Gene editing is a new technology that scientists are using to make targeted, precise changes to the DNA of living organisms. While these edits happen at a microscopic (molecular) level, they have the potential to make a significant positive impact on our world.

In the field of medicine, scientists are researching how gene editing can treat diseases such as cancer, sickle cell anemia and a wide range of genetic disorders.  Read How can CRISPR treat disease?

In agriculture, gene editing is used to breed plants and animals, reduce diseases, and minimize the impact of pests and severe weather. Gene editing can also be used to make foods taste better, increase nutrients and prolong shelf-life to reduce waste.

For example, a new type of leafy greens that are higher in nutrients and more flavorful are now available in foodservice. Gene edited tomatoes are sold in Japan and the UK. Many more gene-edited foods are on the horizon, with more than 500 products under development globally, according to S&P Global.

As the use of gene editing continues to become more prevalent in food and agriculture, Best Food Facts set out to learn more about it. We reached out to three experts – Dr. Rodolphe Barrangou, Distinguished Professor at North Carolina State University; Dr. Zhongde Wang, Professor at Utah State University; and Dr. Jennifer Kuzma, Goodnight-NC GSK Foundation Distinguished Professor in Social Sciences at North Carolina State University and co-founder and co-director of the Genetic Engineering and Society Center – to get their insight about this new technology.

The series contains three articles:

• What is gene editing?
• Are gene-edited foods safe to eat?
• How can gene editing make the food system more sustainable?

What is gene editing?

Dr. Barrangou: “It is a set of molecular tools that enables molecular biologists to edit the DNA sequence of virtually any organism on planet Earth, anyway we want at speed and at scale.”

Dr. Kuzma: “It is a set of techniques for very site-specific introductions or changes in the genome at a particular location. You can make very small changes to the genome. Gene editing often relies on enzymes called site-directed nucleases that will cut the DNA in a particular location. Then if you provide an additional DNA template, the genome will copy that change, much like changing a letter in a word or sentence. That’s what distinguishes gene editing from the first generation of genetically engineered crops, which were not as targeted or specific.”

Improvements through history

Gene editing is the latest technique being used to develop better food.

Even before scientists fully understood genes and DNA, they studied genetics searching for ways to make life better. For instance, about 3,000 years ago, farmers in Asia bred horses and donkeys to produce mules for transportation and farm work. The corn we know today was first grown by Indigenous peoples in North America, who bred maize plants to produce better grain. Broccoli, cauliflower, cabbage, kale, kohlrabi and brussels sprouts all came from the wild mustard plant, which farmers bred to develop specific traits. And now, gene editing is accelerating those improvements.

Production animals such as cows, pigs and chickens have been bred to improve the production of milk, beef, bacon and eggs, Dr. Barrangou said. The challenge for scientists is that it takes a long time for a plant or animal to grow and pass the desired traits to its offspring. Gene editing allows researchers to speed the process.

“Instead of waiting years and multiple breeding cycles to have more flavorful tomatoes or higher yielding corn or better tasting kale, or brighter, more oxidant-containing berries and grapes, we can use genome editing technologies to bestow some of those traits upon the species of interest at speed, scale and cost,” Dr. Barrangou said.

Learn more about how gene editing is being used in food:

• Tomatoes with more Vitamin D
• Soybean oil without trans fats
• Cows with a slick coat to tolerate heat
• Better tasting mustard greens
• Progress toward disease-resistant pigs
• Removing allergens from wheat, peanuts and milk

What’s the difference between GMOs and gene editing?

Dr. Wang: “GMOs refers to any organism whose genome has been modified. The term GMOs was coined before gene editing techniques were available. Gene editing is totally different from the traditional genetic modification methods used in making GMOs in that gene editing is a process of changing the genome with single nucleotide precision while traditional genetic modification tends to introduce DNA from other organisms.”

Read Are GMOs Good or Bad?

What are some of the uses of gene editing that you see as most promising?

Dr. Barrangou: “The ability to recode the code of life of all organisms from very simple basic viruses to microscopic bacteria, fungi, yeast and the like, all the way to sophisticated large organisms like livestock that we eat, plants including crops that we consume and of course, humans for medical applications. And even in environmental stewardship for things like trees and forestry. It is a transformative, disruptive technology that allows humankind to recode the code of life across the planet.”

Dr. Wang: “Developing gene therapy techniques for human medicine, developing new animal models, and improving the genetics of livestock. It could also be very promising in synthetic biology.”

Synthetic biology involves redesigning organisms for useful purposes by engineering them to have new abilities.

Is there anything you would like people to know about gene editing?

Dr. Barrangou: “As scientists, we want to use the best science and technology in the world to solve the grandest problems that we have in humankind. We use the best technologies available to us – the best tools, the most sophisticated data and insights and resources – to tackle those challenges, such as sustainable agriculture, expanding the human lifespan, tackling disease and beating cancer. Growing stuff out of nothing to feed a nutritious diet to billions of people is not a trivial process.”

Gene editing is a technique that precisely alters the genome of an organism to make beneficial changes. This new technology has the potential to prevent or treat human and animal diseases, combat the impacts of climate change and increase the sustainability of the food system.

The post What is Gene Editing? appeared first on Best Food Facts.

Gene editing could also make a significant difference in making agriculture more sustainable. By helping plants and animals become more resilient to climate change and disease, the technology could lead to a more resilient and affordable food supply.

Best Food Facts contacted three experts – Dr. Rodolphe Barrangou, Distinguished Professor at North Carolina State University, Dr. Zhongde Wang, Professor at Utah State University, and Dr. Jennifer Kuzma, Goodnight-NC GSK Foundation Distinguished Professor in Social Sciences at North Carolina State University and co-founder and co-director of the Genetic Engineering and Society Center – to find out more about gene editing and its use in food production. Read more in the series:

• What is gene editing?
• Are gene-edited foods safe to eat?

Improving animal welfare

In much the same way that gene therapy is being researched to cure diseases in humans, researchers are using gene editing to help animals. Dr. Wang’s lab at Utah State University is among the first to employ gene editing techniques to improve the genetics of livestock.

“In livestock, we are in the process of editing the genomes of cattle, sheep, goat and alpaca both for agricultural and medical applications,” he said. “In livestock, gene editing can be used to make the animals disease-resistant and better able to handle cold and heat stresses.”

Here are a few real-world examples of how gene editing is being applied to help animals live better. Gene editing is helping pigs develop resistance to a devastating virus called PRRS (Porcine Reproductive and Respiratory Syndrome), which affects pork producers all over the world. For cattle, the FDA recently approved the sale of beef from cattle with genes altered with CRISPR to have shorter hair. These “slick coat” cattle are better acclimated to live in warm climates.

Safety for animals and people

Is gene editing safe for the animals involved?

Dr. Kuzma: “Animals are regulated a bit more stringently by the Food and Drug Administration. The FDA has a mandatory policy to review all animals that are genetically altered, which provides more assurance of safety.”

Is it safe to eat food made from animals that have been edited?

Dr. Wang: “With scientific vigor, regulatory oversights and approvals, it is safe to consume foods from gene-edited animals.”

Learn more about the safety of gene edited foods.

Improving sustainability

By helping farmers to grow more food by using less land and water, gene editing could make agriculture more sustainable. Dr. Barrangou is researching gene editing to enable trees and forests to be more resilient to climate change.

Dr. Barrangou: “Think of bio-resilience as the ability of something to sustain itself in the face of global warming, in the face of drought or pest, whether it’s insects, viruses, bacteria or fungi. If you’re a tree and you’re in place for hundreds of years, you can’t go and escape. You can’t migrate north if it’s getting hot. You can’t migrate closer to the water if it’s getting dry. So we have to breed in those resistance traits to provide a more sustainable and resilient forest, whether you’re going to use that to grow fruits or nuts or capture carbon.”

Gene editing helps scientists to speed the natural process of breeding and reproducing, which makes it especially important in regard to climate change.

Dr. Barrangou: “The sense of urgency and timelines under which we can develop those products is very important. There’s a heightened sensitivity and urgency to address sustainable farming.”

Gene editing is an emerging technology used to treat disease in humans and animals. It could also help scientists develop plants and animals that are more resilient in the face of climate change.

The post How Can Gene Editing Make the Food System More Sustainable? appeared first on Best Food Facts.

Genetically engineered plants or animals, often called GMOs, were developed through biotechnology and often carry genes from a bacteria or virus. Biotechnology has been used to help crops better withstand drought, be resistant to insects or be better suited to control weeds. Genetic modifications can help animals to better utilize the feed they eat. Find out What foods have been genetically modified?

GMOs and Sustainability

In this series, we are looking at sustainability and the inherent tradeoffs and benefits of specific practices in farming and food production.

To learn more about biotechnology, we reached out to Dr. Pamela Ronald, a distinguished professor in the Department of Plant Pathology at the University of California-Davis. She has gained worldwide recognition for her work in genetically engineering rice to better withstand plant diseases and flooding.

“Rice is an important staple food crop for more than half the world’s people, so it’s really important to work with,” Dr. Ronald said. “Even a small change that you can make in the ability of the plant to survive stress or resist disease can have an impact on millions of people.”

Are GMOs good or bad?

That depends.

First, Dr. Ronald said the biotech foods are safe to grow and to eat. “There’s no question about that. They’ve been planted for 25 years now,” she said. “They have reduced the use of chemical insecticide, and I think that’s really important for people to know.”

Find out more about GMOs and human health.

Dr. Ronald also explained that biotechnology is just one of the tools farmers can use to help produce food. When farmers have access to a variety of tools or techniques, they can choose the ones that work best for each crop, for each location and for each situation.

“All farmers rely on seeds to grow their crops, and farmers are looking for seeds that help make agriculture more productive and sustainable,” Dr. Ronald said. “They want to use less land, use water more efficiently, use soil more efficiently. They want to reduce the use of harmful inputs. Every type of contribution can be really important for farmers.”

Dr. Ronald’s husband is an organic farmer. She noted that every type of farming has tradeoffs. As an example, in order to grow a crop, the soil must be disturbed and native plants are removed.

The key is weighing the impacts, tradeoffs and benefits, and then making an informed choice. “We farm because we have to eat,” she noted. “It’s a huge tradeoff. How do we farm more sustainably and try to minimize our impact on the environment?”

Some farmers have found that GMOs can contribute to making farming more sustainable. Dr. Ronald gave an example of farmers in Bangladesh growing eggplant. Previously, farmers needed to spray insecticide several times a week during the growing season to save the crop from destructive insects. In recent years, they have planted a genetically modified eggplant seed that contains a gene from a bacteria that prevents the insects from reproducing. As a result, the farmers use much less insecticide spray, the crops have yielded more eggplant from the same amount of land and families have a better income. You can learn more about it in Dr. Ronald’s Ted Talk.

Because there is a lot of misunderstanding and incorrect information about GMOs, Dr. Ronald encourages those with questions to explore reputable sources of information, such as the National Academy of Sciences. or the USDA.

“I think it’s important to realize that all farmers rely on seeds that have been genetically altered in some manner. The method is not important. What matters is what kind of trait that’s being imparted to the plant,” she said.

“It’s always good to just think about the challenges faced by farmers. Floods come through, which is predicted to occur more frequently with climate change. Then some farmers can’t grow their crops because there’s not enough water. Some farmers’ crops are devastated by insect pests. So anytime you can develop crops that are resistant to insects, it can have a massive benefit to farmers.”

Weighing the Benefits and Tradeoffs

GMOs and biotechnology have both benefits and tradeoffs. The benefits are that GMOs can help plants or animals grow more efficiently, which means more food produced using fewer natural resources. GMOs can reduce the use of insecticides and harmful herbicides.

On the other hand, GMO crops often involve the use of the herbicide, glyphosate, which is concerning to some consumers. Some perceive that food produced through GMOs is less natural, because of the modification process and introduction of genetic material not native to the original organism. Some people have concerns that genes from the modified plants or animals could transfer to other organisms. There are also concerns that farmers’ reliance on certain types of GMOs could contribute to biodiversity loss or cause over-production.

In the United States, some people have reservations about biotechnology that is owned by corporations, and they worry this could put small companies or farmers at a disadvantage. In other countries, such as in the case of Bangladesh’s eggplant, the seeds were generated by non-profits and distributed free to farmers.

Biotechnology should not be viewed as a one-size-fits all solution to farming challenges. It must be managed in conjunction with other techniques.

“It’s not that once you choose biotech over another approach, that’s it. It really depends on the particular farming system and what’s being used at the time,” Dr. Ronald said.

Science is a continuum with each researcher’s work building on others. Biotechnology can be part of the solution to make agriculture more sustainable around the world.

GMO involves the genetic modification of plants and animals to improve crops and food production. With any practice, there are tradeoffs and benefits. Many experts concur that GMO technology offers tools and solutions that farmers can use to make food production more sustainable.

The post Sustainability: Are GMOs Good or Bad? appeared first on Best Food Facts.

Three new varieties of potatoes that are resistant to late blight have been approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration. The potatoes were developed using a disease resistance gene from an Argentine variety of potato that has a natural defense to the disease. Expert Dr. David Douches, director of the Potato Breeding and Genetics Program at Michigan State University, gave us some insight into what this means.

“Late blight is caused by Phytophthora infestans. which is a fungus-like organism, and it is the most costly potato disease in the world. It will infect the foliage and tubers, killing the plants and rotting the tubers,” he said.

Late blight was responsible for the Irish Potato Famine in the 1840s. Potatoes were a significant part of the diet of Irish working classes and the disease decimated farmers’ crops. At least 1 million people died as a result and at least 1 million immigrated to North America, as well as Australia and Europe.

The Irish brought their love of potatoes with them and the starchy vegetables continue to be very popular. The average American eats 114 pounds every year. Potatoes are considered the fourth food staple crop in the world behind corn, rice and wheat. Late blight continues to be a problem, especially in wetter areas, and growers use fungicides to prevent the disease. The new potatoes mean better yields and less use of fungicide on potato fields.

“The farmers benefit with reduced disease risk and potential for a higher quality crop when grown under disease-risk conditions. The farm environment can benefit because of the need for less fungicide applications during the season,” Dr. Douches explained.

Since the varieties, which were developed by J.R. Simplot Co., were determined to be safe by  USDA/APHIS, the FDA and EPA, farmers are expected to plant them this year and shoppers will be able to purchase them. “These potatoes could end up in the fresh market and or the chip-processing market. Consumers should like the improved quality that can come from these potatoes,” Dr. Douches said.

The potatoes are known by the trade name Innate and have another genetic trait. They do not turn brown when exposed to air. Dr. Douches said this is achieved through, “silencing of the polyphenol oxidase gene that reduces the browning of cut or peeled tubers.” This process is similar to the science used to create Arctic Apples.

We asked if these new varieties are considered GMOs – genetically modified organisms. “The potatoes are genetically modified but I refer to them as Biotech 2.0. They contain genes that come from the potato or related species. So the genes are not foreign,” Dr. Douches said.

He described how that process works to protect against late blight. “The potato can defend itself from P. infestans (blight) if the right R-gene or combination of R-genes are expressed in the foliage,” he said. “There is a battle between the plants and P. infestans: for the plants to have R-genes that recognize the pathogen and the pathogen evolving to evade the R-gene recognition.”

Using the latest precision science to solve a very old problem highlights the potential of genetic engineering to help grow better food.

“These are great potatoes to grow and consume and also process into chips and fries. These potatoes should help dispel the negative myths associated with GM foods,” Dr. Douches said.

The post New Potatoes Solve Historic Problem appeared first on Best Food Facts.