Category Archives: Genetic Engineering

Proposition 105 would require mandatory GMO labeling
Under Proposition 105, food producers would be required to label foods produced with genetic engineering, or GMO #39;s. Russell Haythorn reports.

By: 7 NEWS - The Denver Channel

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Proposition 105 would require mandatory GMO labeling - Video

Last year's half-baked and unsuccessful proposal to ban genetically engineered crops in Los Angeles has not improved with time. Yet here it is before the City Council again, complete with wild statements about bioengineered food, chock full of inconsistent logic and, just like last year, rendered virtually meaningless because there are no such crops in the city and no plans to grow them.

The motion, brought to the council Tuesday by Councilmen Paul Koretz and Mitch O'Farrell, cites concern by consumers that genetically engineered food might be unsafe to eat, a position that is not backed by years of scientific study. The councilmen point out in support of their proposal that 52% of county voters favored a failed 2012 statewide proposition that would have required that labels be put on foods with bioengineered ingredients ignoring the fact that labeling a product and banning the process that created it are entirely different things.

The councilmen also complain about the herbicides used on bioengineered crops, and those complaints are partly justified. But linking that to a ban makes for foolish policy. It is true that plants have often been engineered to resist herbicides, which are then sprayed on the plants intensively and repeatedly over time. That, in turn, has given rise to herbicide-resistant weeds, which can be very difficult to eradicate in fields of conventionally grown crops. But the problem is not the genetically engineered plants, it is the heavy application of the herbicides. Conventional lawns are also heavily treated with herbicides and other chemicals that aren't good for the environment. The proper response is a regulation on pesticide and herbicide use, not a ban on the crops.

And not all genetic engineering of crops is designed to build resistance to pesticides. Scientists have, for instance, developed a form of rice that contains significant amounts of vitamin A, an innovation that could prevent blindness and death for millions of people in Asia and Africa. Scientists are at work on oranges they hope will resist citrus greening, a disease that threatens to wipe out orange groves throughout the U.S. What if future projects included drought-tolerant crops that could survive the kind of prolonged dry spell California has been experiencing? Why would we want to ban such products without any scientific indication that they're unhealthy or unsafe?

That's not to say all bioengineered plants are keepers. Herbicide-resistant turf grass is undergoing product testing. But because grasses spread easily, there should be concern that the engineered products could take over neighbors' lawns and become omnipresent pests even in the wilderness areas that surround the city.

In other words, making sound policy requires lawmakers to rise above irrational fears and easy generalizations and to become informed about science.

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Sowing the seeds of an illogical crop ban

Ebola virus Field Trial in Genetic Engineering Financed by Pentagon?
5 years after the fake with the swine flu: The World Health Organization WHO beats alarm: A fatal virus again threatens the world, this time it is called Ebo...

By: Videos of the world

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Ebola virus Field Trial in Genetic Engineering Financed by Pentagon? - Video

PUBLIC RELEASE DATE:

20-Oct-2014

Contact: Kathryn Ryan kryan@liebertpub.com 914-740-2100 Mary Ann Liebert, Inc./Genetic Engineering News @LiebertOnline

New Rochelle, NY, October 20, 2014When it comes to picking an egg donor, until recent years, recipients tended to prefer someone with a similar appearance. Donor trait choices are changing, though, and which traits are now more preferable and why is the focus of "Beauty, Brains or Health: Trends in Ovum Recipient Preferences," an article published in Journal of Women's Health, a peer-reviewed publication from Mary Ann Liebert, Inc., publishers. The article is available free on the Journal of Women's Health website at http://online.liebertpub.com/doi/full/10.1089/jwh.2014.4792 until November 20, 2014.

Homero Flores, MD and coauthors from Reproductive Medicine Associates of New York and Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai (New York, NY) reviewed the requests of ovum donor recipients over a 5-year period and assessed their preferences for donor traits, categorizing them by appearance, ethnicity, intellect, ability, and mental health. The authors documented statistically significant increases and decreases in the different categories over the years, with more "practical traits" that would improve offspring's overall quality of life tending to increase compared to "self-reflective" traits.

"As social acceptance of ovum donation has increased, and donor selection has become more sophisticated, couples are changing their preferences for what donor characteristics they value most for their future offspring," says Susan G. Kornstein, MD, Editor-in-Chief of Journal of Women's Health, Executive Director of the Virginia Commonwealth University Institute for Women's Health, Richmond, VA, and President of the Academy of Women's Health.

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About the Journal

Journal of Women's Health, published monthly, is a core multidisciplinary journal dedicated to the diseases and conditions that hold greater risk for or are more prevalent among women, as well as diseases that present differently in women. The Journal covers the latest advances and clinical applications of new diagnostic procedures and therapeutic protocols for the prevention and management of women's healthcare issues. Complete tables of content and a sample issue may be viewed on the Journal of Women's Health website at http://www.liebertpub.com/jwh. Journal of Women's Health is the official journal of the Academy of Women's Health and the Society for Women's Health Research.

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Shopping for an egg donor: Is beauty, brains, or health most important?

PUBLIC RELEASE DATE:

20-Oct-2014

Contact: Kathryn Ryan kryan@liebertpub.com 914-740-2100 Mary Ann Liebert, Inc./Genetic Engineering News @LiebertOnline

New Rochelle, NY, October 20, 2014Interleukin-27 (IL-27), a member of the interleukin family of cytokines that help regulate the immune system, has a mainly anti-inflammatory role in the body, and its dysfunction has been implicated in autoimmune diseases such as multiple sclerosis and Crohn's disease. More recently, IL-27's proinflammatory activity and role in chronic inflammatory diseases is becoming increasingly clear, and a new Review article that explores the potential to target a range of diseases that share common IL-27-activated mechanisms is presented in Journal of Interferon & Cytokine Research (JICR), a peer-reviewed publication from Mary Ann Liebert, Inc., publishers. The article is available free on the JICR website until November 20, 2014.

Christopher Wynick, Carlene Petes, and Katrina Gee, Queen's University, Kingston, Canada, explain how IL-27 can contribute to the control of both anti- and proinflammatory responses depending on the predominant type of immune response elicited in the body, the disease type, and the disease severity. They focus primarily on the proinflammatory activity of the cytokine in the article "Interleukin-27 Mediates Inflammation During Chronic Disease".

"IL-27 is emerging as a significant determinant of the character of inflammatory response and this review provides an important perspective," says Co-Editor-in-Chief Thomas A. Hamilton, PhD, Chairman, Department of Immunology, Cleveland Clinic Foundation, Ohio.

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About the Journal

Journal of Interferon & Cytokine Research (JICR), led by Co-Editors-in-Chief Ganes C. Sen, PhD, Chairman, Department of Molecular Genetics, Cleveland Clinic Foundation, and Thomas A. Hamilton, PhD, Chairman, Department of Immunology, Cleveland Clinic Foundation, is an authoritative peer-reviewed journal published monthly online with Open Access options and in print that covers all aspects of interferons and cytokines from basic science to clinical applications. JICR is an official journal of the International Cytokine & Interferon Society. Complete tables of content and a sample issue may be viewed on the Journal of Interferon & Cytokine Research (JICR) website.

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Interleukin-27: Can a cytokine with both pro & anti-inflammatory activity make a good drug target?

Transhumanism - Human Genetic Engineering - Ultimate Metasolution to humanity #39;s Metaproblems
Find out why at Project Prometheus we feel the ultimate metasolution to solving humanity #39;s problems is to work at the foundational building block - ourselves...

By: Project Prometheus

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Transhumanism - Human Genetic Engineering - Ultimate Metasolution to humanity's Metaproblems - Video

8 hours ago by Alvin Powell In his talk, Adapting Species to a Changing World: The Potential of Genome Editing, Professor George Church spoke about his efforts to engineer a mammoth from its closest living relative, the African elephant, while also discussing the primary goal of such technology: improving human health. Credit: Ann Wang

Mammoth DNA in recovered cells frozen for thousands of years is likely too fragmented to clone an animal, according to Harvard geneticist George Church. So he's working instead to engineer one genetically from a close relative, the Asian elephant.

Genetic studies have shown that the Asian elephant is more closely related to the extinct mammoth than to its closest living relative, the African elephant. That provides scientists with the basic stock to build a mammoth, said Church, the Robert Winthrop Professor of Genetics at Harvard Medical School.

"The Asian elephant and the mammoth are really close, closer than the African elephant," Church said during a lecture yesterday. "We're assuming that the Asian elephant is basically right, a mutant [mammoth] that has a problem living at minus 50 C."

Church acknowledged there are important differences between the two animals and said current efforts are aimed at one key contrast: cold tolerance. Increasing that in Asian elephants would mean changing several traits, such as adding a double fur coat and a thick layer of fat to keep out the cold, and reducing ear size to cut heat loss. Church said researchers are testing possible changes in lab cultures and are still several years from trying them out in an elephant.

Church's mammoth work is part of a kaleidoscope of research efforts fueled by genetic engineering, he said. While health and medical goals are driving down the price of genome analysis and fostering the development of new technology, some of the most far-reaching applicationslike resurrecting the mammoth and other extinct creatureslie outside human health.

Another potential non-medical use involves using genetic engineering to manage existing species, such as building malaria resistance into mosquitoes to minimize the human suffering the disease causes, or "de-evolving" the herbicide resistance weeds develop over time to restore a herbicide's effectiveness.

Church spoke at the Harvard Museum of Natural History, one of the Harvard Museums of Science & Culture (HMSC). His presentation, "Adapting Species to a Changing World: The Potential of Genome Editing," was before a crowd of several hundred in a packed Geological Lecture Hall. He was introduced by HMSC Executive Director Jane Pickering.

Though much of Church's talk focused on "de-extinction" and the genetic engineering of species, he also discussed the primary goal of such technology: improving human health. With the cost of decoding the genome having dropped from $3 billion to $999, cheap, widespread genetic analysis may help people understand their risk for genetically influenced ailments. Rapid, portable analysis could be used in the environment to detect potential infectious agents, and in the doctor's office to guide more effective care.

Church acknowledged that many medical conditions have a complex genetic background and are influenced by several genessometimes even several hundred genesbut said there can be a relative handful that outstrip others in importance and so provide therapeutic targets. For example, height has been shown to be influenced by 700 genes, but just a couple, affecting growth hormone production and use, are known to have a sizeable effect on getting taller.

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Genetic engineering may undercut human diseases, but also could help restore extinct species, researcher says

PUBLIC RELEASE DATE:

16-Oct-2014

Contact: Kathryn Ryan kryan@liebertpub.com 914-740-2100 Mary Ann Liebert, Inc./Genetic Engineering News @LiebertOnline

New Rochelle, NY, October 16, 2014Delivering traditional emergency medical care at ground zero of natural disasters and military conflicts is challenging. First responders trained in simple integrative medicine approaches such as acupuncture, hypnosis, or biofeedback can provide adjunctive treatment to help relieve patients' pain and stress. How to teach and utilize modified techniques and their potential benefit are described in a Review article in Medical Acupuncture, a peer-reviewed journal from by Mary Ann Liebert, Inc., publishers. The article is available free on the Medical Acupuncture website at http://online.liebertpub.com/doi/full/10.1089/acu.2014.1063 until November 16, 2014.

In the article "The Roles of Acupuncture and Other Components of Integrative Medicine in Cataclysmic Natural Disasters and Military Conflicts" Richard Niemtzow, MD, PhD, MPH, Editor-in-Chief of Medical Acupuncture, a retired Air Force Colonel, and current Director of the USAF Acupuncture Center, Joint Base Andrews, Maryland; Wayne Jonas, MD, President and Chief Executive Officer of the Samueli Institute (Alexandria, VA); and coauthors from InsideSurgery, LLC (Wayne, PA) and Samueli Institute present integrative health care approaches suitable for use by emergency responders and rescuers that do not require extensive equipment, facilities, or supplies.

"These approaches are usually inexpensive and nontoxic, are inherently low-risk, do not require complicated delivery methods, and can be pushed far forward in disaster relief effort even when other resources cannot be delivered," state the authors. "Such approaches may provide significant and rapid relief for victims of disasters and wars, as well as for their caregivers."

The opinions and assertions contained herein are the private views of the authors and are not to be construed as official or as reflecting the views of the United States Air Force Medical Corps, the Air Force at large, or the Department of Defense.

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About the Journal

Medical Acupuncture, the Official Journal of the American Academy of Medical Acupuncture, is an authoritative peer-reviewed journal published bimonthly in print and online. The Journal presents evidence-based clinical articles, case reports, and research findings that integrate concepts from traditional and modern forms of acupuncture with allopathic medicine. Tables of content and a sample issue may be viewed on the Medical Acupuncture website at http://www.liebertpub.com/acu.

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Should first responders use acupuncture & integrative medicine in natural disasters & battle zones?

PUBLIC RELEASE DATE:

16-Oct-2014

Contact: Kathryn Ryan kryan@liebertpub.com 914-740-2100 Mary Ann Liebert, Inc./Genetic Engineering News @LiebertOnline

New Rochelle, NY, October 15, 2014Palliative care provided in the hospital offers known clinical benefits, and a new study shows that inpatient palliative care can also significantly lower the cost of hospitalization and the rate of readmissions. Further, the study shows the hospital can get the expertise it needs through a collaborative relationship with a community hospice. The results of a comparative study are published in Journal of Palliative Medicine, a peer-reviewed journal from Mary Ann Liebert, Inc., publishers. The article is available free on the Journal of Palliative Medicine website until November 15, 2014.

In the article "A Hospice-Hospital Partnership: Reducing Hospitalization Costs and 30-Day Readmissions among Seriously Ill Adults (http://online.liebertpub.com/doi/full/10.1089/jpm.2013.0612)," John Tangeman, MD, Christopher Kerr, MD, PhD, and Pei Grant, PhD, Center for Hospice and Palliative Care (Cheektowaga, NY), and Carole Rudra, PhD, MPH, Rudra Research (Buffalo, NY), compared cost per hospital admission and readmission rates among patients who received inpatient palliative care to those who did not at two hospitals in western New York.

"Palliative care has been proven to deliver on the value equation," says Charles F. von Gunten, MD, PhD, Editor-in-Chief of Journal of Palliative Medicine and Clinical Professor of Medicine, Ohio University. "To be successful, every health system will want to maximize its investment in palliative care to deliver the highest quality of care at the lowest cost."

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Journal of Palliative Medicine is the official journal of the Center to Advance Palliative Care (CAPC) and an official journal of the Hospice and Palliative Nurses Association

About the Journal

Journal of Palliative Medicine, published monthly in print and online, is an interdisciplinary journal that reports on the clinical, educational, legal, and ethical aspects of care for seriously ill and dying patients. The Journal includes coverage of the latest developments in drug and non-drug treatments for patients with life-threatening diseases including cancer, AIDS, cardiac disease, pulmonary, neurological, and respiratory conditions, and other diseases. The Journal reports on the development of palliative care programs around the United States and the world and on innovations in palliative care education. Tables of content and a sample issue can be viewed on the Journal of Palliative Medicine website.

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Study shows inpatient palliative care reduces hospital costs and readmissions

PUBLIC RELEASE DATE:

16-Oct-2014

Contact: Kathryn Ryan kryan@liebertpub.com 914-740-2100 Mary Ann Liebert, Inc./Genetic Engineering News @LiebertOnline

New Rochelle, NY, October 16, 2014To treat the debilitating anemia associated with reduced erythropoietin (EPO) production by the kidneys in chronic renal disease, patients are often given recombinant human EPO to increase hemoglobin levels. But that treatment has risks. A new approach that uses a small interfering RNA (siRNA) drug to stimulate natural EPO production by the liver has shown promising results in nonhuman primates, as reported in Nucleic Acid Therapeutics, a peer-reviewed journal from Mary Ann Liebert, Inc. publishers. The article is available free on the Nucleic Acid Therapeutics website until November 16, 2014.

Marc T. Abrams and colleagues, Merck Research Laboratories (West Point, PA and Boston, MA), designed a siRNA drug that targets and inhibits expression of the EGLN1 gene, thereby blocking production of a protein called prolyl-4-hydrolase 2 (PHD2). The liver normally makes only small amounts of EPO in adult primates and humans, but one dose of the siRNA drug led to increased levels of EPO and hemoglobin in the blood of the primates. The siRNA effect was dose-dependent and was sustained for at least two months, report the authors in the article "A Single Dose of EGLN1 siRNA Yields Increased Erythropoiesis in Nonhuman Primates."

"The translational relevance of this paper is that it successfully advances the in vivo therapeutic investigation of PHD inhibitors from previous mouse-based work to achieve increased serum EPO and hemoglobin in a primate model, " says Executive Editor Graham C. Parker, PhD, The Carman and Ann Adams Department of Pediatrics, Wayne State University School of Medicine, Children's Hospital of Michigan, Detroit, MI.

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About the Journal

Nucleic Acid Therapeutics is an authoritative, peer-reviewed journal published bimonthly in print and online that focuses on cutting-edge basic research, therapeutic applications, and drug development using nucleic acids or related compounds to alter gene expression. The Journal is under the editorial leadership of Co-Editors-in-Chief Bruce A. Sullenger, PhD, Duke Translational Research Institute, Duke University Medical Center, Durham, NC, and C.A. Stein, MD, PhD, City of Hope National Medical Center, Duarte, CA; and Executive Editor Graham C. Parker, PhD. Nucleic Acid Therapeutics is the official journal of the Oligonucleotide Therapeutics Society. Complete tables of content and a sample issue may be viewed on the Nucleic Acid Therapeutics website.

About the Society

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Novel RNAi-based therapy for anemia stimulates liver to produce EPO