The Genetic Engineering Industry

Ever wish chocolate was healthy and could have the same nutrients and vitamins as fruit and vegetables? Food, one of three necessities of life, affects every living organism on Earth. Although some foods are disliked because of taste or health issues, recent discovery will open up new prosperities and growth in agriculture. Genetic engineering has the capability to make foods taste better, increase nutrient value, and even engineer plants to produce aids for deadly health issues. Every day the progress, understanding, and development of genetic engineering is digging deeper and with this knowledge virtually anything is possible.

Genetic engineering is a growing, prosperous industry and strikes interest in many people, some positive and others negative. Foods that have had foreign genes, genes from other plants or animals, inserted into their genetic codes would be a simple way of explaining genetic engineering. When it is broken down into a more scientific explanation, a plant’s genetic makeup has been altered through a process of recombinant DNA, or gene splicing, to give the plant desirable traits. Recombinant DNA uses bacterial plasmids and viruses to transport the new genes into the host cells. Plasmids are circular DNA found in bacteria that can effectively have the selected genes added to their genetic code, and then inserted into the host. Viruses, which would normally infect the host plant cells, are instead disabled and carrying the new genes, are implanted into the plant cells, without infection. Bioballistics brings forth another approach of genetic engineering where, “the use of tiny slivers of metal that are coated with the genetic material are shot into the host cells using a gene gun” (Bren 1). Once these sliver...

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