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In a new first for genetic engineering, scientists have developed a single-celled synthetic organism that grows and divides much like a normal cell, mimicking aspects of the cell division cycle that underlies and generates healthy living cellular life. The achievement, demonstrated in an engineered unicellular bacteria-like life form called JCVI-syn3A, is the result of decades of genomic sequencing and analysis by scientists, exploring the roles individual genes play inside living creatures. This organism, called JCVI-syn3.0, only possessed 473 genes in total – shorter than any known self-sustaining, living organism in the natural world. But while JCVI-syn3.0's miniaturized genetic toolkit enabled...

“...A bug known as a whitefly received a gene from a plant, and that DNA influx... changed it... The bug has been causing massive damage to tomato, potato, and tobacco crops, as the new gene allowed it to evade protections that plants develop against these pests.... ...As far as we know, ours is the first example of horizontal transfer of a functional gene from plant to animal,”... ...horizontal gene transfer occurs when a species gets genetic code from another species and... incorporates those genes in its DNA. Genes are typically transmitted vertically, from parents to offspring, and don’t involve inter-species...

[ransomnote: The article below describes evidence (not yet certified by peer review) that SARS-CoV-2 RNAs (viruses) can be reverse transcribed. Note that "reverse" here points to the fact that DNA normally transcribes (codes) RNA, not the other way around.] COVID-19 News: A new study by researchers from Whitehead Institute for Biomedical Research-Cambridge, Wyss Institute for Biologically Inspired Engineering-Harvard University, Department of Biology-Massachusetts Institute of Technology and the John A. Paulson School of Engineering and Applied Sciences-Harvard University have alarmingly discovered that the SARS-CoV-2 RNA is reverse-transcribed and integrated into the human genome. These study findings have a wide range of...

Hey. I’m always here to offer advice to the Left, to make their road smoother, to point them in the direction of fellow travelers they should cancel for deficiencies of “wokeness.” Let’s start with the issue of GMOs, poisonous Roundup, and Monsanto (now swallowed up by Bayer). Joe Biden is going to appoint Mr. Monsanto, Tom Vilsack, as his Secretary of Agriculture. Tommy boy held that post under Obama. The Organic Consumers Association writes [1] (see also [2], [3], [4]): “If, like us, you dream of an organic, regenerative food system led by independent family farmers, then news that Joe...

The economic situation in Africa has improved a lot since the 1990s.  Yet rampant poverty and food insecurity still impact millions of lives there. Currently, there is a huge demand-supply gap in the agricultural sector.  At least three hundred million are malnourished. The United Nations Food and Agricultural Organization defines food security as "a situation that exists when all people, at all times, have physical, social and economic access to sufficient, safe and nutritious food that meets their dietary needs and food preferences for an active and healthy life." Africa's agricultural sector needs to be strengthened to meet the demand for quality food.  In...

A lamb that was genetically modified with jellyfish genes for advanced research was sold to a slaughterhouse for meat in France, according to European news accounts. An investigation to find out how the genetically-altered animal ended up as meat is underway, according to Le Parisien, the French newspaper that broke the story. "Rubis, the lamb, was found on a plate. Who ate her? No one knows. All that's known is the meat left a French slaughterhouse in November 2014" according to Le Parisien. The story states Rubis came from a program started in 2009 called "Green Mutton" within the scientific...

An international team of scientists led by the University of Adelaide's Davies Research Centre has shown that it is possible to disentangle the DNA sequences of the chromosomes inherited from the mother and the father, to create true diploid genomes from a single individual. In a report published in Nature Communications, and funded by the Davies Research Centre over the past 15 years, the researchers have shown that genomes of two important modern-day cattle breeds, Angus (Bos taurus taurus) and Brahman (Bos taurus indicus), can be completely decoded from a single hybrid individual carrying the genetics of both breeds, using...

As I said in a BreakPoint commentary last month, gene-editing technologies such as CRISPR and what’s being called “Prime Editing” are “existential threats.” We have no idea what our attempts to play god with the human genome will unleash on humanity. Yet, we insist on charging ahead despite our imperfect knowledge with an unbounded confidence in our abilities.Coming from a concerned non-scientist like me, these concerns can be easily dismissed as alarmist, but what if the concern comes from the Director of the National Institutes of Health?It turns out that Francis Collins is also concerned. In a recent article in...

For the first time, a study shows how glucocorticoid hormones, such as cortisol, control sugar and fat levels differently during day and night, feeding and fasting, rest and activity, over the course of 24 hours. The research conducted in mice found that the time-of-day dependent metabolic cycle is altered by high caloric diet. Since glucocorticoids are widely used drugs for the treatment of inflammatory diseases, these findings published in Molecular Cell suggest that lean and obese patients might respond differently to steroid therapy. Finally, it reveals the biological function of daily rhythms of hormone secretion (high before awakening and feeding,...

Is the hype of the plant-based burger craze and laboratory-grown beef already outstripping the reality? I’ve seen varying taste test reports on the Impossible Whopper and similar offerings, ranging from the ecstatic to the disgusted, but even the real fans aren’t saying that it’s better than a finely grilled burger. At most, they say it’s hard to tell the difference. But now we’re hearing from some of the scientists looking into these experimental monstrosities and they’re claiming that in the very near future, plant-based or lab-cultured “meat” is going to taste better than actual beef. What does that even...

Blue lips. Blackened skin. Blood leaking from noses and mouths. Coughing fits so intense they ripped muscles. Crippling headaches and body pains that felt like torture. These were the symptoms of a disease that was first recorded in Haskell County, Kansas, one hundred years ago this week, in January 1918. From Kansas the illness spread quickly: not only throughout the U.S. but across the world. Eventually (if misleadingly) it became known as Spanish flu. And while its effects on the body were awful, the mortality rate was truly terrifying. During a pandemic that lasted two years from its outbreak in...

The head of the nation's largest sugar beet cooperative said Thursday that shareholders will see improved results this year, but two of his group's biggest challenges are the anti-genetically modified foods movement and Republican presidential candidate Sen. Ted Cruz. American Crystal Sugar Co. CEO David Berg received the only round of applause during his speech to the group's annual meeting when he challenged Cruz to a debate over the Republican presidential candidate's call to do away with government support for the sugar industry. "We will defend the sugar program for a long, long time," Berg said, pretending he was addressing...

With bugs, algae and other resource-efficient foods we could feed one million people on Mars within a century of arriving there. Scientists even invented a martian diet. Cannon and colleagues modeled the food needs of a human population on Mars that grows to one million over about a hundred Earth years through a combination of immigration and reproduction. Though the settlement would need to import a lot of food at the start, it could transition to an entirely Martian-grown diet in about a century with the right food choices, they found. The major limiting factor is space — or rather,...

“We’ve got to get deeper than just these superficial fixes, as important as they are..." “We don’t have a healthcare system in the United States, we have a sickness care system in the United States. We just wait ’til somebody gets sick and then we talk about who’s going to pay for the treatment and how they’re going to be treated. What we need to talk about why so many Americans have unnecessary chronic illnesses, so many more compared to other countries. And that gets back not just into Big Pharma, not just health insurance companies, it has to do...

Sally joined a trial at Baylor College of Medicine using a therapy called CAR T. First, doctors removed some of Sally's T-cells, infection fighting white blood cells, and genetically modified them to recognize her sarcoma cancer as being enemy cells that should be destroyed. Millions of those new cells were then put back in Sally's body, ready to search out and destroy the cancer. Of 10 patients, three have stable disease and two, including Naser, have no evidence of cancer. Two CAR T therapies are already FDA approved for forms of leukemia and lymphoma. The next hurdle is proving it...

Applications include use by the military and helping people who are colour blind HUMANS could get the power to see in the dark after mice were injected with nanoparticles which gave them the ability to see infrared light. The rodents were given infrared night vision for 10 weeks after the injection, with only minor side effects, in an experiment conducted by Chinese and US scientists The team at the University of Science and Technology of China said they could modify a human’s vision to detect a wider spectrum of colours. Current infrared technology allows the user to see heat emitted...

Investigation by Chinese authorities finds He Jiankui broke national regulations in his controversial work on gene-edited babies. The scientist who announced last year that he had produced the world’s first gene-edited babies has been fired by his university. The decision, announced on 21 January by the Southern University of Science and Technology in Shenzhen, in China’s Guandong province, follows a report of findings from an investigation into He’s work by provincial health authorities. A probe by the Guangdong health ministry found that He broke national regulations against using gene-editing for reproductive purposes, Chinese state media agency Xinhua reported on 21...

The tiny, immortal hydra is a freshwater animal that can regenerate an entirely new animal from just the tiniest sliver of its body. Usually, it does this perfectly: One foot, one long skinny body, and one tentacled head. But with a single genetic tweak, researchers can create monstrous hydras that sprout fully functional heads all over their bodies — appropriate for an animal named for an ancient Greek monster that had somewhere between six and nine heads. These many-headed hydras aren't just a trick of mad science. For the first time, researchers have figured out what keeps hydra head regeneration...

In a study published in the journal Nature on Wednesday, researchers from the University of British Columbia detail how they were able to coax stem cells into growing into human blood vessel "organoids," the term used for three-dimensional, lab-grown cellular systems that mimic the characteristics of organs or tissues. They then placed the lab-grown blood vessels in a petri dish designed to mimic a "diabetic environment." They found that the basement membrane thickened in a way that was "strikingly similar" to the thickening seen in patients with diabetes, according to researcher Reiner Wimmer. The researchers then went on the hunt...

AN AMBITIOUS pig farmer raising muscle-bound mutant porkers for the bacon market is selling their sperm on Facebook. The Cambodian-based breeder is flogging the semen - along with insemination kits - to others looking to move into the 'Frankenswine' market. Mutant ...one of the giant pigs greedily gobbles up his massive dinner at a farm in Cambodia ______________________________________________________________ Scientists in South Korea have been credited with originally genetically-engineering double-muscle hogs to avert a future pork shortage crisis. They carefully altered pig genes to create super-sized swines capable of producing more meat than usual breeds. Farmyard footage shows similar porky 'monsters'...