Tag Archives: insertional mutations

In Light of Big Mistakes Made by Developers of “Poster Child” GMO Products like Hornless Cattle and Golden Rice, FDA is Justified in Requiring Regulation

Posted on February 17, 2020 by Belinda

Earlier this month, the United States Food and Drug Administration (FDA) published its analysis of what has been touted as the “Poster Child” of gene-edited animals: cattle genetically engineered (GE) to prevent them from developing horns. As mentioned in an … Continue reading →

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New Salk Institute Study Reveals More Detailed Picture of “Scrambled Nature” of Gene Insertions in GMOs

Posted on February 4, 2019 by Belinda

Plant molecular biologists have known for decades that the techniques they use to genetically engineer plants are error prone and can result in GMOs with unintended: mutations in host plant genes, insertion of vector backbone DNA sequences, small duplications or … Continue reading →

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Golden Rice: Of Good Intentions, Insertional Mutants, Human Error, and the Need for Better Regulation of GMOs

Posted on August 3, 2018 by Belinda

After learning that the genetically engineered (GE) Golden Rice “event” being bred into varieties of rice favored by Indian farmers turned out to have a mutation—a mutation created as a result of the genetic engineering process itself (you can check … Continue reading →

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Informing USDA’s and FDA’s Thinking About Crops/Foods Derived From Plant Varieties Produced Using Genome Editing Techniques Like CRISPR-Cas9

Posted on June 16, 2017 by Belinda

Both the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service (APHIS) and the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) have asked the public for comments on how these agencies might deal with crops and foods derived from new plant … Continue reading →

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Scientific Uncertainty and Professional Ethics as Related to GMOs

Posted on April 22, 2017 by Belinda

Fred Gould, the chairman of the committee that produced the most recent National Academies report on GMOs, and I were invited to speak at the third and final NSF-funded workshop on the topic of “Scientific Uncertainty and Professional Ethics: Getting … Continue reading →

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Time To Talk “Conflicts of Interest” In Relation to GMOs

Posted on March 14, 2015 by Belinda

Scientific conflicts of interest have been in the news a lot lately. For example, a federal judge recently ruled that various members of the FDA’s Tobacco Products Scientific Advisory Committee had conflicts of interest and, consequently, the chairman and three … Continue reading →

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Crop Genetic Engineering, Warts and All

Posted on October 30, 2012 by Belinda

This is a paper I wrote that was published by PBGworks October 26, 2012: Crop genetic engineering is a powerful technology that is helping scientists reveal how genes and genomes function. It could also be used to solve important global … Continue reading →

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Crop Genetic Engineering is a Mutagenic Process

Posted on February 29, 2012 by Belinda

In my last post I argued that the current system for regulating genetically engineered (GE) crops for commercialization in the United States is inadequate because it is possible to design GE plants in such a way that USDA, EPA or … Continue reading →

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