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If you eat a transgenic tomato, your fingers will stick out on your own become a vegetable – the press paints. About how really dangerous genetically modified foods tells geneticist.
EXPERT Ruslana Radchuk, Researcher, Department of Molecular genetics of the Institute of Genetics of Cultivated Plants (Gatersleben, Germany)
– Can genes of GM plants integrate into human DNA?
– There are only a few cases of horizontal transfer ( there are not genes from the parent, but from species to species) genes from the plant to the plant, and the transfer and incorporation of DNA from plants to animals does not not once been observed.
“That’s good, but the experiment would be much more convincing …”
– Scientists tracked the fate of plant DNA in the digestive path of experimental animals and found its fragments in various organs. A logical question arose: since foreign DNA enters the organs, can it not enter the germ cells or fetus, which means to be transmitted to offspring?
But further studies have shown that foreign DNA does not crosses the placenta and does not integrate into the fetal genome, even if it is injected directly into the blood of pregnant females. Strictly speaking, only after these experiments it became clear that it is possible without fear eat any food. After all, the genes of ordinary potatoes can be integrated into the human genome with the same probability as the genes of a GM vegetable.
– Opponents of GMOs like to say that the DNA of such an organism artificially modified, so its properties are different from those “ordinary.”
– In terms of genetics, modern agricultural wheat or corn – monsters, unattainable peaks for biotechnological engineering. They mixed a few different genomes, they are seasoned with allergens and active mutagens.
And apparently these creatures are different from the wild ancestor before total gigantic size. And these plants are the work of the ancient a person who did not know what DNA is. Compared to them GMOs like batteries near a nuclear power plant. And at the same time, we are in earnest We do not discuss the risk of alkali leakage.
– What is more dangerous for humans – GMOs or pesticides and herbicides?
– Most pesticides are dangerous to human health, and when GMO cultivation does not need so much. In press it is widely believed that once GMOs are specially designed resistant to herbicides, which means they are treated much more often and more. It is not true. Fields with transgenic plants watered no more conventional herbicides. At the same time, traditionally cultivated soybeans or cereals are often processed defoliant herbicides (they destroy the leaves) right before collection.
– Why are there so few GM plants on the market today? Where is going delay?
– The biggest problem for promoting GM plants is very expensive and unjustifiably regulated tolerances. Second moment – There are still few potentially competitive plants. And finally The third major hurdle is consumer rejection. As a result, on The market now has a very small assortment of transgenic plants. AND By the way, these are not “plastic” tomatoes or glossy apples from supermarket.
Plant DNA
