Genetically Modified Plants To Produce Natural Lighting 328
kkleiner writes "A team has launched a crowdsourcing campaign to develop sustainable natural lighting by using a genetically modified version of the flowering plant Arabidopsis. Using the luciferase gene, the enzyme responsible for making fireflies glow, the researchers will design, print, and transform the genes into the target plant. The project, which was recently launched on Kickstarter, has already raised over $100k with over a month left to go."
Sustainable? (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Just say NO to GMO (Score:1, Insightful)
Just like burning fossil fuels at an exponential rate, nothing could possibly go wrong!
Well... (Score:2, Insightful)
Say goodbye to Earthbound astronomy.
Re:No more GMO! (Score:5, Insightful)
These bastards are going to eventually kill the human race. GMO corn, wheat, canola, etc...is already in the food supply. Go to google and type in "gmo tumors" or "gmo infertility" to research for yourself.
Yup, I sure did. In all the whack-a-doodle sites, it was ZOMG You eat this shit and ye shal surely DIE. DIE a Horrible Tumor infested death!
Oh...... Wait..... CRIIGEN, an organization devoted to lobbying against GMOs Guaranteed to be honest and report only the truth.
Oh...... Wait...... The "researchers" Joel de Vendomois, is a homeopath, Seralini is the other scientist.
Yup, Homeopathy, that's the ticket.
By golly, this is sounding a lot like the anti-vaccine crowd, first degree murderers in my book.
Especially fun is that the Rats that they fed the fucking roundup pesticide live longer than any of the other rats.
Why don't you take up something with more credibility - like creation science.
Re:Mosquitos (Score:5, Insightful)
But how long before the gene dies out? Glowing mosquitoes make easy targets. Unmodified ones will have a distinct genetic advantage.
Natural? (Score:5, Insightful)
I don't think that means what they think it means.
Re:Mosquitos (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:No more GMO! (Score:5, Insightful)
Sounds like you read the Forbes article [forbes.com] and are just repeating what they said.
Especially fun is that the Rats that they fed the fucking roundup pesticide live longer than any of the other rats.
Just because they didn't get cancer from drinking the pesticide doesn't mean the pesticide-resistant GMO crops are safe.
And that's really the problem with GMO, testing sucks. There are very few, if any, meaningful and rigorous tests. Lots of short term test and tons of grandfathering in genes because they came from other organisms where they were not a problem. But when it comes to comprehensive testing that could reassure the general population of the safety of GMO crops, there just isn't any.
Given the history we have with things like thalidomide, DDT, leaded gasoline, fen-phen, etc it is not unreasonable that people be genuinely concerned about GMO crops, especially given how widespread they've become with such little public notice. Dismissing those concerns as the equivalent of creation science is at least as bad as creationism itself because it is just another misplaced faith.
Re:Sustainable? (Score:2, Insightful)
Let me know when you can grow a solar panel, batteries, charge controller and an LED from a seed.
Efficiency is irrelevant if the components are cheap/renewable and the input power would be wasted anyway.
Re:No more GMO! (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Sustainable? (Score:5, Insightful)
The difference is that you pay to grow one plant, then it replicates on its own until you have millions of them. So you pay for the first plant, then the rest are essentially free.
Tell that to Monsanto [wikipedia.org].