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February 2, 2011
· Organic farmers sue agribusiness giant
· NPR’s bias against genetic engineering
· Kansas plan lets illegals stay on the job
· Corn gene helps fight many leaf diseases
· Nature’s best made better for biofuels
Organic farmers sue agribusiness giant
(voanews.com) – Food activist Gianni Ortiz joined with others to protest the Monsanto Company's legal actions against organic small farms, January 31, 2012.
A group of small farmers and activists gathered outside
federal district court in
The group is petitioning the court to prevent the company from suing association members for patent infringement if its genetically modified plants are found on its members’ farms.
In a written statement, Monsanto spokesman Thomas Helscher said "Monsanto never has and never will sue a farmer if our patented seed or traits are found in his field as a result of inadvertent means.”
But Gianni Ortiz, founder and director of FarmAssist Productions, a nonprofit advocacy group for small farms, says she is aware of nearly 900 court cases in which Monsanto won damages from farmers because their crops contained plants grown from its genetically modified organisms, or GMOs.
Ortiz says that one case Monsanto did not win involved a non-organic Canadian farmer. “There was truckload of GMO seed going from ’Point A’ to ‘Point B.’ The tarp came off the top of the truck and their seed blew into his field, and they went after him for years. They are very aggressive," she said.
Ortiz does not deny that Monsanto products have been used illegally by some farmers, but she says organic farmers have a compelling financial reason not to do so.
“This group of farmers, they clearly do not want anything to do with their genes, their [i.e., Monsanto's] pollens [and] their seeds because they will lose their certification. So if they do wind up being contaminated, they are the ones who should be collecting damages, not Monsanto," she said.
Advocates for organic farmers in the Monsanto case call the lawsuit a “David versus Goliath” issue. If so, Monsanto is a Goliath that is choosing its battles. In Tuesday's hearing, Monsanto sought to have the case dismissed.
Analysis: NPR’s bias against genetic engineering
(Forbes) – National Public Radio’s treatment of scientific and environmental issues is puzzling — and irritating. While its programs cover global warming and the environment from every angle, embracing the most recent apocalyptic predictions, they permit continual attacks on genetic engineering applied to agriculture. This technology – an extension, or refinement, of widely used, less precise, less predictable techniques –is friendly to the environment, reduces CO2 released to the atmosphere and contributes to sustainable agriculture, yet NPR regularly exaggerates its risks and ignores its benefits.
The most recent example was the Jan. 3 program of syndicated talk show host Diane Rehm, a bash-fest dominated by her anti-genetic engineering chum who heads an organic yogurt company. Predictably, he advocated government-mandated labeling of foods that contain genetically engineered ingredients – never mind that such a (completely unnecessary) requirement would be costly, mislead consumers and violate the constitutional guarantee of commercial free speech.
Among the most egregious previous transgressions by NPR of fair, professional journalism was a series of programs called “The DNA Files,” which set up a false moral equivalence by juxtaposing the views of polymathic Princeton Professor Lee Silver against those of Margaret Mellon, long-time NGO-dweller, troglodyte and antagonist of any and all applications of biotechnology. This pairing was a typical example of NPR’s notion of “balance” – really “pseudo-balance”: an eminent mainstream, nonideological academic versus an intransigent, anti-industry, anti-technology, uneducable activist.
Another abdication of fair, professional journalism occurred on Dec. 12, 2011, on NPR’s “Talk of the Nation.” That day the World Wildlife Fund’s Jason Clay appeared on the program and proceeded to bash the genetic engineering of plants. The subject of the segment was “A Planet Running Low on Water.”
Clay’s rant, however, was completely misinformed, and ironic considering genetic engineering’s greatest long-term boon to food security and the environment is the creation of new crop varieties that tolerate periods of drought and other water-related stresses.
Where water is scarce, the development of crop varieties
that grow under conditions of low moisture or temporary drought could boost
yields and lengthen the time that farmland is productive. Even where irrigation
is feasible, plants that use water more efficiently are needed. Agriculture accounts for about 70% of the
world’s freshwater consumption — and more in areas of intensive farming and
arid or semi-arid conditions, such as
Where does genetic engineering come in? Plant biologists have identified genes that regulate water use and transferred them into important crop plants. These new varieties grow with smaller amounts of water or with lower-quality water, such as recycled water or water high in natural mineral salts. Egyptian researchers have shown that the transfer of a single gene from barley to wheat enables the plants to tolerate reduced watering for a longer period of time. This new, drought-resistant variety requires one-eighth the irrigation of conventional wheat and in some deserts can be cultivated with rainfall alone.
NPR has also aired a lot of uninformed commentary about a
genetically engineered, fast-growing Atlantic salmon called AquAdvantage.
This fish is indistinguishable from its wild cohorts except that it reaches its
mature size in about 40% less time because it contains a new growth hormone
gene from a Chinook salmon. Last year I
discussed the scientific and regulatory aspects of the salmon on the NPR
program “Forum,” at NPR’s KQED in
NPR aired another fishy salmon-focused segment during “Science Friday” on Dec. 9, 2011, pitting distinguished lab scientist Alison Van Eenennaam against Anne Kapuscinski, a “professor in sustainability science” (which sounds like something from The Onion) and veteran anti-science alarmist, fabulist and darling of radical environmental NGOs.
The basic scientific and risk-assessment questions
surrounding the fast-growing salmon were resolved long ago, but you wouldn’t
know it from the discussion. As responsible scientists are wont to do, Van Eenennaam made only carefully qualified, measured
statements, while Kapuscinski prattled on and on
about small risks and expressed concern about the regulatory approval of this
salmon being a worrisome “precedent” for future animals. (In spite of the fact
that every such animal undergoes an intensive — and excessive — case by case
review by FDA.) Kapuscinski
spouted a lot of obfuscatory gobbledygook about the
need for worst-case scenarios that make about as much sense as planning for
July snowstorms in
Furthermore, Kapuscinski never
acknowledged that more efficient and productive fish-farming would greatly
benefit human and environmental health.
As Steven Salzberg, professor of medicine and
bioinformatics at the
Moreover, Randall Lutter
(Resources for the Future) and Katherine Tucker (
The management, producers and program hosts at NPR fail to realize that not every issue has two sides. They have instead attached equal value to various points of view in a clumsy attempt to approximate fairness. But decision-makers in academia and government as well as the media make such decisions routinely. For example, in the 21st century we no longer argue about whether vaccines prevent childhood diseases, and financial writers don’t cover companies whose business is the development of perpetual-motion machines. By pretending that certain viewpoints are legitimate long after they have been discredited, the media prolong the pseudo-controversies and mislead their audience.
Media bias on a variety of issues is nothing new, but NPR’s biotech-bashing is an affront to two of the constituencies that provide generous subsidies to the network — the federal government and various high-tech companies. Do they really want to support a forum for baseless, mendacious anti-technology propaganda?
Henry I. Miller, a
physician and molecular biologist, is the Robert Wesson Fellow in Scientific
Philosophy and Public Policy at
Kansas
The proposal is likely to stir controversy in the
Legislature and divide the Republican majority, some of whose members have
argued
The coalition spelled out details of its proposals only days after state Agriculture Secretary Dale Rodman said he would seek a waiver from the federal government to help agribusinesses. But the coalition's representatives said their proposal would make such a step unnecessary.
Instead, the new program proposed by the groups would create
a pool of immigrant workers businesses could tap after the state certifies a
labor shortage in their industries. The state would support individual workers'
requests from the federal government for authorization to continue working in
the
"The key is, these are people that are in
But the proposal is not part of Brownback's legislative agenda, and he's not supporting it, spokeswoman Sherriene Jones-Sontag said. Asked about Rodman's earlier comments, Jones-Sontag said, "You need to talk to him." A spokeswoman for Rodman did not immediately return a telephone message seeking comment or an interview.
State Rep. Lance Kinzer, an Olathe
Republican who's pushing proposals to crack down on illegal immigration, called
the business groups' plan "amnesty" for such immigrants. He said the
state — working with Democratic President Barack Obama's administration — would
give legal status to immigrants "by fiat" despite their being in the
"It should make some people mad," Kinzer said. "A proposal like that, I think, is unlikely to make it through the legislative process."
The proposed program would be for illegal immigrants who
have been in the
Businesses would have to pay a fee of up to $5,000, plus an additional $200 for each worker, to tap the labor pool, and they'd have to agree to follow federal labor standards. Money raised by the fees would go to community groups to help finance English lessons, immunizations and other services.
The proposal comes months after the state Department of Social and Rehabilitation Services enacted a new policy Oct. 1 that reduced or denied food stamps benefits to hundreds of U.S.-born children of illegal immigrants. Legislators also are pursuing several proposals to crack down on illegal immigration.
Corn gene helps fight many leaf diseases
(USDA-ARS) – A specific gene in corn seems to confer resistance to three important leaf diseases, according to U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) scientists and their university colleagues.
This discovery, published in 2011 in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, could potentially help plant breeders build disease-resistance traits into future corn plants.
The research team included Agricultural Research Service
(ARS) plant geneticists Peter Balint-Kurti, Jim
Holland and Matt Krakowsky in the agency's Plant
Science Research Unit in
Three diseases-southern corn leaf blight, northern leaf blight, and gray leaf spot-all cause lesions on corn leaves worldwide. In the U.S. Midwest Corn Belt, northern leaf blight and gray leaf spot are significant problems.
The researchers examined 300 corn varieties from around the world to ensure a genetically diverse representation. No corn variety has complete resistance to any of these diseases, but varieties differ in the severity of symptoms they exhibit.
The researchers set out to look for maize lines with resistance to the three diseases to determine which genes underlie disease resistance, according to Balint-Kurti. When they tested the lines for resistance, they found that if a corn variety was resistant to one disease, chances were favorable that it was also resistant to the other two.
The researchers applied a statistical analysis technique called "association mapping" to identify regions of the genome associated with variation in disease resistance. According to Balint-Kurti, the scientists knew there was a strong correlation between resistance of one disease and the other two. They postulated that some resistance genes conferred resistance to two or more different diseases, and they identified a gene that seemed to confer multiple disease resistance.
This gene, a GST (glutathione S-transferase), is part of a family of genes known for their roles in regulating oxidative stress and in detoxification. Both of these functions are consistent with a role in disease resistance.
Nature’s best made better for biofuels
(PHYSORG.com) – If a tree falls in the forest and there are no enzymes to digest it, does it break down?
It's a question that has important ramifications for the renewable energy industry. Engineers are studying methods to transform non-food plant material into transportation fuel. Think alfalfa stalks or wood-chips (which have energy contained in a molecule humans can't digest called cellulose), as opposed to the edible corn grains that are used in the production of ethanol for biofuels.
"Cellulose in the biosphere can last for years,"
said Gregg Beckham, a scientist in the
Despite the strength of plant cell walls made of this tough molecule cellulose, over eons, fungi and bacteria have evolved enzymes to convert abundant cellulosic plant matter into sugars to use as an energy source to sustain life.
Breaking down in the lab
Unfortunately, these particular enzymes don't work fast enough to break down cellulose at a pace (and price) that is competitive with fossil fuels ... yet. So, computational scientists at NREL set about trying to understand and create enhanced, "designer" enzymes to speed up biofuel production and lower the cost of biomass-derived fuel to serve the global population.
"It's a Goldilocks problem," Beckham said. "The enzymes have to be 'just right,' and we're trying to find out what 'just right' is, why, and how to make mutations to the enzymes to make them most efficient."
Supercomputed proteins
In a series of linked projects, researchers used the
National Science Foundation-supported Ranger supercomputer at the
"Nature cleverly designed machinery for single-cell organisms to locate cellulose, then secrete large enzyme complexes that hold the cells near biomass while the enzymes degrade it," Beckham said.
The bacteria forms scaffolds for its enzymes, which work together to break apart the plant. The fungal enzymes, on the other hand, are not tethered to a large complex, but act independently.
It isn't clear how the enzyme scaffolds form, so the researchers created a computational model of the active molecules and set them into motion in a virtual environment. Contrary to expectations, the larger, slower-moving enzymes lingered near the scaffold longer, allowing them to bind to the frame more frequently; the smaller ones moved faster and more freely through the solution, but bound less often.
The results of the study, led by NREL researchers Yannick Bomble and Mike Crowley, were reported in the Journal of Biological Chemistry in February 2011. The insights are being used in the creation of designer enzymes to make biomass conversion faster, more efficient and less expensive.
Unexplored enzyme function
The scientists also studied parts of the enzyme called the carbohydrate binding molecule--a sticky "foot" that helps the enzymes find and guide the cellulose into their active site--and the linker region, which joins the foot to the main body of the enzyme. The carbohydrate binding molecule and linker region were long thought to play a minor role in enzyme function; yet without them, the enzyme can't convert cellulose to glucose effectively. The researchers wondered why that is.
Using the Ranger supercomputer, the researchers made several important discoveries. First, they found that the cellulose surface has energy wells that are set 1 nanometer apart, a perfect fit for the binding module. They also found that the linker region, previously believed to contain both stiff and flexible regions, behaves more like a highly flexible tether. Those insights would have been difficult to determine experimentally, but, now hypothesized and backed up with advanced computing simulations, they can be tested in the laboratory.
"It's a very messy problem for the
experimentalists," said
The research addresses the enzymatic activity bottlenecks that prevent renewable energy from cellulose containing biomass from being competitive with fossil fuels. "If we can help industry understand and improve these processes for renewable fuel production, we'll be able to offset a significant fraction of fossil fuel use in the long term," Beckham said.
Provided by National Science Foundation
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