The 2008 Beijing Olympics is only a day away as of this writing. Athletes around the world are raring to give their countrymen honor and glory by winning their respective sports nice and clean. But there has never been a “clean” Olympics. In fact, Jacques Rogge, president of the International Olympic Committee (IOC) expects about 40 positive doping results at the Beijing Games, compared to 26 positive results at the 2004 Athens Olympics. There were 12 athletes caught doping at the 2000 Olympics…

The term “designer baby” used to be found only in weblogs and sci-fi movies. But in 2004 the term made its way to the Oxford English Dictionary. The dictionary defines it as “a baby whose genetic makeup has been artificially selected by genetic engineering combined with in vitro fertilization to ensure the presence or absence of particular genes or characteristics.” From fiction to non-fiction Imagine a number of couples in a waiting room, all excitedly looking through a variety of catalogs. But…

It seems that tiny genetic modifications on an organism may have huge consequences after all. This may have an impact on the belief that certain genetically modified organisms may not pose any possible harm on humans without further testing. This may make some researcher think of making GMO’s go through more extensive testing before evaluating such organisms as safe. Although the study may have focused on how small changes in the DNA of an individual can lead to dramatic differences, this may al…

According to an article from the Science Daily website, a team of scientists have developed a pioneering approach towards boosting the levels of provitamin A in corn through selective breeding. Provitamin A is the nutrient that is converted to vitamin A upon being consumed. This new development will someday help improve the nutritional status of people in developing countries that use corn as a staple crop. The team that developed the novel approach is composed of scientists from Cornell Univers…

According to an article in the Science Daily website, researchers have been able to develop a method of producing biofuels by genetically modifying the E. coli bacteria and making it into an efficient biofuel synthesizer. A team of researchers from UCLA Henry Samueli School of Engineering and Applied Science, made up of professor of chemical and biomolecular engineering James Liao, visiting professor Taizo Hanai and post doctoral fellow Shota Atsumi, modified key pathways in the E. coli bacteria…

According to an article on the Science Daily website, scientists have been able to genetically engineer a mosquito that is able to release a protein found in sea cucumbers that may help impair the development of parasites known to cause malaria. The said research states that this new development may be the next step towards discovering new methods in trying to prevent the eventual transmission of malaria by mosquitoes. An international team of scientists which included Professor Bob Sinden from …

Questions and concerns among the vigilant public has continuously raised alarm over the development of GM crops by some biotech firms making use of the so-called “Traitor” technology. The Traitor technology is similar to the so-called Terminator technology that renders the next generation of patented commercial GM seeds sterile. But they differ in terms of how they are used in GM seeds. But their purpose is to limit the proprietary use of seeds by farmers. Traitor technology, along with the Term…

With the growth of the field of biotechnology through the years, it has come to be applied in a wide variety of different fields and industries. Modern biotechnology that dealt with genetic engineering has made it quite an interesting as well as promising field of study and research that aims to produce and develop the next generation of new biological products aimed to make an impact in agriculture as well as medicine. There are a number of applications that biotechnology now finds itself being…

By definition, plant breeding is the purposeful manipulation of certain species of plants in order to create desired varieties to achieve specific purposes.  The manipulation may be done in several ways. It can either be by means of controlled pollination or the direct manipulation of the plant’s genes as in genetic engineering. This usually progresses into artificial selection new strains that will eventually lead to domestication. Plant breeding is a practice in making plants develop better st…

Aside from being able to develop genetically modified plants and crops, the field of genetic engineering will be doing the same for animals in the near future. In fact, scientists have already done this by genetically modifying genes in cows and goats to enable them to produce more proteins in milk that can be used for the manufacture of medicines. Although this is still in the developing process, it seems that biotechnology has gone a long way in spreading the scope of genetic modification. Alo…