plants – GMO SAFETY

All about the Vegetable Vaccine against Covid

Researchers at Medicago (a biotechnology company) in Quebec, collaborating with GlaxoSmithKline (a leading drug manufacturer), have developed a plant-based vaccine for Covid-19. The vaccine branded Covifenz is quite promising, with trial participants exhibiting a robust antibody response after getting the jab. The immune response is about ten times above that observed in individuals recuperating from the natural disease. The antibody levels are also higher than are those induced by other current vaccines.

How it Works

Researchers must identify a method to produce antigens to develop a vaccine. Antigens are the molecular particles that induce an immune reaction in the body. In plant-based vaccines, plants serve as bioreactors for the production of antigens. A suitable plant candidate for vaccine development must exhibit susceptibility to infections by an array of pathogens porno. For the development of covifenz, Nicotiana benthamonia, a plant related to the tobacco plant, was the ideal plant. Researchers modify the plant to produce virus-like particles (VPLs), which serve as the antigen.

The process begins by inserting the genetic code for making the VLPs into the plant. The code is like an instruction manual to the plant. Next, The plant cells read the code and use the information to produce large amounts of VLPs. The VLPs are very complex molecular structures that closely resemble the virus that causes the covid-19; they mimic the organization and size of the virus. However, VLPs lack genetic information and are therefore not virulent – unlike the virus, VLPs cannot replicate or cause disease. Once injected into the body system, the VLPs trick the body’s immune defenses into action. The next step involves the purification of the VLPs.

Vegetable Vaccine against Covid

Aside from VLPs, the covifenz vaccine contains another key ingredient, an adjuvant produced by GSK GlaxoSmithKline. Adjuvants are essential in some but not all vaccines, and they strengthen the immune response. The inclusion of adjuvants is necessary, especially during a pandemic, because it boosts the immune response and reduces the quantity of antigen needed in a dose. This allows for the production of more vaccine doses to protect a larger population.

The Effectiveness of Plant-Based Vaccines

During its third phase of trials, covifenz (currently the only plant-based vaccine against covid-19) showed a general efficacy rate of 71 percent. According to researchers, virus-like proteins retain their structure as the blood transports them through the body. Other vaccines’ active molecules – spike proteins – quickly disperse in the bloodstream. Since VLP’s are delivered as a whole – resembling the virus – they elicit a more robust immune reaction. This could explain the excellent performance of the vaccine in different environments. The plant-based vaccine is 75.3 percent effective against the current dominant Delta strain and about 89 percent effective against the Gamma strain.

Advantages of Plants for Vaccine Production

Plants are ideal for vaccine development because they yield high amounts of VLPs. It is also cheaper to produce vaccines using plants than other methods. Plant-based vaccines take a shorter time to make than conventional vaccine production methods. For example, the production of plant-based flu vaccine takes between five and six weeks. The same vaccine takes five to six months using the egg-based vaccine production method.

First Drought Resistant Maize Successfully Planted in Tanzania

Many countries located in Africa grow maize due to the fact that it has high nutritional values and it can be planted almost everywhere. Unfortunately, due to frequent draughts, the maize crops often fail, leading farmers to huge losses and leaving thousands of people without the they desperately need. Water Efficient Maize for Africa project is about to change the future of crops in Africa by developing a drought resistant genetically modified maize sort that can survive in the toughest conditions imaginable.

The project plans

Hundreds of millions of people all around this continent are dependent on the maize so minimizing the losses was one of the major goals of the scientists working on this project. Funded by non-government organizations from all around the globe, Water Efficient Maize for Africa project wants to deliver their new sort of maize to all farmers who are trying to grow this crop in a challenging climate.

Even though this genetically modified maize has been tested and planted in smaller amounts all over central Africa, it arrived in Tanzania this October. A handful of farmers planted it on their fields and the aim is to reduce the cost of food by growing local crops that will be readily available to everyone living in the surrounding areas. The next step is reaching out to farmers in Mozambique to get them on board in the following months.

Water Efficient Maize for Africa project received positive feedback from numerous countries who are aware of the food problem that has been effecting Africa in the last couple of decades. Genetically modified crops might be the best way to fight the food shortage in these countries and we will see how this plan unfolds in the future.

Developing the seed

Even though scientists has been very supportive of this project from the beginning, not all countries are ready to accept the new technologies. The process of developing and modifying the drought resistant maize has been long. South Africa is a country that accepted genetically modified crops in the past so it comes as no surprise to find out they were the first country who decided to purchase large quantities of drought resistant maize.

Uganda did plenty of testing and successfully planted these crops but the laws of this country did not allow commercialization. Drought resistant maize is sold with the royalty free maize which makes it very useful, but it still wasn’t enough to convince the government to change their law regarding the genetically modified crops entering their country.

The international support

As we have previously mentioned, Water Efficient Maize for Africa project is supported by numerous non-government organizations such as Bill & Melinda Foundation and a couple of agencies from the United States. They are financing the research that will solve the food problem in Africa through developing biotechnology and they are hoping to receive a positive feedback from the African countries in the years to come.

It is important to mention that Water Efficient Maize for Africa project started in 2008 and they are still set on finding and developing various ways to genetically modify the maize seeds in order to make them stronger and more resistant to harsh African. Hopefully, their effort will be more accepted in the future.

The Longest GMO Research: The Results Are In

The results of the longest GMO research have been released to the public last week and the findings are astonishing. The general public were left in the dark for years regarding the GMO crops and their influence on the economy of a country. A team of economists led by Francesco Ciliberti from The University of Virginia started collecting the data in 1998 and started analyzing it after fourteen years. They focused on the use of pesticides among farmers who are cultivating soy beans and maize, and looked at it from the economic aspect. The released findings mostly focus on the use of pesticides that include herbicides and insecticides and the final results are quite interesting.

The team and the research

Francesco Ciliberti managed to assemble a team of respectable economists who do have years of experience with data analysis. The majority of the team members come from respectable universities from all around the United States. They started their research back in 1998, selecting 10,000 US farmers who were growing soy beans and maize.

Have in mind that every past research that touched upon this topic usually covered only two or three years, so this study is definitely the largest (so far). Soy beans and maize are the most commonly cultivated crops in the world so it comes as no surprise that they decided to focus on the farmers who were growing those plants. The team selected the candidates and followed their journey from planting the first crop in 1998, to making a decision to grow GMO crops, and everything that followed, including the usage of pesticides and insecticides during each year.

GMO soy beans are modified in order to hold out against various weeds that ruin the crops, while genetically modified maize is resistant to pests. After planting the genetically modified crops, farmers did report the decrease in usage of herbicides and insecticides. They simply did not need it in the first couple of years of cultivating the genetically crops. However, the situation did change after a couple of years.

The results

Planting and growing GMO crops do have a significant impact on the economy due to the fact that the crops in question are more resistant to the outside factors and they generally give more produce at the end of each harvest. Additionally, farmers spend far less money on pesticides since they are not needed in this situation.

However, this research discovered that after some time, genetically modified plants do change the environment around them and even though they don’t require specific herbicides or insecticides, they do give in to other weeds or pests. For instance, weeds that grow around genetically modified soy develop immunity and farmers usually start using large amounts of herbicides in order to keep the situation under control.

This fact alone has a huge impact on the economy and the farming methods since farmers have to spend more money on various chemicals in order to battle this unexpected situation that can arise after years of growing genetically modified crops. On the other hand, insects are not reacting in the same way to genetically modified crops probably because they breed with other insects who do not live in the same.

The team was surprised by their findings regarding the increased usage of herbicides and the impact it has on the economy. The patterns were quite clear so dealing with this problem should definitely be the next goal of GMO researchers who develop the crops in order to reduce the weed resistance and keep the balance.

Golden Rice and the Possibility of Overcoming World Famine Through Genetic Modification

Golden rice is a crop that has been in development in one way or another since 1984. The crop itself is named after the golden yellow color it has, which contrasts greatly with the normal white color of rice. The signature trait of golden rice is that it is infused with beta-carotene, an extremely important nutrient that is the source of Vitamin A. It is the addition of that nutrient that also gives the rice its distinctive color.

According to the article “In A Grain of Golden Rice, A World of Controversy Over GMO Foods” on NPR, the idea for golden rice came about from a group of master plant breeders talking after a Rockefeller Foundation funded meeting at the International Rice Institute. Peter Jennings, who had helped to orchestrate the Green Revolution that had saved billions, suggested that altering rice to include beta-carotene could vastly improve the lives of millions or even billions itself.

The reason for this was simple. In many poorer and less developed countries in the east, most children grow up on rice from a young age. Because rice lacks the ability to give meaningful amounts of Vitamin A, children tend to grow up malnourished and suffer from that lack for their whole lives. Because parents in many of those countries wean their children on rice gruel predominantly, it would be imperative to have some way of introducing the absolutely important vitamin into the diet of the less wealthy masses.

One of the hurdles that must be overcome in selling the long developed idea of golden rice to people in both the developed and developing world is to overcome the stigma of the odd coloration. While gold is not a color that is generally looked at with disdain, it still triggers the parts of our brain that warn us about off coloration of food. Those parts of the brain were evolved to protect us from spoiled food and edible items that may have been poisonous, and they also allowed us to notice the natural warning colors that dissuaded us from trying to touch harmful plants or animals. But now it is serving to scare people away from trying the healthier rice for their benefit.

On the goldenrice.org website under the heading “Sociocultural Issues”, the team behind golden rice points out that early in their inception carrots were actually white or purple. They state that while they understand why people may be hesitant to try their golden rice out of tradition for using only their specific kinds of grains, they hope that the curiosity of people in places ranging from Africa to Latin America to Asia will have them try out their golden rice.

Back on the NPR article, the writer states that while golden rice has taken decades to cultivate and turn into a viable product, the developers have gotten close to the release of the rice and were working on passing rigorous testing standards and accompanying legislation so that they could plant in countries like the Philippines and Bangladesh. Being that the rice was designed so that very low income people would have access to the nutrient it provided, it was important to make the most headway in those locations. Even with their positive goals, though, the comments were ripe with anti-gmo sentiments, and illustrated how even with the best intentions it would still be hard to get the passage approved to where the rice could do the most good- in some of the most tradition focused areas on earth. However, there was hope that all the effort that has gone into the rice would pay off for those in need.

Source:

Charles, D. (2013). In A Grain Of Golden Rice, A World Of Controversy Over GMO Foods. NPR.

Golden Rice Humanitarian Board. (2016). Sociocultural Issues. Golden Rice Project.

Examining Inborn Defenses against Pests in Leptra Corn

One of the most prevalent traits of genetically modified plants is their ability to resist insects that would normally consume and destroy the plant. One recent addition to the family of gmo plants created to protect itself from insects is a hybrid plant created by DuPont Pioneer and is known as Optimum Leptra. The website states that the modification is to the corn plant and is designed to reduce the ear feeding of lepidopteran pests which delivers cleaner ears with less kernel damage and that it eliminates the major risk of development of molds and mycotoxins in harvested grain (“Optimum Leptra Hybrids”).

An article by Clarin Rural, covering news in the Latin American regions, talked about how the corn will soon be introduced in Argentina after having the Ministry of Agro Industry approve the marketing of the plant (“Resistant corn comes with four transgenic events”). The article gives more details on the function of the modifications, stating that two of the events protect against stem borer and isoca Tang, a double event for protection against fall armyworm and glufosinate ammonium with a room for glyphosate. The corn has already been made available in Brazil and hopes carry to better yields with it in Argentina.

In the United States the protections on the crop protect it from different pests. In the article “DuPont Pioneer releases Optimum Leptra Hybrid” on AGProfessional, in the United States the insects repelled by the modifications of the corn include European and Southwestern corn borers, the corn earworm, and black and western bean cutworms. In the article, penned by the DuPont Pioneer Company, they cite figures of 98% reduction in ear feeding damage using their crops. The plants are also resistant to herbicides, protecting them from more types of poison control.

Some of the traits found in the corn have long been used in other genetically modified plants produced by DuPont, and have long known mechanisms for working. For example, Herculex I, a trait available in Leptra to kill bugs functions by being ingested by larva who feed on the modified plant. The protein binds to receptors in the gut of the larva and causing a series of reactions which ultimately lead to the death of the larva (“Herculex FAQ”).

As with any genetically modified food, of course, there are questions about the effects these different traits may have on the ecology around it. Modified plants that have natural pesticides and that are resistant to herbicides and pesticides have been shown to cause resistant strains of weeds and pest insects to survive and reproduce, causing a drop in the effectiveness of the traits modified in the plants. The article “How pesticides develop” by Michigan State University explained that worldwide more than 500 species of pests have developed a resistance to pesticides due to the growth of resistance among their populations.

Even so, the Clarin Rural article goes on to state that the importance of the Leptra crop is that, since it has so many different resistance traits it makes it easier to rotate the amount of herbicides and pesticides needed for cultivating the crop. In addition, the natural pest defenses the corn has should also reduce the amount of poison needed as it is targets the greatest pests that threaten the growth of corn plants in the regions the crop is planted in. All of these different additions may prove to be fundamental in helping feed a world that is highly defendant on its corn plants on production, if they can get past the stigma of genetic modification and scientific uncertainty.

Sources:

Clarin. (2016). Argentina approves new GMO corn with four traits for insect, pesticide resistance. Genetic Literacy Poroject.

Dow AgroSciences. (2016). Herculex I FAQ. DowAgro.

DuPont Pioneer. (2013). DuPont Pioneer releases Optimum Leptra hybrid. AGProfessional.

Gut, L., Schilder, A., Isaacs, R., & McManus, P. (2016). How Pesticide Resistance Develops. Michigan State University.

Pioneer. (2016). Optimum Leptra Hybrids. DuPont Pioneer.