Genetically Engineered Pets Hit the Market

psoriac writes "According to this article the Taiwanese Taikong Corporation is starting to sell "Night Pearls" - zebrafish that glow in different red and green patterns thanks to genes from jellyfish and marine coral. US sales are expected to follow."

selective breeding

[Brown Eggs]

I totally agree - it is certainly not a bad thing. This is only a more extreme form of the kind of "genetic engineering" that has been going on for thousands of years with cats, dogs, cattle, and other species that have close relationships with humans (either as food or pets). By selectively breeding pets, they enhance certain traits. Granted, this technology introduces genese that are not present in any form (most likley) in the host - I think that as long as there is no serious adverse effect to the organism then great. And if for some reason it does get into the wild, and decides to overrun the natural population - even better. It means that the gene that was introduced gave the new species a selective advantage over its predecessors. And isn't that what evolution (in any form, by any mechanism) is all about?

Re:Bah!

[ender-]

Seriously, if I could afford to create such an environment and the equipment needed to get the fishes from the ocean and into it (which to the best of my knowledge noone has ever done)

On the contrary, the Monterey Bay Aquarium [mbayaq.org] has quite a few deep sea creatures [mbayaq.org] in pressurised tanks/displays. I don't know how they clean them though.

Ender

pictures here...

[moodswung]

Did some googling found pictures and more information here : http://www.mongabay.com/external/glowing_fish.htm [mongabay.com]

Re:I'm totally in favor of genetic engineering

[Mogomra]

But glow in the dark fish?

Not to nitpick, but these fish don't glow in the dark (photoluminescent [reference.com]), they glow under ultraviolet light (fluorescent [reference.com]).

Is that really worth the possibility that the fish will escape and reek havoc in the ecosystem?

Check out the article, the company says that more than 90 percent have been sterlized, but I'm sure really concerned about protecting their product, rather than the environment. As to whether or not the zebra fish constitute a ecological threat like snakeheads, check out this page [tropical-fish.net] - looks like they prefer warmer water.

Re:Bah!

[JungleBoy]

Many deep sea creatures don't actually require a pressurized environment. They can life at surface pressure. But they tend to be very sensitive to temp (need cold), light (its dark down there), and oxygen level.

Monterey Bay Aquarium: Care of deep sea animals [mbayaq.org]

More info on the fish

[TheSync]

The Taikong Corporation has info on the fish on their Azoo [azoo.com.tw] site. Unfortunately, it appears to only be in Chinese, but you can get the idea from the pictures.

Here are several [mongabay.com] stories and pictures of the fish.

The pictures (and other sites such as this one [ornamental-fish-int.org]) imply that they are "fluorescent" fish, i.e., they glow when bathed in UV light, as opposed to fish that glow without a UV light source.

Re:I'm totally in favor of genetic engineering

[Niksie3]

Actually, aquarium fish already escape into the wild frequently to wreak havoc. I don't think the native species give a swimming fuck weather or not the exotics glow or not.

NEVER release your pets into the wild!

Re:I have to wonder about the people aginst this

[Anonymous Coward]

I'm looking for someone [nasw.org] to try and change mine, in a way that makes sense. [bbc.co.uk]

Re:Bah!

[b-baggins]

A well balanced aquarium doesn't need to be cleaned. In a saltwater tank, you might want to scrape brine from the walls periodically, but I've had freshwater tanks that haven't been cleaned in years. You just exchange 10% of the water every two weeks. Just make sure you have some aquatic plants and a couple of Chinese Algae eaters to keep the glass clean.

Heres a pic of the fish

[towaz]

http://www.mongabay.com/external/glowing_fish.htm [mongabay.com]

Re:more than cool

[cens0r]

actually, you're allergic to the saliva. Which builds up on the skin and hair.

Skin color

[reptilicus]

Wow are you wrong about pigmentation.

"most human attributes including pigmentation were selected by sexual, not environmental selection"

No. Skin pigmentation is due to 1) the amount of UV exposure in a given environment. UV is needed to synthesize vitamin D (this comes from Farnsworth Loomis' work at Brandeis in 1967). Humans in areas with less sunlight needed less pigmentation in order to get enough Vitamin D. 2) in 2000, Nina Jablonski and George Chapliln of the California Academy of Sciences added to this the idea that melainin protects the body's stores of the B vitamin Folate. Folate deficiencies during pregnancy lead to birth defects. So humans living in high UV locations evolved higher amounts of pigmentation to protect their Folate.

This is all detailed in a Scientific American article (Jablonski and Chaplin 2002. Skin Deep, Sci Am 287: 74-81) and discussed in the book DNA Science [amazon.com] by David Micklos and Greg Freyer.

In a word, No

[reptilicus]

" If an "engineered" fish escapes and breeds with a fish that's in our food chain and then we eat it, that could have important health implications."

These fish are carrying GFP (green fluorescent protein), a naturally occuring protein found in a wide variety of jellyfish (which are eaten in some cultures) and other sea creatures. It has no known toxic effects.

Furthermore, Zebrafish are tiny little bony things. We don't eat them. They are not able to mate with fish from different species (hence the definition of species), so your fears in this case are unwarranted.

Re:Bah!

[secolactico]

While I'm daydreaming, I may as well make it a perfectly self-sustaining biosphere that never needs cleaning, right?

Here [ecosaqua.com]. Not luminicent, but it's a start.

Re:Roll on the genetically engineered toys

[G. Waters]

Actually, people with dark skin have kept that feature from proto homo-sapien times. It was caucasian people who adapted to the lack of sunlight in northern climes.

The skin produces vitamin D when exposed to sunlight. Too much pigment in a low-sunlight environment will result in rickets and other problems from lack of vitamin D. Hence, light-skinned people winning out in sexual selection in the northern geographical regions. This carries over to asiatic peoples, with lighter skinned north and darker south.

There is a reason for everything.

Re:can i ask the anti-gm people a question?

[Moofie]

Okay. [www.gene.ch]

Monsanto is suing farmers for having the audacity to re-plant seeds from plants they grew. Apparently, you're supposed to keep paying Monsanto year after year for your seed stock.

Note: Many farmers actually do buy new seed every year, as commercially available seed is of a higher and more consistent quality compared to harvested seed from the field. However, Monsanto is trying to take this choice away from farmers, and force them to keep paying.

So just don't buy Monsanto seed, right?

Wrong.

Monsanto is also suing farmers for patent infringement, because they had the audacity to have their plants have sex with the plants from the next farm over's field. Therefore, Monsanto's patented genes are present in that sneaky farmer's field, even though he didn't pay for it.