- A scheme to insert DNA from a dead person into an apple
tree to create a living memorial of that individual's "biological
essence" has run into problems, despite being promised UK government
funding.
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- The GM apple tree, proposed by art graduates Georg Tremmel
and Shiho Fukuhara of the Royal College of Art in London, has been dubbed
a "transgenic tombstone" by the British press.
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- The artists' symbolic goal is that every cell in the
tree will have a genetic echo of a dead loved-one allowing their heritage
to be handed on forever in the tree's fruit.
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- The UK National Endowment for Science Technology and
the Arts (NESTA) earmarked £35,000 (nearly AUD$90,000), to help the
duo's company, Biopresence, get off the ground.
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- Their goal is to market individually engineered trees
at £20,000 pounds (just over AUD$50,000) each.
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- But according to this week's New Scientist, Tremmel and
Fukuhara have encountered some stumbling blocks.
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- Their original plan was to insert a uniquely individual
sequence of "junk" human DNA ñ that which does not code
for protein - into the tree's genome. But, ethical and safety objections
made them steer away from this plan.
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- They have decided instead to write a "silent"
piece of human genetic code which could be embedded in an apple gene without
changing the gene's length or the protein it spells out. This is possible
because there is often more than one codon in a gene that codes for the
same amino acid. A codon is a specific collection of three of the four
bases (G, T,C and A) that make up the genetic code.
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- The problem is that the technique they plan to use is
involves eight coding steps and is extraordinarily complex and time-consuming
ñ not to mention, expensive. The method is borrowed from "bio-artist"
Joe Davis from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, who himself claims
to have coded a fragment of Greek text by Heraclitus into a gene of the
fruitfly.
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- The other problem is even more daunting: British regulators.
NESTA has made its funding dependent on approval from the Advisory Committee
on Releases to the Environment (ACRE), the Department for Environment,
Food and Rural Affairs, and English Nature.
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- They have to be satisfied it won't threaten the environment
and ACRE has said that it will have to consider each individual tree separately,
requiring Biopresence to produce exhaustive test results for every order
it receives.
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- "If you are in search of a permanent genetic memorial
to grandma, look closer to home," advises New Scientist. "Her
truly meaningful genetic legacy lies in you, your children and your grandchildren."
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- The coding process would be entirely man made and has
some people questioning the extent to which the altered apple sequence
would represent human DNA.
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- "How you realte this to a specific human I'm not
sure," said Professor Chris Lever, head of plant sciences at the University
of Oxford who condemend the project as a waste of public funds.
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- - with ABC Science Online
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- ©2004 ABC
- http://www.abc.net.au/science/news/stories/s1108342.htm
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- Comment
- From Mary Sparrowdancer
- 5-22-4
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- This project should be condemned not just as a "waste
of public funds" - of which there seems to be an infinite quantity
these days, for any purpose or agenda embraced by corporate giants now
ruling this planet - but, this project should be condemned because it is
a potential biological threat to the entire planet.
- If this, in fact, is a true suggested experiment (as
opposed to a hoax) that was intended to be carried out by students, then
it points to the fact that we need some real and overdue regulations enforced
immediately regarding gene splicing.
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- If one's grandmother died of cancer, where is the guarantee
that splicing her genes into the food chain would not cause others to then
ingest genes carrying a propensity toward cancer?
- In addition, the genes referred to as "junk"
DNA actually refers to DNA that science has not yet been able to understand
or completely explain. Since they are clueless about this DNA, they have
dismissed it by labeling it, "junk."
- Most of us have heard that God does not create junk.
Perhaps it is time to listen to at least a portion of what we keep hearing.
Maybe we keep hearing certain snippets of wisdom for a reason.
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- mary sparrowdancer
- www.sparrowdancer.com
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