Scientists genetically engineer silkworms to produce artificial spider silk

Artificial spider silk has higher tensile strength and elasticity than naturally spun silkworm fibers – this silk has a variety of potential uses from bandages to bullet proof vests.

PhysOrg, 29 September 2010

How to win the GM food PR game

By Jason Major

TechNyou

Easy, look at how Greenpeace did it this week.  Tests they had done found trace amounts of GM material in an infant baby formula.  To get this issue noticed they used the classic formula to kill two birds with the single stone: They got front and centre in the media their Greenpeace brand (always good for booting the donation coffers), and their cause for that day which was their opposition to GM foods.

The result

The following, including the lead paragraph, are sentences from the Daily Telegraph report on the Greenpeace protest against the S-26 baby formula:

GENETICALLY modified baby formula is being sold in Australia without warning labels. Health authorities have effectively given baby-food manufacturers the green light to include the contentious ingredients in their products.

The Sunday Telegraph can reveal that tests of one of the most popular baby formulas on the market – S-26 Soy – show it contains genetically altered ingredients.

Labelling laws allow a one per cent “unintentional” presence of GM, and a maker will not be prosecuted if it can prove it ordered non-GM foods from suppliers.

But an ongoing Russian study had found they could damage liver, kidney and reproductive function in rats and hamsters and make them grow hair on their tongues, Greenpeace spokeswoman Julie Macken said.

“I reckon most mums are going to hit the roof when they find out how they’ve been hoodwinked with this stuff,” she said.

“Transnational companies such as Pfizer and others love Australia, because we’ve got labelling laws you can drive a truck through, which is great for their bottom line and bad for our babies.”

The visuals in TV versions were better because they had the protesters in Greenpeace attire standing in the supermarket aisles with giant Greenpeace “contaminated” labels draped over the infant formula. I dare say they mothers were given a stern warning about the product as they approached the display as well.

Dramatic, emotive stuff, especially if you are a mother.  What Greenpeace has done is create an element of uncertainty in the minds of those most vulnerable to their message (ie, mothers), and frame it to focus on the risk and uncertainty of the product. And they did it well. What mother with minimal knowledge about GM foods is going to look at this story and make the judgement that there is no risk to my baby?  And most mothers that I am aware of go to great lengths to avoid any risk – real or perceived.

Toward the end of the article the manufacturer stated that they take the quality of their products very seriously and are complying with all Australian labeling laws. Most news reports also squeezed in that the amount of GM material discovered was significantly less than the 1% allowed by law. (FSANZ says the proportion of GM soy and corn was actually about 0.2% of the total soy or corn in the product). The naturally risk-averse mother reading or hearing this is going to take about as much notice of that information as her child. Facts, depending on how and where they are used, often have sod all affect, as has been suggested in a previous post.

Getting your message across

There are many differences in how the PR machines of NGO groups such as Greenpeace work compared to the more corporate entities – namely that NGOs can have many heads all operating independently, whereas corporate PR usually has to go through and be approved by one head and the one head must stick to the corporate message. That one head is also often the only person allowed to speak to the media. But in this instance, the key elements are simple: find a dramatic way to create any level of uncertainty (real or not) and steer clear of the factual stuff. Framing is all important – find a vulnerable target for your message and stick to the emotive angles – such as endangering your child’s health, unknown long-term health risks, deception…and so on.  In this case, a target and message of mothers unknowingly putting babies at risk is a winner.

Some context

Yes, alright, the facts don’t matter, the emotion is missing and my framing will be out of whack, but I am obliged to try, if for no other reason than context is something the media don’t generally worry about.  Certainly not in this case anyway, which is another reason this stunt succeeds for Greenpeace.

In this case Greenpeace did try and introduce an element of factual science, with the Russian study, but then used emotive language to describe it – organ damage and hair growing on your tongue.

But as far as I can find out this Russian research has yet to be peer-reviewed; the scientist behind the research, Alexei Surov, has never had anything published in a peer-reviewed journal and no-one has been able to get hold of the raw data to try and repeat the results or analyse the methodology.  Additionally, I understand that your bog-standard hamster (guinea pig) food from the pet shop has soy and corn in it, and I would bet that a lot of that will be the GM variety considering the majority of US soy and corn is genetically modified.  In which case, I suspect that if there were problems with hamsters eating GM corn and soy, we would have seen lots of hairy-mouthed, reproductively-compromised, sick hamsters running around. We haven’t.

I have however, fallen in the same trap as many anti-GM claims in that I am making a claim here without any robust evidence to back it.  Regardless, although we can’t dismiss the research, we can’t exactly hold it up as gospel either.

One point Greenpeace make is correct: there have been no long-term studies done on the health affects of GM foods.  Nor have there been any long-term health effects of conventional foods.  In fact there has been, relative to the safety testing on GM food, almost no testing of

any sort on conventional food.  Soy naturally contains allergens. In fact about 2% of people are allergic to soy.  It is probable that via conventional breeding practices the genes responsible for these allergens could mutate, become up-regulated (work more efficiently) to make the soy plant produce more of the allergen.  If it did we would be none the wiser.  Each year we bring out loads of new varieties or strains of cereals and other food crops.  No safety testing has been done on them, short or long-term.

The level, of the genetically modified soy and corn was about 0.2% according to Food Standards Australian New Zealand.  That, is in every gram of soy or corn used in the formula, 0.2% of it was genetically modified soy or corn.  So the company wasn’t breaking any labeling laws, nor any food safety laws as the soy and corn has been deemed safe by FSANZ.  Yes such a tiny amount among all the other ingredients used is unlikely to be harmful even if there were issues with using GM ingredients, not that this fact will be of any consolation to mothers

A good point

The one valid argument Greenpeace make is about the labeling, which was actually one of their key messages. At the moment they want the ingredients label to state if the product contains any product containing even trace amounts GM material, which in this case is right on the detectable limits for standard instrumentation.  They also want any GM food processing agents such as enzymes that may or may not end up in the final product to be on the label, along with oils and other refined products that are exempt under existing guidelines.

Whether practical, realistic or justified is unimportant. Their rationale is simply about choice, the right to know what is in our food.  Fair enough.

Offline – on leave

I will be taking a holiday and not thinking about work until mid-November, so there will be a lull in blog activity until my return.  News stories will still be posted and there will likely be some new publications uploaded, so still keep an eye out or subscribe through the RSS feed.

Junk DNA reverses cancer

Australian and US scientists find a way of shrinking tumours in certain cancers

Garvan Institute:  27 September 2010

There is also a downloadable MP3 of an interview with the scientists on the Garvan site

Having your clone and eating it two

Eating cloned animals is safe – still. But that doesn’t mean we will want to eat it.

By Jason Major

TechNyou

The European Food Safety Authority has just release a statement on animal cloning saying that none of the new scientific information on animal cloning has changed their position on the matter.

Their position remains as follows:

• Mortality rates and the number of animals born with developmental abnormalities are higher in animal clones than in conventionally bred animals.
• In relation to food safety, there is no indication that differences exist for meat and milk of clones and their progeny compared with those from conventionally bred animals.
• There is still limited information available on cloning of species other than cattle and pigs, therefore at the moment risk assessment can be carried out only for these two species.

The US FDA (Food and Drug Administration) has also approved cloned animals and their products as safe.

Cloning in Australia

There was a review on animal cloning done in 2003. It cited six groups with active livestock cloning programs in Australia and New Zealand (AgResearch, Hamilton, NZ; Dairy CRC, Vic.; CSIRO, NSW; SARDI, SA; BresaGen, SA, and Clone International, Vic.), and these have so far produced a total of 32 cattle, 11 sheep and 2 pig clones by NT from a variety of cells of embryonic, fetal and somatic (adult) origin. The animals targeted for cloning were and still are mostly of scientific value and many are genetically modified.

Report here Cloning_Review_Final_June 2003

The numbers will have changed a bit since 2003, but it will give you an idea. Since this report actual cloning research in Australia has been put on the backburner a bit, at least at CSIRO and SARDI, and the Dairy CRC no longer exists.

There are a couple of stories on Australian cloning research in Biotechnology in animals.

Regulating animal cloning in Australia

Following other regulators, Food Standards Australia New Zealand has also declared that meat and milk from cloned animals is safe to eat. I guess the issue for some people may be that although it is illegal to throw something on the market that is unsafe, we don’t have any legislation that specifically regulates the sale of cloned animals or their products.  It has been deemed safe, therefore it is allowed to be sold regardless of how it is produced.  FSANZ’s fact sheet gives a partial insight into what is happening

At the moment there is an informal agreement between the research groups and companies that have developed cloned livestock to ensure that none of the clones or their progeny enter the food chain.  It remains to be seen how long this will last, or if there is an accidental breach of this agreement.

Street talk

There is plenty of talk on the blogs about the possible dangers of eating a cloned animal or its offspring, but intuitively and scientifically there is no justification at this stage anyway, to think that meat or milk from a cloned animal would be any different from your regular animal.

The question is, do we need to regulate the development and sale of cloned animals, their progeny and their products (milk, eggs, etc), and what are we trying to regulate?  It is unlikely that we will be regulating cloned animals because consumption of them or their products is unsafe for human health. If for some reason the call is to regulate for safety, the level of technical expertise required to clone an animal should, I would have thought, make it relatively easy to regulate and police.  That is, it requires somewhat more expertise than a strong, lubricated arm and a straw of frozen semen. It will require, at least initially, specialised labs with the necessary expertise. This should make it easier to monitor the progeny and products of clones entering the food chain. The expense of a producing a cloned animal means that you are highly unlikely to be eating it.  You would only eat its offspring, or products such as milk or eggs, or use products such as the wool or hides. The tagging process of livestock today allows any animal sold on the market, in most cases, to be tracked back to the farm, and any decent farmer keeps accurate breeding records.  The exception might be rangeland cattle and sheep in outback Australia, though I am prepared to be corrected on that.

Ethics and animal welfare

The real issue I see is the animal welfare issue.  There is still a low success rate for cloning.  According to the EFSA report about 10% for cattle and 6% for pigs.  Among those that don’t make it are many sick or malformed creatures, which is what is driving the animal welfare issue.  There is probably a good dose of “we are playing God” argument, as well.  I tend to disregard this “playing God” as a legitimate ethical argument, but I do question the necessity of animal cloning, or cloning of anything.

But then the scientist in me comes out, and I wonder about all this useful knowledge that is being generated in trying to perfect the animal cloning process, knowledge that may have important implication in treatment of human diseases, even animal health which could lead to better animal husbandry.  The question for us, as it is often is, at what cost are we getting this knowledge?

The animal welfare concern is a legitimate one and it raises other questions such as, how desperate are we for good breeding stock that we need to clone an animal?  I guess if there is a demand there will be someone ready to meet that demand and others prepared to pay.

And based on the popularity among a select few to clone their prized beasts, it seems only inevitable that we will soon be eating their offspring.

Is it just another reproductive technology we will get used to?

Leaving the question aside of whether we should or not, or if such products should be labeled, what happens when, as I think is inevitable, that the technology improves to the point where malformed and sick cloned offspring appear at a similar rate to those from natural conception? Does the welfare issue go away for people, or are there other underlying factors contributing to a person’s opposition?

I would be interested to hear from people that wouldn’t eat a cloned animal and why. What are the key factors driving our perceptions about the production and consumption of cloned livestock?

How much of the Yuck factor is present?  What I call the Yuck factor is that intuitive abhorrence of something that you can’t explain or understand.

SBS ran a program last month asking would you eat a cloned animal.  The responses give a bit of insight, but then as I have pointed out in previous blogs, I suspect the people who feel most passionate about the topic are those more likely to respond.

Do we have the same perception about the use of the technology to clone endangered species – ie where there is no thought of eating them, only to prevent extinction? Why or why not?

Quantum leap towards computer of the future

Australian scientists have taken a big step forward in the race to develop a quantum computer.

Breakthrough: an artist's impression of a phosphorus atom (a red sphere surrounded by a blue electron cloud) coupled to a silicon single-electron transistor(Source: William Algar-Chuklin/College of Fine Arts, The University of New South Wales)

ABC Science News: 27 September 2010

Nanomesh material may lead to efficient thermoelectric devices

A thin silicon film with nano-sized holes could efficiently harness wasted heat to generate electricity.

Nanowerk, 23rd September 2010

Computer imaging gives deeper insight into osteoporosis

A novel computer tomography method can determine the 3D structure of bones on the nanometer scale to develop better therapies for osteoporosis and related diseases.

Science Daily, 23 September 2010

Stem cells give insights into Huntington’s

Australian researchers studying Huntington’s disease in human embryonic stem cells say that signs of the disease can be seen in cells which are just a few days old.

ABC News 22 September 2010

Nanowires split water, make hydrogen

Nanowires can efficiently split water to make hydrogen that could lead to affordable chemical storage of solar power.

RSC Publishing Chemical Science: 22 September 2010

Neural stem cells may reverse paralysis

Japanese researchers have discovered that in a rodent model neural stem cells taken from the brain could be used to restore movement to paralysed patients.

Journal of Clinical Investigation: Vol 120 (9)

And short report in Australian Stem Cell Centre September newsletter