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Margaret Mellon is a science policy consultant who specialise in food and agriculture . She contributed this article to Live Science’sExpert Voices : Op - Ed & Insights .
Biotechnology is heading into the Garden of Eden . A Canadian corporation , Okanagan Specialty Fruits , is propose a genetically organise Malus pumila that does n’t brown after it ’s bruise or sliced . The U.S. Department of Agriculture is likely on the brink of deregulating the so - called " Arctic " Malus pumila , allowing it to be planted and sell without any further supervising . The society wo n’t label the apples as genetically engineered , but will sell the fruit under the Arctic orchard apple tree brand name .
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To many hoi polloi , reduced browning may not seem like such a big wad . The new apple wo n’t be any cheaper , savour any better or carry any fewer toxic chemicals than conventional apples do . But Okanagan hop the apple will appeal to fresh - cut orchard apple tree - slice processors , the food service industry and consumer unwilling to squish sliced apple with lemon juice . [ GMOs : Facts About Genetically Modified Food ]
It is not yet clean how enticing the Arctic Malus pumila will be . cutting - apple CPU account for only a little part of the apple diligence . agriculturalist of unfermented apple — the much larger part of the manufacture — vex that genetically engineered Malus pumila will excite unwanted controversy and perhaps sully the apple ’s simulacrum as a traditionally healthful product . Also , some consumers may value embrown as an index of glow .
Gene silencing : The next waving of genetically organise crop
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Whatever challenges it poses to the apple industriousness , the Arctic apple bring up a much larger issue for the world : how to evaluate the risks of the next big moving ridge of genetically engineered crop and foods .
Does the Arctic Malus pumila pose risk to health and the environs ? As of right now , the government does n’t know . That ’s because the Arctic apple is the product of complex newfangled transmitted engineering technique that the USDA is just learning how to evaluate .
Unlike earlier cut - and - splice techniques focused on DNA , the unexampled technique are based on the manipulation of RNA molecules .
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RNA corpuscle recognize and bind to DNA succession as cubicle go about their everyday activities . Organisms are like orchestras ; they only work well if each instrument ( or factor ) play when it is speculate to and at the right level .
Figuring out how the 10 of thousand of genes that make up organism bet at the right tier at the ripe fourth dimension has been a major focus of molecular biologists for the last 15 years . Craig Mello and Andrew Fire were awarded aNobel Prizein 2006 for the germinal find that doubly - stranded RNA ( dsRNA ) could silence cistron and affect which genetic tool dally when .
Since then , scientists have discovered many more types of RNA involved in transmitted orchestration , butdsRNA remains cardinal to those cognitive process . Genetic railroad engineer can now utilise gene silencing to dial back the expression of factor . The Arctic Malus pumila has been engineered to silence the polyphenol oxidase ( PPO ) enzymes responsible for for browning in orchard apple tree shape after the fruit is cut .
Concerns about turning off factor
Is there any reason to worry about turn gene off ? Yes . RNA manipulations may end up turn down , or off , genes other than those that were targeted .
The PPO cistron that cause browning in apple are part of a family of 10 or 11 closely interrelate genes . Okanagan ’s unconscious process is aimed at only four of the gene , but because the gene sequences are very similar it will probably have effect on all of them .
Why does that count ? PPO gene families perform multiple functions in plants . Little is know about the PPO gene family in Malus pumila , but in other plants , PPO gene are known to pad pest and emphasis immunity . This raises the interrogative of whether non - browning apple trees might be more vulnerable to disease and ask more pesticide than conventional apples — and whether they might transfer those vulnerabilities to other apple trees .
But the fellowship ’s request to the USDA for deregulating did not analyze PPO gene functions , other than browning , in apples — nor did it measure the levels of PPO factor expression in the untransformed apples to equate with those in the transformed apples .
Okanagan ’s request regarding its applealso did not analyze whether it has inadvertently silenced gene outside the PPO family . In addition to failing to properly characterize the genetically engineered apple , the Okanagan assessment gave brusk shrift to potential effects on wild pollinator and honeybees , human nourishment and weediness .
Getting a handgrip on gene silence
The sensational inadequateness of the Arctic apple risk of exposure assessment is largely the USDA ’s defect . The government agency just accepted what the company give it and did not demand specific data on the risks of cistron silencing .
The U.S. Food and Drug Administration , which offers voluntary food safety critique of genetically organise intellectual nourishment , also has yet to issue its approach path to the rating of gene - silence endangerment .
The FDA and the USDA need raw protocols for pass judgment these complex new technology . mod genomics research has provide scientists with powerful tools to name nontarget cistron that might be turned off by factor silencing .
The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency take a step in the correct steering last January by convening experts to look at that agency ’s power to evaluate dsRNA molecules used as pesticides . After noting some of the style gene silence to control pest might go wrong , thecommittee concluded that the EPA ’s try - and - lawful methods for evaluating chemical pesticide would not workto assess such risk of exposure and that new plan of attack , include genomics , were want .
The USDA and the FDA should convene their own expert panel on cistron silencing . Once the expert have brainstorm how cistron - silencing technologies might misfire in the environment and food safety arenas , the committees will be capable to make recommendations on how to pass judgment the risks of the new technologies . Then , the USDA and the FDA will know what information to call for from Okanagan and other companies to evaluate their product .
Until such workshop are held and judgment protocol developed , the U.S. governing should hold back on the approval of products based on gene hush up .
Let ’s be smarter than Eve and not bite into this apple until we know whether there is a worm inside .
