Genetics

by Ayelet Hines

For many people, the developments in genetic engineering conjure such images like designer test tube babies, slave clones, a caste system based on genetic perfection or a day when males and their sperm are obsolete. Indeed, this new technology tightens humanity's grip on nature unlike any other-except perhaps the nuclear bomb.

Genetic selection is not a new science. For thousands of years, humans have altered the organisms around them to suit their needs. Scientists have been fiddling with genes since the 1970s, but combining DNA from unrelated species takes artificial selection to new heights, with promises that miracle crops, "improved livestock" and manipulated bacteria can eradicate illness and world hunger and let us live forever. The complex problems associated with genetic engineering stem not from the basic science but from our arrogance and ignorance.

Transgenic organisms are not inherently dangerous. The environmental risk is that an organism's new traits will produce unwanted results. Because a trait is produced by combination of genes, one gene can produce several traits, and the inserted genetic material often acts as a wild card.

What are the effects of bioengineering? They could be very slight or they could be great. At this stage of the game we just don't know. The more important question is how we'll assess the risks.

As the genetic library grows, researchers have more genes than ever to draw upon and manipulate. Geneticists can now tailor the genes of any organism to produce new characteristics. At first glance, the attentive reader might ask, "Natural mutation and traditional breeding practices produce organisms with new traits all the time, so why should genetic engineering be of greater concern?"

It may seem fairly benign to take a gene from a cold-water fish and put it in an orange cell to create frost-resistant orange trees. Of course, the environmental risks of this technology depend on, among other things, the nature of the organism, its location, the characteristic of the gene and the ability of this gene to move to other "non-target" organisms.

The risk of backfire becomes increasingly likely as the technology moves out of the controlled laboratory into the great outdoors, where experimenters have far less influence over growing conditions. Researchers are ready for the roulette, however, with the addition of certain genes, produce could become easier to transport, less costly to process and have a longer shelf life (How much easier it would be if oranges were square!). Who knows? Perhaps in the near future food could be engineered to have greater nutritional value.

Proponents of genetic engineering claim that herbicide-tolerant crops open up weed-killing options for farmers, since farmers could soak their fields with chemicals that would only affect weeds that don't contain new-fangled, herbicide-resistant genes. Coincidentally, most of these transgenic crops are being developed by, or in conjunction with, the same chemical companies that sell the herbicides the plants have been engineered to resist.

Here's a real-life example: Monsanto has inserted a gene into a oil-seed rape plant to make it resistant to the herbicide Roundup, which it also manufactures. Farmers plant seeds derived from this plant and then buy huge amounts of Roundup to spray on their crops, so the herbicide kills all the plants except the oil-seed rape that is resistant to it. Proponents acknowledge that crops will require the continued use of the chemicals, but claim fewer applications will be necessary. That is, until the weeds become resistant to the herbicide too, in which case the use of Roundup will skyrocket. Some dream of the day when, thanks to genetic engineering, researchers will be able to insert genes into plants so that less toxic chemicals can replace the poisons in use today. This, however, only furthers our dependence on toxins and a failing system of agriculture. At the corporate feeding trough, even genes have become a commodity.

Resistance to pests such as fungi, viruses and insects is another promise of biology's new toy. This use of the technology creates plants that produce toxins themselves, rather than making them resistant to an applied toxin. When crops have built-in pesticides, say proponents, farmers won't have to rely on chemicals, right? These potential benefits are short-lived at best, only lasting as long as pests aren't resistant to the toxins engineered into the plants.

New traits such as resistance to disease or insects could enable a plant to overcome ecological limitations on population growth. These traits might give an engineered plant the upper hand, driving out native species. With the invasion of non-native species as the second most prominent cause of dwindling biodiversity, after loss of habitat, the threat of engineered plants disturbing ecosystems becomes a real nightmare. For example, if a new genetic combination in corn yielded a plant with greater frost resistance, the altered plants could transfer the new genes via pollen or insects to their wild relatives, enabling the wild plants to survive in colder climates and possibly displace other species. These effects could reverberate throughout an entire ecosystem, since, once wild plants are crowded out by engineered ones, other species dependent on the native plants could be lost.

Ready-made pesticides and drugs are rarely selective enough to avoid killing unintended targets. In fact, new chemicals produced by a plant might kill beneficial organisms associated with it. Transgenic crops used as "factories" for pharmaceuticals and other chemicals intended for human use can expose microbes, insects, birds and other non-targets to drugs, vaccines, enzymes, etc. These chemicals could quite possibly wash into rivers, lakes and streams, affecting aquatic critters. Additionally, virus-resistant transgenic crops invite development of new viruses, as they, too, evolve for survival.

Those in favor of genetic engineering will tell you that the risks posed by manipulated organisms are no greater than those of naturally occurring ones. All living things contain mutations that are the engine driving the evolutionary train. Perhaps the greatest difference is that evolution is patient, allowing more control over the expression of new genes; genetic engineering, on the other hand, works against the clock. Evolution doesn't teach us about combining genes from dramatically different organisms. It would never have produced a creature that was half goat, half sheep, like the "gheep" bred in the '80s.

The US Patent and Trademark Office has already announced that all forms of life on Earth are "patentable." Already pharmaceutical companies are "bioprospecting," patenting genes from blood samples of indigenous populations in the developing world in search of unique genes. A gene from a native Panamanian woman has already been patented in an effort partly funded by the US Department of Commerce. If we don't get this genie back in its bottle, our kids will grow up thinking that the intrinsic value of life is no greater than the value of the other manufactured junk collecting dust on the shelves at Wal-Mart.

Some possible uses of the technology are extremely insidious; the Pentagon admits it has been conducting "defensive" research programs on biological warfare, exploring the use of pathogens such as botulism and yellow fever. The people with the resources understand the potential power of transgenics. It was no coincidence that the Atomic Energy Commission awarded the research grant to James Watson and Francis Crick in 1953 that lead to the discovery of the structure of DNA.

Thanks to the global economy, the risks of this technology span the globe. Since practically all the research is done in the Northern Hemisphere, we're even more clueless about the effects it will have on other locales. Developing nations, buying their seeds from northern suppliers, will be hit hardest by this ignorance and increased dependency on the industrialized world.

The question persists: "Doesn't genetic engineering offer the possibility of feeding the world?" Probably not. Most of the research is being done on crops that grow in the North, and world hunger is a far more complex issue than mere crop yield. Besides, would any industry invest billions of dollars into any technology for the sake of altruism? The introduction of new genes into cultivated plants, or worse, the wild relatives that constitute the basic diversity from which our food plants derive, threatens the genetic base of the world's food supply.

The bottom line is that we don't have enough experience to make any meaningful predictions. We would be wise to err on the side of caution. The farmer's field is even less controlled than the experimental plot, and molecular biologists are not qualified to assess the impact of their creations on an entire ecosystem.

So how extensive should regulations be on genetic engineering? The uncertainties involved will become far less acceptable as the technology is brought out of the laboratories. The public should weigh the potential risks and benefits of each scenario, determining which applications encourage sustainable agriculture and which further chemical dependency. Currently the public doesn't hold the reins on this technology, but the stakes are too enormous to place our confidences in the hands of government, corporations or geneticists.

The world has seen the systematic elimination of "undesirable" traits before. The idea of creating more perfect species was attempted 50 years ago by a man named Adolf Hitler, resulting in the deliberate removal of nine million people from the human gene pool. When people in labs, boardrooms or military offices decide which genes are good or bad, they're practicing eugenics. These cases are not too similar because I'd venture to guess that nearly all scientists pursue bioengineering with good intentions. But when humans try to improve on nature, the consequent suffering is often incomprehensible.

With the advent of biotechnology comes an urgent ecological and social responsibility. We must make a choice. Do we want to have a stranglehold on the living world, or are we going to take part in it like the rest of creation? Biotechnology sets us once again at a crossroads, facing the path of sustainability and compassion, or that of domination and profits. We no longer have to wait for nature to do her thing. It was a wise person who said, "He that increases knowledge increases sorrow." If we don't apply the brakes to the new genetic technology, the Frankenstein we create may be beyond our ability to control.