Article - Genetically Engineered Bacon

[phantasmagoric]

Pursuing Healthier Bacon Through Biotech
March 26, 2006 03:36:31 PM PST

A microscopic worm may be the key to heart-friendly bacon.

Geneticists have mixed DNA from the roundworm C. elegans and pigs to produce swine with significant amounts of omega-3 fatty acids — the kind believed to stave off heart disease.

Researchers hope they can improve the technique in pork and do the same in chickens and cows. In the process, they also want to better understand human disease.

"We all can use more omega-3 in our diet," said Dr. Jing Kang, the Harvard Medical School researcher who modified the omega-3-making worm gene so it turned on in the pigs.

Kang is one of 17 authors of the paper appearing Sunday in an online edition of the journal Nature Biotechnology.

The cloned, genetically engineered pigs are the latest advance in the agricultural biotechnology field, which is struggling to move beyond esoteric products such as bug-repelling corn and soy resistant to weed killers.

Hoping to create healthier, cheaper and tastier products that consumers crave, Monsanto Co. of St. Louis and its biotech farming competitors like DuPont are developing omega-3-producing crops that yield healthier cooking oils. Kang said 30 academic laboratories are now working with his omega-3 gene, presumably pursuing similar projects.

"Consumers have responded pretty positively when asked their opinion of food modified to improve food quality and food safety, just as long as the taste isn't altered negatively," said Christine Bruhn, director of the Center for Consumer Research at the University of California, Davis.

Earlier experiments have succeeded in manipulating animals' fat content but most never made it out of the lab because of taste problems.

While boosting Omega-3s doesn't decrease the fat content in pigs, the fatty acids are also important to brain development and may reduce the risk of Alzheimer's disease and depression. The American Heart Association recommends at least two weekly servings of fish, particularly fatty fish like trout and salmon, which are naturally high in omega-3s.

People already eat genetically engineered soy beans in all manner of processed food, but biotech companies run into what bioethicists call the "yuck factor" when they begin tinkering with animals.

The Food and Drug Administration has never approved food derived from genetically engineered animals. Unlike crops, the FDA treats such animals as medicine and requires extensive testing before approval.

"We understand that this research is in the very early stages," FDA spokeswoman Rae Jones said. "This technology will not likely reach meat counters for many years."

The FDA is still considering Waltham, Mass.-based Aqua Bounty Technologies' application to market a salmon genetically engineered to grow faster, the only such request pending with the agency. Aqua Bounty began its federal application process about nine years ago and there is no indication when the FDA will rule.

In the meantime, the researchers of the latest project said they will use their genetically engineered pigs to study human disease, especially heart conditions. --

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so i'm curious; what are your opinions about this? it's enchanting to hear that the general public might be taking more of an interest in omega-3 (and overall health in general) but i honestly think this is a huge waste. if ranchers would stop feeding these animals grains, animal by-products, etc. and start feeding them natural foods such as grass, we could have the same results without having to "genetically engineer" them. :(

any thoughts?

[Gabriel Guzman]

...so i'm curious; what are your opinions about this? it's enchanting to hear that the general public might be taking more of an interest in omega-3 (and overall health in general) but i honestly think this is a huge waste. if ranchers would stop feeding these animals grains, animal by-products, etc. and start feeding them natural foods such as grass, we could have the same results without having to "genetically engineer" them. :(

any thoughts?

That would be the ideal situation but Monsanto and DuPont are also the biggest producers of modified seeds (corn, soy, amont others) to feed the animals. I'm not sure if they are also the biggest producers of 'grass' other than 'ornamental green' but the amount of corn and soy used to feed animals is really big and a good business for them. In a way, it's easier to tinker with the pig's DNA so it produces more omega-3s than change their whole marketting strategy by stopping their corn/soy investments.

[LisaS]

if only they could/would channel their corn and soy and canola into other non-food areas - like plastics & starch products - we may never get off gasoline for internal combustion engines (that is, I'm not sure that biodiesel or ethanol fuel will ever get off the ground)

but there are many other uses for crude oil that might be candidates for veg oils instead.

[banshee]

While it may be true that feeding the animals more natural feed is better, how likely is that to happen on a large scale? If it isn't realistically going to happen, then isn't finding other ways to improve the omega 3/6 balance important? I know we'd all love for the "big businesses" to go back to more natural ways, but I just don't know that that is a realistic view of the world. It's similar to recommending that people try to buy the organic, grassfed, and currently very expensive meats. You can recommend it, but people on a budget often just can't afford it if they want to be able to pay the electric bill.

That said, if I had a choice between organic meat that is naturally high in omega 3s and the genetically engineered meats, I'd buy the natural meats, if I could afford it. If the choice was between regular processed meat and the healthier genetically engineered meat, I'll buy the genetically engineered stuff, again, if I could afford it. And I think realistically, price is almost always going to have a strong influence on people's buying decisions. Not that people won't occasionally indulge in higher-cost items, but for everyday occurrences, they want to save money.

And let's not forget convenience. If organic meats were always available in the grocery stores right next to the regular processed meats, you'd have a certain percentage of people going for them, even if they were more expensive. But in most cases you have to go to a specialty store for this stuff, and most people won't bother with the inconvenience... It will be the same with this new genetically engineered stuff. If the grocery stores won't carry it, it will be a huge waste of time, except for what is learned from a research standpoint. Which might be considerably important in itself - who knows what the researchers might learn as they work on this?

[dvdmon]

Mary, I agree that people want to save money, but this also a cultural thing. In the U.S., food prices in general have been made very low for many kinds of things. The more processed something, the cheaper it can be. With the Walmarts and Costco's, we've gotten used to a level of "value" that is hard to remove ourselves from. But in some ways it's also a choice. We choose to spend our money in other ways. For some, admittedly, there's no wiggle room. But for many of us there really is. We can choose not to get that iPod (or HDTV, etc.)and have a ton more money for spending on food. Other countries do spend much more per capita then we do on food. France in particular does this. It's a very high priority for them that they get high quality food, and so they spend a lot more of their paychecks on it than we do. I'm not saying that the U.S. will ever have this high a priority, but I think it's something admerable to strive toward. We are also much bigger than France is, of course, both geographically and in terms of population, so it's not the best comparison, but before there were these huge factory farms, this country did feed its population with smaller, local ones. I just want to support local, more natural ways of producing food as much as I can. On a macro level, it's great that Americans will be able to get more Omega-3, but even so, I would much rather deal with free-range because in addition to being healthier, it's far more humane than the factory farming methods...