Genetic Engineering

It is the direct manipulation of an organism’s genome using modern DNA technology … also called genetic modification

A genome is the entirety of an organism’s hereditary information

What is it?

Glow-in-the-dark cats

Venomous cabbage

Web-spinning goats

Less flatulent cows

Which of the following have scientists genetically

engineered?

Scientists have recently taken the gene that programs poison in scorpion tails and looked for ways to combine it with cabbage. This would limit pesticide use while still preventing caterpillars from damaging cabbage crops. These genetically modified cabbages would produce scorpion poison that kills caterpillars when they bite leaves — but the toxin is modified so it isn’t harmful to humans.

Venomous cabbage

Agriculture research scientists at the University of Alberta have identified the bacterium responsible for producing methane and designed a line of cattle that creates 25 percent less methane than the average cow.

Less-flatulent cows

Researchers inserted a spiders’ dragline silk gene into the goats’ DNA in such a way that the goats would make the silk protein only in their milk. This “silk milk” could then be used to manufacture a web-like material called Biosteel.

Web-spinning goats

In 2007, South Korean scientists altered a cat’s DNA to make it glow in the dark and then took that DNA and cloned other cats from it — creating a set of fluffy, fluorescent felines. The researchers took skin cells from Turkish Angora female cats and used a virus to insert genetic instructions for making red fluorescent protein.

Glow-in-the-dark cats

Your Thoughts?

The term cloning describes a number of different processes that can be used to produce genetically identical copies of a biological entity.

The copied material, which has the same genetic makeup as the original, is referred to as a clone.

They occur naturally and artificially

Cloning

Gene Cloning: produces copies of genes or segments of DNA

Reproductive Cloning: produces copies of whole animals

Therapeutic Cloning: produces embryonic stem cells for experiments aimed at creating tissues to replace injured or diseased tissues

Types of Cloning

The procedure consists of inserting a gene from one organism, often referred to as "foreign DNA," into the genetic material of a carrier called a vector.

Examples of vectors include bacteria, yeast cells, and viruses.

After the gene is inserted, the vector is placed in laboratory conditions that prompt it to multiply, resulting in the gene being copied many times over.

How genes are cloned

Remove DNA from an egg cell

Replace with DNA from the animal you wish to clone by injection or electrical current

Allow egg to develop into an early-stage embryo

Finally, implant into the womb of a female of the animal you are trying to clone

Reproductive Cloning

Could create genetically modified animals (sheep that produce milk that contains blood clotting protein)

Create animals for food

Bring back extinct species …. DINOSAURS!!!

Potential Benefits

Very inefficient … the cloned sheep Dolly was the only embryo out of 277 that actually survived

Numerous health issues including early death

Minimal genetic variability

Potential Problems

Therapeutic cloning involves creating a cloned embryo for the sole purpose of producing embryonic stem cells with the same DNA as the donor cell.

One of the human body's master cells, with the ability to grow into any one of the body's more than 200 cell types

The best stem cells exist during the first five days of embryo

The cells are harvested resulting in destruction of the embryo

Therapeutic Cloning

ApplicationsStem cells can be used in experiments

to help understand disease and create new treatments

New tissue formation

Applications and Drawbacks

DrawbacksStem cells are similar to cancer cells in

that they can reproduce indefinitely and could develop mutations

It involves killing an embryo

It’s Not Just Animals!

Read the articles on cloning

Choose your side

Write a paragraph explaining why you chose that side

Homework