts to enhance the next generation of athletes sooner rather than later.  Athletes and nation-states already pay close attention to genetics and biotechnology in sports. Scientific American has reported that shortly before the 2008 Summer Olympics, a scientist known for gene therapy research received multiple calls a day from athletes seeking a genetic edge in the competition, even though the technology is largely untested and potentially unsafe. In 2018, China announced that it would use athletes’ full genomes as a factor when considering their eligibility for the 2022 Winter Olympics team. The possibility of genetic forms of cheating spurred the World Anti-Doping Agency to expressly ban genetic doping in its 2004 Prohibited List. It’s also created programs to monitor and punish adult athletes who try to enhance themselves. But the WADA measures make a very specific assumption: that the athlete has decided to do this on their own. They likely don’t apply to athletes whose genetic modification took place before they were born.  When combined with the growing attention being paid to genetics in sports, as we argue in a new paper published in the the Australian and New Zealand Sports Law Journal, the hype and allure of embryonic gene editing is likely to create serious political and economic temptations for countries and/or parents to start “genome doping.” Countries often see performance at the Olympics as a proxy for power and influence in the international community, and as a result, those seeking to increase or maintain their political and economic status could well be driven to develop covert genome-doping programs. The same holds true for parents, even if it’s on a smaller scale, at least to start with—having a world-class athlete as a child brings fame, perhaps financial stability (depending on the sport), and pride. It will be unfathomably expensive initially, but there are very wealthy people who want to see their children succeed in competitive sports. And for decades, international sporting events have been a place where athletes and their countries and coaches have used cutting-edge science and technology in search of getting ahead of the pack. Almost 70 years ago, for instance, Soviet weightlifters and wrestlers using new testosterone supplements were able to take home eight Olympic gold medals.  But this is risky. Editing genes before pregnancy begins will be much more complicated than taking a course of hormone supplements. Athletic performance doesn’t flow from just one or two genes. Instead, hundreds or more all work in concert to create athletic potential. And whether this potential translates into performance depends on many other factors, including environment, training, nutrition, and the sheer desire to win. A handful of individual genes have known connections with athletic features such as better endurance and lower chances of injury, but scientists still have a lot to learn about how those genes work and which other genes they interact with.  Limited understanding of how new performance-enhancing technologies affect the body hasn’t stopped athletes or countries from using them in the past. In the late 1980s, for example, cyclists began using new methods of blood doping to increase their endurance—and continued even after reports in the early 1990s that up to 20 athletes may have died from complications. Definitively linking doping to the cyclists’ deaths has proved complicated in retrospect, but the case still highlights how athletes hastily employed new and untested technologies in order to gain a competitive edge without knowing whether they could cause serious harm.  This is a pattern that isn’t just limited to individuals. A long and controversial history of countries—including East Germany, China, and Russia—engaging in state-sanctioned doping programs suggests that governments can be just as willing to take risks with their athletes’ health as the individuals themselves are. Such programs are not a thing of the past, as highlighted by WADA’s decision this week to ban Russia from competing at the global level for the next four years. Some, like China, have even been accused of coercing athletes to dope with high doses of drugs over long periods. History suggests that some government-backed sporting programs, uninterested in athlete health or consent, might see few ethical issues with gene editing if there is even a slight potential to increase the performance of future athletes.  That could put them at significant risk. Even if the correct areas for treatment are found, various CRISPR gene-editing tools are liable to make off-target edits in the genome—unintended changes that could lead to disease or dysfunction in humans. While new “prime editors” could be more accurate, mistakes will still occur, and much more research is needed to assess their benefits and limitations. Even if only intentional edits occur, they could still cause health consequences. For example, while the modifications made to the twins born in China could reduce their immunity to some infectious diseases, they were previously thought to have shortened their life spans as well. However, the data supporting this conclusion have recently been called into question, illustrating exactly how complicated all of this is.  It’s not clear how the international sporting community will, or should, react. We don’t even know how gene-edited athletes could be detected—something that may well lead to regulations requiring whole-genome screening for athletes. This raises particularly thorny issues around if and when gene editing is used to confer a naturally existing but helpful genetic variant—something that already exists but is enhanced in gene-doped athletes. And this is where more complex social and ethical challenges are likely to arise. If athletes who have been gene-edited before birth are detected, will they be barred from competing out of “fairness” to others or to discourage the practice of human gene editing? Or will they be required to take drugs to suppress their abilities, bringing then back down to “normal” levels—as happened to sprinter Caster Semenya this year? As embryonic gene editing becomes increasingly accessible, who will decide what “normal” is?  With no clear legal or ethical pathways forward, society is ill-prepared for the very real possibility of genome doping in athletes. As a first step, anti-doping agencies like WADA should be convening expert groups to design rules that work across cultures and incorporate the best available science on gene editing and its potential impacts. Beyond this though, bodies such as the World Health Organization and UNESCO need to develop a set of norms and expectations of embryonic gene editing, including reference to athletics. Without this deliberative debate and norm setting, we collectively run the risk of turning a blind eye to the use of a technology that, if not implemented responsibly, could lead to a legacy of destroyed lives.  Future Tense is a partnership of Slate, New America, and Arizona State University that examines emerging technologies, public policy, and society.

Walter G. Johnson, Diana M. Bowman, Lucille M. Tournas, and Andrew Maynard


sottnet--2019-01-09--Space microbes arent so alien after all - theyre just trying earthlings to survive

Space microbes aren't so alien after all - they're just trying earthlings to survive

Genetic evidence shows bacteria on the International Space Station are adapting to survive, not to harmMicrobes stranded in the International Space Station (ISS) are just trying to survive, man.A new Northwestern University study has found that -- despite its seemingly harsh conditions -- the ISS is not causing bacteria to mutate into dangerous, antibiotic-resistant superbugs.While the team found that the bacteria isolated from the ISS did contain different genes than their Earthling counterparts, those genes did not make the bacteria more detrimental to human health. The bacteria are instead simply responding, and perhaps evolving, to survive in a stressful environment."There has been a lot of speculation about radiation, microgravity and the lack of ventilation and how that might affect living organisms, including bacteria," said Northwestern's Erica Hartmann, who led the study. "These are stressful, harsh conditions. Does the environment select for superbugs because they have an advantage? The answer appears to be 'no.'"The study was published today (Jan. 8) in the journal mSystems. Hartmann is an assistant professor of environmental engineering in Northwestern's McCormick School of Engineering.As the conversation about sending travelers to Mars gets more serious, there has been an increasing interest in understanding how microbes behave in enclosed environments."People will be in little capsules where they cannot open windows, go outside or circulate the air for long periods of time," said Hartmann. "We're genuinely concerned about how this could affect microbes."The ISS houses thousands of different microbes, which have traveled into space either on astronauts or in cargo. The National Center for Biotechnology Information maintains a publicly available database, containing the genomic analyses of many of bacteria isolated from the ISS. Hartmann's team used that data to compare the strains of Staphylococcus aureus and Bacillus cereus on the ISS to those on Earth.Found on human skin, S. aureus contains the tough-to-treat MRSA strain. B. cereus lives in soil and has fewer implications for human health."Bacteria that live on skin are very happy there," Hartmann said. "Your skin is warm and has certain oils and organic chemicals that bacteria really like. When you shed those bacteria, they find themselves living in a very different environment. A building's surface is cold and barren, which is extremely stressful for certain bacteria."To adapt to living on surfaces, the bacteria containing advantageous genes are selected for or they mutate. For those living on the ISS, these genes potentially helped the bacteria respond to stress, so they could eat, grow and function in a harsh environment."Based on genomic analysis, it looks like bacteria are adapting to live -- not evolving to cause disease," said Ryan Blaustein, a postdoctoral fellow in Hartmann's laboratory and the study's first author. "We didn't see anything special about antibiotic resistance or virulence in the space station's bacteria."Although this is good news for astronauts and potential space tourists, Hartmann and Blaustein are careful to point out that unhealthy people can still spread illness on space stations and space shuttles."Everywhere you go, you bring your microbes with you," Hartmann said. "Astronauts are exceedingly healthy people. But as we talk about expanding space flight to tourists who do not necessarily meet astronaut criteria, we don't know what will happen. We can't say that if you put someone with an infection into a closed bubble in space that it won't transfer to other people. It's like when someone coughs on an airplane, and everyone gets sick."


sottnet--2019-01-17--Researchers can now grow perfect blood vessels in a petri dish

The researchers also demonstrated that it is possible to grow functioning human blood vessels in another species.A team of researchers has managed to grow "perfect" human blood vessels in a Petri dish and a non-human animal for the first time.As detailed in a study published Tuesday in Nature, organoids - biomasses grown from stem cells that mimic human organs - were grown after researchers identified an important pathway that prevents changes to blood vessels, a major cause of death in diseases such as diabetes and Alzheimer's."Being able to build human blood vessels as organoids from stem cells is a game changer," Josef Penninger, director of the Life Sciences Institute at the University of British Columbia and lead author of the study, said in a statement . "Every single organ in our body is linked with the circulatory system [so] this could potentially allow researchers to unravel the causes and treatments for a variety of vascular diseases."After growing the blood vessels in a Petri dish, Penninger and his colleagues also transplanted the vascular organoids into live mice. As they discovered, the organoids developed into fully functional blood vessels, which demonstrated for the first time that vascular organoids could be grown in another species.Blood vessels in people with diabetes will often thicken in such a way that it prevents the effective delivery of oxygen and nutrients through the body, and, over time, can lead to serious problems such as kidney failure, strokes, and heart attacks.To test the effectiveness of the organoids as a stand-in for diseased blood vessels, the researchers put the organoids in an environment meant to simulate what it would be like to have diabetes. The blood vessels in the Petri dish responded just like they would in a diabetic human."Our organoids resemble human capillaries to a great extent, even on a molecular level," Reiner Wimmer, a postdoctoral researcher at the Institute for Molecular Biotechnology, said in a statement. "We can now use them to study blood vessel diseases directly on human tissue."


sottnet--2019-01-28--Chickens in Scotland modified to produce human proteins in eggs

During their study, which is reported in the journal BMC Biotechnology, they found that the drugs workd at least as well as the same proteins produced using existing methods."We are not yet producing medicines for people, but this study shows that chickens are commercially viable for producing proteins suitable for drug discovery studies and other applications in biotechnology," says Helen Sang, from the University of Edinburgh's Roslin Institute.Eggs are already used for growing viruses that are used as vaccines, such as the flu jab. Sang and colleagues say their approach is different because the therapeutic proteins are encoded in the chicken's DNA and produced as part of the egg white.Large quantities of the proteins can be recovered from each egg using a simple purification system, they say, and there are no adverse effects on the chickens themselves, which lay eggs as normal.The work has initially focused on two proteins that are essential to the immune system and have therapeutic potential: the human protein IFNalpha2a, which has powerful antiviral and anti-cancer effects, and the human and pig versions of a protein called macrophage-CSF, which is being developed as a therapy that stimulates damaged tissues to repair themselves.The researchers found just three eggs were enough to produce a clinically relevant dose of the drug. As chickens can lay up to 300 eggs per year, they say their approach could be more cost-effective than other production methods for some important drugs.Protein-based drugs, which include antibody therapies such as Avastin and Herceptin, are widely used for treating cancer and other diseases.For some of these proteins, the only way to produce them with sufficient quality involves mammalian cell culture techniques, which are expensive and have low yields. Other methods require complex purification systems and additional processing techniques, which lifts the cost.Scientists have previously shown that genetically modified goats, rabbits and chickens can be used to produce protein therapies in their milk or eggs.The researchers say their new approach is more efficient, produces better yields and is more cost-effective than these previous attempts."We have validated the transgenic chicken system for the cost-effective production of pure, high-quality, biologically active proteins for therapeutics and other applications," they write in their paper.


sottnet--2019-04-15--Israeli scientists print the worlds first 3D heart

Israeli scientists print the world's first 3D heart

A team of Israeli researchers has "printed" the world's first 3-D vascularized, engineered heart.said Prof. Tal Dvir of TAU's School of Molecular Cell Biology and Biotechnology, Department of Materials Science and Engineering in the Center for Nanoscience and Nanotechnology, and the Sagol Center for Regenerative Biotechnology, who was the lead researcher for the study.He worked with Prof. Assaf Shapira of TAU's Faculty of Life Sciences, and Nadav Moor, a doctoral student. Their research was published in Advanced Science.Heart disease is the leading cause of death among both men and women in the United States. In Israel, it is the second largest cause of death (after cancer). In 2013, heart disease accounted for about 16% of the total number of deaths in Israel, according to the Health Ministry.Heart transplantation is often the only treatment available to patients with end-stage heart failure. The waiting list for patients in the US can be as much as six months or more. In Israel and the US, many patients die while on the waiting list, hoping for a chance at survival."This heart is made from human cells and patient-specific biological materials. In our process, these materials serve as the bio-inks, substances made of sugars and proteins that can be used for 3-D printing of complex tissue models," Dvir explained."People have managed to 3D-print the structure of a heart in the past, but not with cells or with blood vessels. Our results demonstrate the potential of our approach for engineering personalized tissue and organ replacement in the future," he said.For the research, a biopsy of fatty tissue was taken from patients, according to a release. The cellular and a-cellular materials of the tissue were then separated. The cells were reprogrammed to become pluripotent stem cells that could then be efficiently differentiated into cardiac or endothelial cells. The extracellular matrix (ECM), a three-dimensional network of extracellular macromolecules, such as collagen and glycoproteins, was processed into a personalized hydrogel that served as the printing "ink." The differentiated cells were then mixed with the bio-inks and were used to 3D-print patient-specific, immune-compatible cardiac patches with blood vessels and, subsequently, an entire heart.According to Dvir, the use of "native" patient-specific materials is crucial to successfully engineering tissues and organs.The hope is that within "10 years, there will be organ printers in the finest hospitals around the world, and these procedures will be conducted routinely," Dvir said.


sottnet--2019-08-25--Recombinetics Flaws overlooked in Gene-edited hornless cattle

Recombinetics: Flaws overlooked in Gene-edited hornless cattle

Yet "unwanted genetic changes" from gene editing are exactly what the FDA scientists found.  New techniques for genetic engineering are not as precise as claimedCattle are being genetically engineered using gene-editing tools to not grow horns. But according to newly published research by experts at the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA), gene-editing errors in the genome of these cattle are often being overlooked (see abstract below).The animals were genetically engineered by the biotech company Recombinetics.. The cattle have for some years been hyped as a positive application of new genetic engineering techniques and a boon for animal welfare, since these GM cattle will not need to be de-horned. However, it appears to have so far gone unnoticed that the gene-editing has resulted in major unintended outcomes.The gene editing scissors (nucleases) used in this case are known as TALENs, a method frequently described as highly precise, and indeed, no off-target genetic changes were detected by the developers of these hornless cattle at Recombinetics.However, the FDA research shows major unintended effects at one of the two intended target sites. The desired "POLLED" gene variant was correctly inserted into the two intended genome sites. But there was an unintended additional change: two copies of the entire DNA construction (plasmid) that carried the POLLED sequence were also integrated into one of the two target sites. Within these unintended integrations of the plasmids, the researchers found complete gene sequences that confer resistance to three different antibiotics.It is crucial to recognise that both the intended insertion of the POLLED gene variants and unintended integrations of the plasmids into the cattle genome occur after the TALEN has completed its task of cutting the DNA at the intended editing sites. These desired and undesired DNA insertion events take place via the cell's innate DNA repair processes, which are activated once the TALEN gene-editing tool has cut and thus damaged the DNA.The findings described in the paper by the US FDA scientists are yet another illustration that looking only for off-target effects from a gene-editing procedure is not enough to identify the full spectrum of undesirable outcomes, which can occur even at the intended gene-editing site.No research has been carried out on the possible consequences for animal health, or whether these additional genes are biologically active.As the experts fromThe FDA scientists highlight several reasons why Recombinetics failed to detect these errors in its screening methods and recommend procedures that should be followed in future in order to provide a more accurate picture.GMWatch concludes that Recombinetics made assumptions as to outcomes from the POLLED genome editing and in so doing, their analytical procedures were inadequate to detect the unintended on-target effects - in this case, the integration of the POLLED template plasmid DNA molecule. This elementary mistake has evidently come back to haunt them.Given that the the POLLED gene-editing event is present in every cell of the animal, the antibiotic resistance genes will also be present in every cell. If these genes are active, they will produce a body-wide antibiotic resistance which can render these medicines ineffective when used to combat pathogenic bacterial infections in the animals. This factor invalidates any claims of animal welfare benefits from producing gene-edited POLLED cattle.The new research exposes much of the hype around gene-edited animals as false and misleading. For example, an article published by UC Davis Dept of Animal Science about the animal scientist and promoter of gene-edited animals, Alison Van Eenennaam, begins, "Gene editing — one of the newest and most promising tools of biotechnology — enables animal breeders to make beneficial genetic changes, without bringing along unwanted genetic changes."The UC Davis article goes on to claim that "gene editing has tremendous potential to boost the sustainability of livestock production, while also enhancing food-animal health and welfare".In truth, no one has assessed the effects of gene editing on animal welfare, but it's easy to predict that the mess created in the genome revealed by the new research will not have beneficial effects on the animal and may create major problems.The new publication also summarizes recent research findings using the CRISPR gene editing tool in mammalian cells. The gene editing process resulted in "unexpected alterations" of the genome, including "complex genomic rearrangements at or near the target site in 34 mammalian genome editing experiments". These complex rearrangements "included 35 insertions, deletions, inversions, and translocations that were difficult to detect" using standard sequencing methods.These findings, combined with the new findings of the FDA experts, highlight the fact that off-target effects are only part of the imprecision problem with gene editing. The other part is the unexpected effects that take place at the target site that is meant to be edited. These effects are often ignored in research that looks at unintended effects of gene editing.Questions remain over whether gene-edited polled cattle are needed at all. GMWatch has received a comment from a beef producer who wishes to remain anonymous. He said,Granted, the POLLED gene is more prevalent in beef cattle than dairy cattle. The cattle that Recombinetics edited with the POLLED gene were Holstein dairy cattle . So what were the developers' reasons for editing the genome of the cattle? The Recombinetics publication presents several justifications. These are: paper co-authored by Alison Van Eenennaam repeats many of these arguments, such as the scarcity and poor genetic merit of polled dairy sires and the cost and pain involved in de-horning. In addition, the Van Eenennaam paper emphasizes that breeding more polled animals from so few sires causes issues of inbreeding.All this seems pretty convincing - until you step outside the rarified world of gene editing enthusiasts. Curiously, an article for the online magazine Progressive Dairy called "Polled Holsteins: Past, present and future" gives a totally different picture of the current situation with polled Holsteins.The article concedes the relative scarcity of polled Holsteins - polled animals account for only 1% of the Holsteins registered with the Holstein Association. But it cites figures from the Association to the effect that "there are 12 polled bulls that are active and available with milking daughters, and there are 136 polled genomic bulls available. Of these bulls, 23 are homozygous polled, meaning that all offspring of these sires will be polled."Regarding females, "795 polled females were registered in 2010, and that number saw a dramatic climb to 3,698 polled females registered in 2015 - an 365 percent increase." Progressive Dairy calls this "exponential" growth "impressive".That's a rather healthier picture than that painted by Van Eenennaam and colleagues, who state, "In March 2018, only 3 Holstein and 0 Jersey active homozygous polled sires were registered with the National Association of Animal Breeders". Different association, different figures?The Progressive Dairy article contains an interview with John Burket of Burket Falls Farm in Pennsylvania. Burket is a breeder of polled Holsteins, who has always insisted on producing "a good cow, not just a polled cow". Burket's main problem is not breeding good polled cattle, but the vagaries of fashion: "The enthusiasm for polled cattle run[s] hot and cold", especially with domestic artificial insemination organizations.Revealingly, the greatest enthusiasm for the Burket Farm genetics has come from Europe. Burket says, "They aggressively selected for the trait, and now they are years ahead of us as far as polled genetics. Animal welfare legislation in Europe based on consumer pressure will drive even further use of polled."So there we have it. High quality polled cattle can be easily bred, without gene editing. Animals are spared the pain of de-horning, while farmers are spared the cost. And Europe is "years" ahead of the US in the breeding of these animals, seemingly because they were quicker to recognise a useful thing when they saw it.Recombinetics' interests spread way beyond hornless cattle. According to Testbiotech The large breeding corporates, Genus and Hendrix Genetics, might be amongst those profiting from the introduction of these animals onto the market. Both companies have contracted and funded the work of Recombinetics and its affiliate Acceligen. In addition to polled cattle, Recombinetics is moving to develop a gene-editing breeding method to eliminate the need to castrate pigs.Urgent questions need to be answered regarding the safety and ethics of gene-editing techniques - including the real, as opposed to the imagined, effects on animal welfare.For further information, see Testbiotech's article and downloads here Template plasmid integration in germline genome-edited cattleAlexis L. Norris, View ORCID ProfileStella S. Lee, Kevin J. Greenlees, Daniel A. Tadesse, Mayumi F. Miller, Heather Lombardidoi: https://doi.org/10.1101/715482 (open access)We analyzed publicly available whole genome sequencing data from cattle which were germline genome-edited to introduce polledness. Our analysis discovered the unintended heterozygous integration of the plasmid and a second copy of the repair template sequence, at the target site. Our finding underscores the importance of employing screening methods suited to reliably detect the unintended integration of plasmids and multiple template copies.