Comments on: Is space beer risky?

By: Anastasia Bodnar

Anastasia Bodnar — Thu, 10 Dec 2009 23:05:10 +0000

James, I love trying exotic fruits and veggies! I had the honor of tasting fresh durian this week. I'm glad I did it, and I recommend the experience, but it's not something I'll go for again. It looked like a dead animal once it was opened up, and smelled worse. The taste was something like papayas mashed up with rotten onions, and the texture was that of partially cooked eggs. The book Safety of Genetically Engineered Foods: Approaches to Assessing Unintended Health Effects that I found for this post did a good job, I think, of showing that we need to look at all novel traits, not just those from biotech. The whole mutageneis with no regulation thing just seems weird to me.

By: James

James — Thu, 10 Dec 2009 07:07:51 +0000

So assuming epigenetic changes will eventually revert to their wild type state once returned to earth, especially if the plants are being bred back to non-space treated varieties, it seems this is mostly an expensive, and awesome, way to do radiation mutagenesis (which has been around for decades without public relations problems).

Karl, I’d be fascinated to learn more about Chinese Space Potatoes (a name like that deserves to be capitalized), but I don’t think it’s something present in Chinese culture and missing in our own. It’s a natural human response to be fascinated with the strange and exotic.* In their case, I imagine national pride also plays a significant role. (I’m assuming the space potatoes are a product of China’s own space program). It’s only when that fascination with the new and different is masked by a induced hatred which seems to be present in European culture, and to a lesser extent in our own.

*Hand someone a fruit they’ve never seen before in their lives, and the vast majority will be more interested in what it tastes like than fearing that it might be dangerous.

By: Karl Haro von Mogel

Karl Haro von Mogel — Thu, 10 Dec 2009 05:36:17 +0000

The Chinese have a curious fascination with “Space Potatoes”, which are blue potatoes that have been sent up in space. Although probably more symbolic than anything, it makes me wonder what cultural differences they have that draw them to such novelties, and what it might mean for acceptance of other novelties, like GE.
What I also like about this is that the barley was bred, and Sapporo obviously had to pay money to a space program to get a spot in their costly payload. So additional money to space science to advertise for plant genetics and enhance interest in a new variety. What’s not to like about that?
Oh yeah, mutations. It is surprising how easily the issue of mutagenesis gets glossed over as OK and genetic engineering is the dangerous one to look out for, when we know that the changes brought about by mutagenesis have a much higher risk of unintended consequences. I was just talking to someone on the phone today and they were a bit surprised that mutagenesis is used to generate new traits for breeding.