Scientists Genetically Engineer the World's First Blue Chrysanthemum (sciencemag.org) 75
sciencehabit shares an article from Science magazine: True blue flowers are a rarity in nature -- they occur only in select species like morning glories and delphiniums. Now, researchers have created a genuinely blue chrysanthemum by adding two genes to the normally pink or reddish flower. The advance could be applied to other species -- and it may mean that florists wanting to hawk blooms of blue will no longer have to dye them...
The next step for Noda and his colleagues is to make blue chrysanthemums that can't reproduce and spread into the environment, making it possible to commercialize the transgenic flower. But that approach could spell trouble in some parts of the world. "As long as GMO [genetically modified organism] continues to be a problem in Europe, blue [flowers] face a difficult economic future," predicts Ronald Koes, a plant molecular biologist at the University of Amsterdam who was not involved with the work.
The next step for Noda and his colleagues is to make blue chrysanthemums that can't reproduce and spread into the environment, making it possible to commercialize the transgenic flower. But that approach could spell trouble in some parts of the world. "As long as GMO [genetically modified organism] continues to be a problem in Europe, blue [flowers] face a difficult economic future," predicts Ronald Koes, a plant molecular biologist at the University of Amsterdam who was not involved with the work.
i will never forget... (Score:2)
... where I was at that moment.
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Blue people are less scary than black people?
Of course. How many people are afraid of Blue Man Group [h-cdn.co]? None.
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I'm pretty sure a lot of people in the southern states in the USA tried this already, and they remained scared of black people. Of course, instead of genetic modification, they just beat the hell out of a lot of black people to make them blue.
Next up - Na'vi (Score:2)
And scientists are just starting to create designer humans.
"My own suspicion is that the Universe is not only queerer than we suppose, but queerer than we can suppose" JBS Haldane
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>And scientists are just starting to create designer humans.
The problem with Na'vi (beyond their impossible weird psychic hair-link with trees) is that only an adult would consider altering themselves to be a giant blue North American Indian analog, but it looks very much like any kind of macroscopic change needs to be done when you're just a single cell... so that kind of change is for your kids.
I think we can argue about engineering healthier, stronger, longer-living, smarter, more emotionally stable c
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http://www.npr.org/sections/th... [npr.org]
Commercialization Trumps all other concerns (Score:1)
I think the real reason for the necessary "next step" is not concerns about spread of blue flowers into the environment (what could be the harm?) but the inability to control the supply the flowers. So while I find the science interesting, I call BS where I see transparent stab at anti-GMO over making the plant sterile, when clearly the whole thing is an example of GMO.
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Patents already cover that. Next time you're looking at potted flowers, check out how many of them have tags that say 'Propagation Prohibited' under the patent number. The floriculture industry always has something new and patented on store shelves. Sterility is not necessary for market control, unless someone somewhere is illegally violating your patent.
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BLUE? HA! (Score:2)
Blue? HA! That's NOTHIN'! This guy on Amazon has seeds that turn RAINBOW:
https://smile.amazon.com/Loveb... [amazon.com]
Amazing what a bit of photoshop and some gullible people will do for your pocket book, eh?
It's not GMOs that people object to. (Score:5, Informative)
Informed individuals don't have a problem with GMOs, they have a problem with companies that want absolute control of GMOs. While this is a novel thing they have made, the vast majority of GMOs are to make plants resist increasingly caustic herbicides/pesticides. The problem with this is that despite how much you clean it, trace amount of the herbicides/pesticides remain on the plant and if ingested then become part of you and there is no real research into the long term effects of this. What's worse is that herbicides/pesticides don't just land on the crops, trace amounts are in the air which can be enough to kill unmodified plants. On top of that, being unable to use seeds from a previous generation of plant forces a continual dependence on a corporation which is only harmful to everyone but the GMO owner.
TL;DR: GMOs are fine but corporations are assholes who don't care if you live or die.
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I think I found the flaw in your logic. It applies to vaccines as well.
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Unfortunately vaccines and GMO have nothing in common. ...
The first one is a life saver and the last one a permanent risk.
And yes: I'm informed about both as we learn about both in school from about age 10 or 12 on
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Of course it is more or less one sided. :D
It is a school book after all.
And probably the facts in the book are 20 years outdated, happens often in biology or sports
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The first one is a life saver and the last one a permanent risk.
You should pick up a history book then. Because dousing a rag with cider vinegar and covering your face was considered a life saver against the plague and flu. And vaccines were considered a permanent risk.
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Having a vinegar rag over your face is indeed helping against catching bacteria, and in case of flue, it will at least filter the air and reduce the risk of catching it.
However plague is mainly transmitted via flea bites.
I was of the opinion that the anti vaxing ... oh ... vaccing ... shit red underlined, too ... anyway: the anti scene agains vaccination (ha! not red!) is a new phenomenon?
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This is why opposition to plant patents makes no sense. Either patented plants are useful, in which case patents are clearly beneficial because they allow crop breeders to make a living and continue to make desirable new varieties, or the patents are not useful, in which case, it really doesn't mater if they are patented because you would be better off freely growing the older non-patented varieties.
The problem is, in their effort to demonize every single aspect of GE crops, the anti-GMO people want to hav
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The problem with plant patents is their abuse e.g. by companies like Monsanto.
Some stray seeds land on your ground, the plant grows, they sue you for patent infringement and surprisingly won often enough to sue farmers into poverty and losing all their land.
Why a court has no common sense that plants have seeds and they grow where they drop is beyond me.
We are not talking about farmers who had a field full with crops from patents but a few single plants.
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I have never heard of a single case of that happening. The only cases where someone has gotten sued over cross pollination are those where someone then knowingly, purposefully selects for and propagates the transgenic material. If you don't want sued, don't violate patent law.
If that did happen, yes, it would be terrible. But when the Organic Seed Growers and Trade Association filed a lawsuit against Monsanto a few years back, they were unable to provide a single instance of that happening when the judge
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First hit on a google search:
https://www.theguardian.com/en... [theguardian.com]
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That doesn't at all disprove what I said. AS I mentioned, Monsanto does sue people. It is a well known and undeniable fact that they do. What I said is that they have never been documented to have sued someone for simple cross pollination, and that the cases I know of were justifiable, and could have been avoided had patents not been intentionally violated. I somehow doubt that the Center for Food Safety mentioned in your link, a group well known for their anti-GE activism, goes out of their way to ment
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Monsanto is suing people who have done nothing wrong into bankruptcy and poverty.
That was my point, you can find enough stuff about that yourself.
That was not one of the cross pollination cases (more of someone trying to get circumvent patent law with a perceived loophole), however the Supreme Court would later unanimously and in my opinion justly rule in favor of Monsanto.
Actually it was not a cross pollination, some seeds of surrounding fields dropped on his fields. So he lost his farm for a couple of ran
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Actually it was not a cross pollination, some seeds of surrounding fields dropped on his fields. So he lost his farm for a couple of random plants. Not for a paten violation ...
Vernon Hugh Bowman bought the seeds as commodities - not as something to be planted. Then he tested them to see if some were resistant to pesticide, and they were. Then he grew them, and then planted a second generation of them. Then he sold the resulting crop. This wasn't about 'a couple of random plants' - this was someone who deliberately went out of their way to knowingly make money off of someone else's patented seeds.
The court ruled that, just like any other patented item, he could do pretty much an
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I don't know about this particular case.
However if he bought the seeds and then panted them it hardly would be a patent violation in the rest of the world.
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if he bought the seeds and then panted them it hardly would be a patent violation in the rest of the world.
Even in Canada [wikipedia.org] it wouldn't matter how you got them - if you make copies without permission, you're violating the patent.
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By planting seeds you bought, regardless from the producer or a third party that bought them from a the producer, you hardly infringe a patent.
After all that is their intended purpose.
There would be a patent violation if I would use monsantos seeds to breed a new kind of plant.
Or do they argue, that you not only have to buy the seeds but also require a license to plant them?
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By planting seeds you bought, regardless from the producer or a third party that bought them from a the producer, you hardly infringe a patent. After all that is their intended purpose. There would be a patent violation if I would use monsantos seeds to breed a new kind of plant.
That's the 'blame-the-bean' defense and would undermine the entire purpose of patenting anything that can self-replicate. You might as well argue that you didn't steal a car, but only pushed some buttons and pedals and the car moved on its own. Or that requiring me to burn all of my newspapers immediately after printing them doesn't really infringe on my freedom of the press since I did get to print whatever I wanted. I'm sorry, but that's just childish.
Or do they argue, that you not only have to buy the seeds but also require a license to plant them?
You don't have to buy the seeds - just like books you
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So, and how does then the legitimated use work?
With your explanation no farmer could use the seeds.
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So, and how does then the legitimated use work? With your explanation no farmer could use the seeds.
The same way a publisher gets the right to make copies of a book - they make a deal with the person who owns the rights. This goes back to what you said about needing to buy and license - you don't need to buy, but you do need a license.
It's the same as (say) Harry Potter - you can get the books any of they ways you can get paper, or water, or any other commodity, but you can't photocopy them and sell them, or sell derivative works (movies, an illustrated version of the books, a new book with the same cha
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I really shouldn't feed the troll, but this was too good to pass up.
> Look at the rantings of the vegan/vegetarian ...
Oh look! Another meat eater ranting about others who don't agree with their myopic view! How ironic!
You DO realize that people have been vegan/vegetarian for THOUSANDS of years, right?
> /. is evidence of what exposure to pesticides does.
1. [[citation]]
2. FTFY. Ironically this is evidence YOU don't know to capitalize only the _first_ word in a sentence. Why are you capitalizing "Is" ???
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Plants don't produce useful forms of vitamin B12. If you don't get vitamin B12 (available from animal sources and chemical factories) your nervous system doesn't develop properly.
Those vegetarians before vitamins became commercially available, who were not brain damaged, got their B12 from impure food: insect vermin in their grains, vegetables, and fruit.
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For the most part, our crops are not particularly fit in the wild. They are to the wild plants what pugs are to wolves. A change made by genetic engineering will typically be pretty minor compared to the other aspects of the species. With drought and virus resistance, those have only been applied to corn and papaya/summer squash, respectively, and thus far there hasn't been any major ecological issues, although transgenes have been found in wild squash populations. You occasionally have canola or papaya
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Your post only serves to prove that GMOs are exactly what people oppose. You mention corporate control of them, and yet, plenty of non-genetically engineered crops varieties are also patented. Besides that, those patents expire, like all patents...Monsanto's first generation of GE soybean is now available as an off patent generic...and you fail to clarify what is wrong with a system whereby one makes something superior, gains control of it for a limited time to recoup their R&D costs, then it falls int
Genuine Blue? (Score:3)
So... Most flowers that look blue are somehow not really "genuine" blue? Could we get some explanation of that? Our local bluebells and bluebonnets look pretty darn blue to my eyes. (I did once find a few mutant "pinkbonnets", by the way! They were cute.)
The word "blue" has held varied meanings, and what computer systems today define as blue -- the B in our RGB scheme -- would have been regarded as indigo or violet in the not-too-distant past.
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If the flowers really look blue, then they are blue. However many (perhaps most) flowers "called" blue actually have red components in their color, and are thus some bluey shade of purple of violet. Blue flowers definitely exists, but are a minority for both evolutionary and (related) biochemical reasons.
The principal claim of "few blue flowers" is really about the commercial flower trade. The major flowers sold by florists are roses, chrysanthemums, carnations, lilies, and gerberas none of whom have any tr
Blue Bunny (Score:1)
Next the Blue Bunny that brings me Ice Cream!
Europeans don't eat chrysanthemums (Score:2)
So they won't have to worry about the GMO flowers turning them into autistic zombies.
The Japanese do eat chrysanthemums, so since this was their idea clearly they don't have a problem either.