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By Gregory Cancelada and Bill Lambrecht
In a decision that threatens the state's rice industry, Anheuser-Busch Cos. won't buy Missouri-grown or processed rice to brew its beers if a biotech company is allowed to sow an experimental crop of genetically modified rice in the Missouri Bootheel region.
The brewer says it's worried that the rice, which is genetically modified to produce human proteins, eventually might contaminate edible rice grown there.
Now rice growers fear the actions by A-B, which says it's the largest domestic buyer of U.S. rice, will spur food companies to reconsider Missouri rice, a crop with annual sales of about $100 million. It covers about 200,000 acres.
"I think this will start a domino effect," said Jason Bean, who grows rice in Pemiscot County. "Gerber, Post, Kellogg - everybody will follow suit."
However, biotech supporters say the experimental crop production is safe and accuse A-B of succumbing to consumer fears rather basing its decision on science.
"It really is too bad that a large company that must employ technology would take a non-science-based decision on a technology that is going to provide help for children around the world," said Lisa Dry, a spokeswoman for the Biotechnology Industry Organization, a trade group in Washington.
Ventria Bioscience of Sacramento, Calif., has genetically engineered rice seeds to produce two types of human proteins, lactoferrin and lysozyme, for use in drugs intended to help babies and young children with acute diarrhea.
Ventria is awaiting approval from the U.S. Agriculture Department to grow the genetically modified rice in Missouri.
Once approved, Ventria will sow about 200 acres in Scott County with the genetically modified rice. If successful, it wants to expand production to more than 20,000 acres.
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Nanotechnologies may help millions in the world's poorest nations
Nanotechnology's biggest impact on millions in the developing world could be in better energy production and storage methods, according to a report.
A panel of 63 specialists worldwide was asked by the Canadian Joint Centre for Bioethics (JCB) to identify the most promising areas of nanotech.
The panel said nanosciences could also significantly improve agriculture.
The nanotech impact study is reported in PLoS Medicine, the US-based Public Library of Science journal.
It is the first to rank nanotechnologies and nanoscience's potential influence relative to development, according to the authors.
"Economic development and energy consumption are inextricably linked," said Dr Peter Singer, director of the University of Toronto's JCB, a medical ethics think tank.
The authors also recommend an initiative - called Addressing Global Challenges Using Nanotechnology - should be launched to encourage the development of nanotechnologies targeted at developing nations.
It could work along the lines of the Grand Challenges in Global Health initiative started last year by the Foundation for the National Institutes of Health and the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation.
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By Charles Piller, Times Staff Writer
International health officials fighting a deadly outbreak of Marburg fever in Angola said Tuesday that they had called in church leaders, social anthropologists and even a popular music group to help stop attacks on health workers clad in intimidating moon suits.
As the virus has spread, killing 194 people so far, some grieving residents have turned their anger toward relief workers, who have halted traditional burial rituals and removed bodies from villages to contain the virus.
Family members of Marburg victims have thrown rocks at health workers, and rumors have been circulating that the foreigners are spreading the disease.
"Imagine that a mother has lost her children, and then in come guys in white full-body suits and masks, and they don't allow the families to do their ritual washing of the bodies," said David Daigle, a spokesman for the World Health Organization in the province of Uige, northeast of the capital, Luanda.
Monica Castellarnau, emergency coordinator for Doctors Without Borders in Uige, told Reuters that fear of health workers had led some to hide Marburg victims in their homes so as not to elicit a visit from authorities.
"That means the virus keeps on spreading in the community," she said.
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Thousands of scientists are scrambling at the urging of global health authorities to destroy vials of a pandemic flu strain sent to labs in 18 countries as part of routine testing.
The rush, urged by the World Health Organization, was sparked by a slim, but real, risk that the samples could spark a global flu epidemic.
The vials of virus sent by a U.S. company went to nearly 5,000 labs, mostly in the United States, officials said on Tuesday.
"The risk is relatively low that a lab worker will get sick, but a large number of labs got it and if someone does get infected, the risk of severe illness is high and this virus has shown to be fully transmissible," WHO's influenza chief, Klaus Stohr, told The Associated Press.
It was not immediately clear why the 1957 pandemic strain, which killed between 1 million and 4 million people, was in the proficiency test kits routinely sent to labs.
It was a decision that Stohr described as "unwise," and "unfortunate."
That particular bug was "an epidemic virus for many years," Stohr said from the U.N. health agency's headquarters in Geneva, Switzerland.
"The risk is low but things can go wrong as long as these samples are out there and there are some still out there."
The 1957 strain has not been included in the flu vaccine since 1968, and anyone born after that date has no immunity to it.
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Milk and meat from cloned cattle appear safe for human consumption, a pilot study has found.
Scientists in the US and Japan found that meat and dairy products from a bull and cow cloned using the "Dolly" technique met industry standards.
The team says its results suggest cloning techniques could be used to boost food production, particularly in developing countries.
The study appears in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.
Two beef and four dairy clones were used in the research, all derived from a single Holstein dairy cow and a single Japanese black bull.
The scientists, led by Jerry Yang from the University of Connecticut, compared the produce with that from normal animals of similar age and breed.
The scientists found no significant differences in their comparisons of the milk and meat.
They did find higher levels of fat and fatty acids in the cloned cow meat, but said that these still fell within beef industry standards.
Higher levels of fat can also be seen as a desirable quality in the Japanese black breed of bull that was used for cloning.
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An ambitious project to map the migration of humans across the globe using genetic information was launched by the US National Geographic Society and IBM on Wednesday.
The Genographic Project aims to collect DNA from hundreds of thousands of people around the world over the next five years, including indigenous peoples. Those who wish to contribute their own DNA can purchase DNA sampling kits for $100, with the money being used to fund further research.
By analysing the DNA, the researchers hope to trace past migrations and create a family tree for humanity. Data from the project will be made freely available to other researchers at the end of the project, and a “virtual museum” of human history will also be established.
The project will collect samples from men only, because these reveal the maximum genetic information. The researchers will look for key genetic markers - called haplotypes - in mitochondrial DNA, inherited from the mother, and Y-chromosomes, passed down by the father.
By comparing the genetic markers found in geographically separated populations, the researchers hope to trace the migration of populations over the past 10,000 to 15,000 years. They plan to collect samples from at least 100,000 people worldwide.
The genetic data will then be compared with ethnographic records in order to reconstruct a picture of population spread over time. Collecting genetic information from relatively isolated populations will be a priority because this will provide the clearest picture of humankind's evolutionary past.
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