Biofortified

For the second week in a row on my radio show on WSUM in Madison, I talked about plant genetics. Not that I’m trying to bore a general audience by discussing this topic over and over again, it’s just not every fortnight that you get to go to Berkeley to grub and elbow-rub with Michael [...]

If you are familiar with my past science media projects, you may remember that I used to host a radio show / podcast in Davis, CA. I have been eager to get that going again in Madison, so last fall I went through the training at the local student station, WSUM 91.7 fm, and they [...]

Another change brought about by the Changemakers contest is that I now have a video editing program suitable to start coming out with videos that we have been collecting. Behold, I give you Marty Sachs and Candy Gardener talking about the stocks of maize seeds that they manage! This footage was taken at the 51st [...]

Anastasia was on the ball the other night with publishing her review of our evening with Michael Pollan. Mine comes a little late but not too little. We had all weekend to prepare our thoughts for what we wanted to talk about (And what we wanted to eat), and I daresay we did well on [...]

Anastasia and I have successfully traversed the continental divide yesterday, and are just north of San Francisco in my hometown of Petaluma. We have some time between now and our Monday engagement with Michael Pollan, so between now and then it is an open book. I know Frank is itching to go sight-seeing, and might [...]

Genetic Engineering & Biotechnology News reports that UC Berkeley and Stanford University are collaborating on a project to build a biotechnology resource called BIOFAB. This stands for International Open Facility Advancing Biotechnology. (IOFAB?) I guess the missing B stands for BYOB, or “Bring Your Own B.” What’s so fabulous about BIOFAB?
Well, genetic engineering requires all [...]

At the 2009 Maize Genetics Conference, Anastasia and I took a moment to sit down and record a conversation about blogging about plant genetics and genetic engineering. We talked about the challenges ahead of us, what we’d like to do with the site, and how to figure out what to focus on first, and concerns [...]

If you have been paying attention to the blogosphere lately, you’ve heard about a study that came out in the International Journal of Biological Sciences called A Comparison of the Effects of Three GM Corn Varieties on Mammalian Health, by Vendomois et al. It is a reanalysis of feeding trail data from Monsanto corn-fed rats. [...]

It is time for a major update to the look and functionality of the Biofortified Blog. Prior to the Changemakers contest voting week and discussions, we added an integrated forum to the blog that I’m happy to say is getting well-used. It is helping us get an idea what issues readers want to discuss apart [...]

Mark Henderson at the Times Online has just published an article about Genetic Engineering and Organic Agriculture. Organic farmers must embrace GM crops if we are to feed the world, says scientist. The scientist is non other than Agricultural Ecologist Sir Gordon Conway, and he argues that Organic Ag should be open to GE crops, [...]