Genetically Modified Chickens!

[catterbug]

This really frustrates me. I just don't understand why we can't let God's perfect creations be the way they were perfectly created. I try not to eat anything that has been genetically modified which is VERY difficult. Everything has corn and soy in it!!!

 

[Mac_]

When the USDA had it's listening sessions regarding NAIS, I called my senators' offices and representative's office and got an e-mail address for the staff member that dealt with ag issues.

I've already e-mailed them about this issue with a link.

Maybe we could find out who at the USDA or FDA is responsible for approving gen. modified food products and e-mail that person too.

Below is an e-mail re: GM alfalfa with a link:

Dear CFSA Members: The USDA has acknowledged that there organic farmers may suffer harm if it approves Monsanto's request for approval of genetically engineered alfalfa. But the agency may go ahead and approve it anyway.

If USDA decides to allow GE alfalfa to be planted, it sets a bad precedent for future decisions about GE crops and puts organic farmers at risk of widespread GE contamination. Rather than rushing through this process to keep the biotech industry happy, the agency needs to slow down and do a real assessment of the harm that GE alfalfa could do.

So far 23,000 supporters have emailed President Obama and the U.S. Department of Agriculture urging them to slow this approval but we need more. Please take a few seconds of your time to take action. This online tool makes it quick and easy:

http://salsa.democracyinaction.org/dia/track.jsp?v=2&c=n7rYqqByy49mw0BoO7Ca1heElDXqVDz9

Thanks

Roland

Roland McReynolds, Esq.
Executive Director
Carolina Farm Stewardship Association

 

[95yj]

Quote:
i completely agree with you about not trying to screw with the DNA of everything, but humans created all the chickens as you see them now, the raw base, jungle fowl, was Gods creation, but any domestic breed of livestock or field crop are a mostly human creation

 

[Mac_]

Quote:
i completely agree with you about not trying to screw with the DNA of everything, but humans created all the chickens as you see them now, the raw base, jungle fowl, was Gods creation, but any domestic breed of livestock or field crop are a mostly human creation

But, there is a HUGE difference between selective breeding and gene splicing in a laboratory. At least in my opinion.

 

[95yj]

oh yeah, i completly agree. selective breeding is slightly altering nature in a natural way, genetically modifying dna is just wrong. i was just being a PITA...

 

[gumbii]

from science point of view, selective breeding is genetic engineering... the DNA of a selectively bred show bird is different than the DNA of a wild jungle fowl or whatever it came from...

also, genetic engineering isn't always altering DNA... the government also does selective breeding at times to get different animals... even if it's artificial insemination, it's still selective breeding...

 

[ivan3]

Etches says the promise of the glowing bird is that it offers a cheaper and easier way to grow the important human antibodies that fight killer diseases.

Current methods for producing human antibodies use large batches of costly and complicated cell cultures from the ovaries of Chinese hamsters. The largest factory using this method will be Genentech's soon-to-be expanded production facility in Vacaville, said company spokeswoman Kelli Wilder.

There, Genentech manufactures two successful therapeutic antibodies for fighting cancer, Herceptin for breast cancer and rituximab for lymphoma.

Using chickens instead of huge factory tanks of cells promises to simplify and reduce the cost of producing therapeutic antibodies. As Etches says, "You just collect the eggs, separate the yolk from the white, and purify the (antibody)."

http://www.hintonnews.net/health/060822-shns-chicken.html

Technically a chimera, `fashionably' speaking.

Traditional engineering can work very rapidly: http://www.hum.utah.edu/~bbenham/2510 Spring 09/Behavior Genetics/Farm-Fox Experiment.pdf​

 

[Mac_]

The quest to find a solution for bird flu (which doesn’t include updating the current inefficient and needless cruel system of large-scale factory farming) has resulted in a team of UK scientists creating the world’s first genetically modified chicken incapable of spreading the bird flu.


The GM fowl came about after scientists at Edinburgh University and the University of Cambridge inserted an artificially created gene with the bird flu virus into the chickens. The result was birds that are infected with the virus but incapable of infecting other hens.

The scientific research and findings, recently published in Britain’s Science journal, explains that the scientists believe they can create an entire range of genetically engineered farm animals that are resistant to a range of viral diseases.

http://www.greenmuze.com/animals/farm/3482-the-uks-franken-chicken.html​

 

[Mac_]

Scientists have developed genetically modified chickens that don't transmit bird flu to other chickens.
This achievement could stop bird flu outbreaks from spreading within poultry flocks and possibly reduce the risk of bird flu epidemics that could lead to flu virus epidemics in humans, according to the researchers at the Universities of Cambridge and Edinburgh in the United Kingdom.

The scientists developed the chickens by introducing a gene that makes a "decoy" molecule that mimics a crucial control element of the bird flu virus. This molecule interferes with the replication cycle of the virus.

http://www.businessweek.com/lifestyle/content/healthday/648772.html​

 

[Mac_]

To produce these chickens, the Cambridge and Edinburgh scientists introduced a new gene that manufactures a small "decoy" molecule that mimics an important control element of the bird flu virus. The replication machinery of the virus is tricked into recognising the decoy molecule instead of the viral genome and this interferes with the replication cycle of the virus.

When the transgenic chickens were infected with avian flu, they became sick but did not transmit the infection on to other chickens kept in the same pen with them. This was the case even if the other chickens were normal (non-transgenic) birds.

Dr Tiley continued, "The decoy mimics an essential part of the flu virus genome that is identical for all strains of influenza A. We expect the decoy to work against all strains of avian influenza and that the virus will find it difficult to evolve to escape the effects of the decoy. This is quite different from conventional flu vaccines, which need to be updated in the face of virus evolution as they tend only to protect against closely matching strains of virus and do not always prevent spread within a flock."

http://www.physorg.com/news/2011-01-gm-chickens-dont-transmit-bird.html



"...the virus will find it difficult to evolve to escape the effects of the decoy."

Wanna bet? Look at the problems from the over use of antibiotics.​