In China, as elsewhere, the debate over genetically modified organisms has become polarized into anti- and pro-GMO camps. Given the size of China's population and market, much is at stake in conflicts over regulation for domestic as well as international actors. In this book, Cong Cao provides an even-handed analysis that illuminates the tensions that have shaped China's policy toward agricultural biotechnology in a global perspective. Cao presents a comprehensive and systematic analysis of how China's policy toward research and commercialization of genetically modified crops has shifted that explains how China's changing GMO stances reflect its evolving position on the world stage. While China's scientific community has set the agenda, it has encountered resistance rooted in concerns over food safety and consumers' rights as well as issues of intellectual property rights and food sovereignty. Although Chinese leaders at first sought to take advantage of the biotech revolution by promoting GMO crop consumption, Cao demonstrates that policy has since become precautionary, as seen in new laws and regulations grounded in concerns over safety and the deferral of commercialization of GM rice. He presents China's policies in light of changing global attitudes toward GM crops: As shifts in China have closely followed global trends, so has domestic activism. Drawing on government and scientific documents as well as interviews with scientists, officials, policy analysts, activists, and journalists, GMO China is an important book for China studies, science and technology studies, policy analysts, and professionals interested in the Chinese biotechnology market.

Plants, being sessile and autotrophic in nature, must cope with challenging environmental aberrations and therefore have evolved various responsive or defensive mechanisms including stress sensing mechanisms, antioxidant system, signaling pathways, secondary metabolites biosynthesis, and other defensive pathways among which accumulation of osmolytes or osmo-protectants is an important phenomenon. Osmolytes with organic chemical nature termed as compatible solutes are highly soluble compounds with no net charge at physiological pH and nontoxic at higher concentrations to plant cells. Compatible solutes in plants involve compounds like proline, glycine betaine, polyamines, trehalose, raffinose family oligosaccharides, fructans, gamma aminobutyric acid (GABA), and sugar alcohols playing structural, physiological, biochemical, and signaling roles during normal plant growth and development. The current and sustaining problems of climate change and increasing world population has challenged global food security. To feed more than 9 billion, the estimated population by 2050, the yield of major crops needs to be increased 1.1-1.3% per year, which is mainly restricted by the yield ceiling. A major factor limiting the crop yield is the changing global environmental conditions which includes drought, salinity and extreme temperatures and are responsible for a reduction of crop yield in almost all the crop plants. This condition may worsen with a decrease in agricultural land or the loss of potential crop yields by 70%. Therefore, it is a challenging task for agricultural scientists to develop tolerant/resistant varieties against abiotic stresses. The development of stress tolerant plant varieties through conventional breeding is very slow due to complex multigene traits. Engineering compatible solutes biosynthesis by deciphering the mechanism behind the abiotic tolerance or accumulation in plants cell is a potential emerging strategy to mitigate adverse effects of abiotic stresses and increase global crop production. However, detailed information on compatible solutes, including their sensing/signaling, biosynthesis, regulatory components, underlying biochemical mechanisms, crosstalk with other signaling pathways, and transgenic development have not been compiled into a single resource. Our book intends to fill this unmet need, with insight from recent advances in compatible solutes research on agriculturally important crop plants.

Recent decades have seen tremendous changes in Latin America's agricultural sector, resulting from a broad program of liberalization instigated under pressure from the United States, the IMF, and the World Bank. Tariffs have been lifted, agricultural markets have been opened and privatized, land reform policies have been restricted or eliminated, and the perspective has shifted radically toward exportation rather than toward the goal of feeding local citizens. Examining the impact of these transformations, the contributors to Food for the Few: Neoliberal Globalism and Biotechnology in Latin America paint a somber portrait, describing local peasant farmers who have been made responsible for protecting impossibly vast areas of biodiversity, or are forced to specialize in one genetically modified crop, or who become low-wage workers within a capitalized farm complex. Using dozens of examples such as these, the deleterious consequences are surveyed from the perspectives of experts in diverse fields, including anthropology, economics, geography, political science, and sociology.

From Kathy McAfee's "Exporting Crop Biotechnology: The Myth of Molecular Miracles," to Liz Fitting's "Importing Corn, Exporting Labor: The Neoliberal Corn Regime, GMOs, and the Erosion of Mexican Biodiversity," Food for the Few balances disturbing findings with hopeful assessments of emerging grassroots alternatives. Surveying not only the Latin American conditions that led to bankruptcy for countless farmers but also the North's practices, such as the heavy subsidies implemented to protect North American farmers, these essays represent a comprehensive, keenly informed response to a pivotal global crisis.

Genetic Engineering: Principles and Methods, published by Springer since 1979, presents state-of-the-art discussions in modern genetics and genetic engineering. This focus affirms a commitment to publish important reviews of the broadest interest to geneticists and their colleagues in affiliated disciplines. Recent volumes have covered gene therapy research, genetic mapping, plant science and technology, transport protein biochemistry, and viral vectors in gene therapy, among other topics.

Continued advances in biotechnology have driven forward the harnessing of micro-organisms and plants to help protect our fragile environment from the impact of human activity in increasingly targeted yet diverse ways. Environmental Biotechnology provides a broad overview of the subject, focusing on how biotechnological techniques are applied to solve environmental problems, rather than giving detailed explanations of the techniques themselves. Opening with an overview of environmental biotechnology, and a review of the key aspects of microbiology upon which the field is based, the book goes on to explore the diverse way in which biotechnology is applied to tackle environmental problems and issues, from monitoring of the environment and treatment of waste, to the removal of pollutants and extraction of oil and minerals. The book closes with a discussion of the ways in which future advances in biotechnology are likely to be harnessed to address current and emerging issues and problems in increasingly effective and powerful ways. Capturing the current excitement in a field reinvigorated by advances in genetic manipulation, and emerging genomic and proteomic technologies, Environmental Biotechnology is the perfect resource for any student needing to develop a sound understanding of biotechnology, and the diverse ways it can be applied to address important environmental issues. Online Resource Centre - Figures from the book available to download, to facilitate lecture preparation - Library of web links cited in the book, to give students ready access to these additional resources

Few avenues of scientific inquiry raise more thorny ethical questions than the cloning of human beings, a radical way to control our DNA. In August 2001, in conjunction with his decision to permit limited federal funding for stem-cell research, President George W. Bush created the President's Council on Bioethics to address the ethical ramifications of biomedical innovation. Over the past year the Council, whose members comprise an all-star team of leading scientists, doctors, ethicists, lawyers, humanists, and theologians, has discussed and debated the pros and cons of cloning, whether to produce children or to aid in scientific research. This book is its insightful and thought-provoking report.

The questions the Council members confronted do not have easy answers, and they did not seek to hide their differences behind an artificial consensus. Rather, the Council decided to allow each side to make its own best case, so that the American people can think about and debate these questions, which go to the heart of what it means to be a human being. Just as the dawn of the atomic age created ethical dilemmas for the United States, cloning presents us with similar quandaries that we are sure to wrestle with for decades to come.

This book is the first comprehensive assemblage of contemporary knowledge relevant to genomics and other omics in date palm. Volume 2 consists of 11 chapters. Part I, Nutritional and Pharmaceuticals Properties, covers the utilization of date palm as an ingredient of various food products, a source of bioactive compounds and the production of nanomaterials. Part II, Omics Technologies, addresses omics resources, proteomics and metabolomics. Part III, Molecular Breeding and Genome Modification, focuses on genetic improvement technologies based on mutagenesis, quantitative traits loci and genome editing. Part IV, Genomics of Abiotic and Biotic Stress, covers metagenomics of beneficial microbes to enhance tolerance to abiotic stress and the various genomics advances as they apply to insect control. This volume represents the efforts of 34 international scientists from 12 countries and contains 65 figures and 19 tables to illustrate presented concepts. Volume 1 is published under the title: Phylogeny, Biodiversity and Mapping.

Human genetic enhancement, examined from the standpoint of the new field of political bioethics, displaces the age-old question of truth: What is human nature? This book displaces that question with another: What kind of human nature should humans want to create for themselves? To answer that question, this book answers two others: What constraints should limit the applications of rapidly developing biotechnologies? What could possibly form the basis for corresponding public policy in a democratic society? Benjamin Gregg focuses on the distinctly political dimensions of human nature, where politics refers to competition among competing values on which to base public policy, legislation, and political culture. This book offers citizens of democratic communities a broad perspective on how they together might best approach urgent questions of how to deal with the socially and morally challenging potential for human genetic engineering.

The creation of 'test--tube babiesa acted as a spur to public debate about the implications of research on embryos, in vitro fertilization, surrogate motherhood, and the whole range of technologies concerned with human reproduction. The scope of reproductive technologies examined in this volume -- from techniques for the medical 'managementa of childbirth, to genetic engineering -- is such that few women in the western world, and smaller and smaller numbers in the third world, escape their influence. What then is their impact: on the process of reproduction, on family life and particularly on women? 'Reproductive Technologiesa is a remarkable collection of original essays which attempts to place the current controversy over reproductive technologies in a political, legal and economic context. Contributors -- including Lesley Doyal, Ann Oakley, Ros Petchesky, Carol Smart, Hilary Rose, and Naomi Pfeffer -- examine systematically the technologies that have sparked off these debates. They explore the problem of infertility which is used to validate reproductive technologies; the way assumptions about the family and about biological parenthood continue to structure the arguments for and against; the impact of the medicalization of childbirth; the way debates are embedded in changing conceptions of paternal rights, maternal rights and embryo rights; the problems of providing adequate health care for women; and, above all, the urgency with which these issues raise problems about the accountability of science.

Plants are an important source of fats and oils, which are essential for the human diet. In recent years, genomics of oil biosynthesis in plants have attracted great interest, especially in high oil-bearing plants, such as sesame, olive, sunflower, and palm. Considering that, genome sequencing projects of these plants have been undertaken with the help of advanced genomics tools such as next generation sequencing. Several genome sequencing projects of oil crops are in progress and many others are en route. In addition to genome information, advanced genomics approaches are discussed such as transcriptomics, genomics-assisted breeding, genome-wide association study (GWAS), genotyping by sequencing (GBS), and CRISPR. These have all improved our understanding of the oil biosynthesis mechanism and breeding strategies for oil production. There is, however, no book that covers the genomes and genomics of oil crops. For this reason, in this volume we collected the most recent knowledge of oil crop genomics for researchers who study oil crop genomes, genomics, biotechnology, pharmacology, and medicine. This book covers all genome-sequenced oil crops as well as the plants producing important oil metabolites. Throughout this book, the latest genomics developments and discoveries are highlighted as well as open problems and future challenges in oil crop genomics. In doing so, we have covered the state-of-the-art of developments and trends of oil crop genomics.

This book provides a comprehensive overview of the basic and advanced metabolic engineering technologies used to generate natural metabolites and industrially important biomolecules. Metabolic engineering has the potential to produce large quantities of valuable biomolecules in a renewable and sustainable manner by extending or modifying biosynthetic pathways in a wide range of organisms. It has been successfully used to produce chemicals, drugs, enzymes, amino acids, antibiotics, biofuels, and industrially important pharmaceuticals. The book comprehensively reviews the various metabolites detection, extraction and biosensors and the metabolic engineering of microbial strains for the production of industrially useful enzymes, proteins, organic acids, vitamins and antibiotics, therapeutics, chemicals, and biofuels. It also discusses various genetic engineering and synthetic biology tools for metabolic engineering. In closing, the book discusses ethical, patenting and regulatory issues in the metabolic engineering of microbes. This book is a valuable source not only for beginners in metabolic engineering, but also students, researchers, biotechnology and metabolic engineering based company.

Gene Delivery: Methods and Applications provides a comprehensive overview on viral and non-viral methods used to genetically engineer human mesenchymal stromal cells. In addition, an update on ongoing and completed clinical studies with engineered mesenchymal stromal cells will be provided, as well as a snapshot of the advances and technical challenges yet to be addressed. Next, a variety of gene delivery systems including physical transfection techniques, virus-based delivery vectors, chemically engineered delivery systems and bio-inspired vehicles are reviewed and their strengths, shortcomings and biomedical applications are discussed. Selfish DNA called transposons capable of cutting out and pasting into the host genome are active throughout the phylogenetic kingdoms. Researchers have repurposed natural transposons for use in delivering a gene-of-interest, enabling for the study of a large and growing list of preclinical gene therapy applications. As such, the authors discuss the past achievements and future challenges of this early-stage technology. The closing chapter introduces cell-penetrating peptides as an efficient tool for DNA transfection. HR9, a designed cell-penetrating peptides, containing nona-arginine flanked by cysteine and penta-histidine displayed a high penetrating ability in mammalian cells.

Much research has focused on the basic cellular and molecular biological aspects of stem cells. Much of this research has been fueled by their potential for use in regenerative medicine applications, which has in turn spurred growing numbers of translational and clinical studies. However, more work is needed if the potential is to be realized for improvement of the lives and well-being of patients with numerous diseases and conditions. This book series 'Cell Biology and Translational Medicine (CBTMED)' as part of SpringerNature's longstanding and very successful Advances in Experimental Medicine and Biology book series, has the goal to accelerate advances by timely information exchange. Emerging areas of regenerative medicine and translational aspects of stem cells are covered in each volume. Outstanding researchers are recruited to highlight developments and remaining challenges in both the basic research and clinical arenas. This current book is the eight volume of a continuing series.

This specially curated collection features six reviews of current and key research on genetic modification of crops. The first chapter reviews key challenges facing banana production, primarily the risk of species decimation by diseases such as Fusarium wilt, and considers how genetic modification may be a solution to this. The second chapter discusses the development and establishment of 'Golden Rice' - a biofortified variety designed as a health intervention to help alleviate the problem of vitamin A deficiency. The third chapter details recent advances in the genetic modification of important agronomic traits of soybean crops, such as herbicide tolerance and insect resistance. The fourth chapter addresses progress in and prospects for transgenic interventions in the improvement of grain legumes, concentrating on chickpea, pigeonpea, cowpea and more. The fifth chapter reviews recent research efforts in the production of genetically modified (GM) oil palm plants and looks towards establishing stable lines of commercially viable GM varieties. The final chapter describes recent progress relating to transgenic modification of cassava and how future research can strengthen food security and commercialization of the crop.

Much research has focused on the basic cellular and molecular biological aspects of stem cells. Much of this research has been fueled by their potential for use in regenerative medicine applications, which has in turn spurred growing numbers of translational and clinical studies. However, more work is needed if the potential is to be realized for improvement of the lives and well-being of patients with numerous diseases and conditions. This book series 'Cell Biology and Translational Medicine (CBTMED)' as part of SpringerNature's longstanding and very successful Advances in Experimental Medicine and Biology book series, has the goal to accelerate advances by timely information exchange. Emerging areas of regenerative medicine and translational aspects of stem cells are covered in each volume. Outstanding researchers are recruited to highlight developments and remaining challenges in both the basic research and clinical arenas. This current book is the seventh volume of a continuing series. Chapter "Application of iPSC to Modelling of Respiratory Diseases" is available open access under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License via link.springer.com.

This is the first book portraying to a wide readership many fields of DNA in the world of materials altogether in a single volume. The book provides underlying concepts and state-of-art developments in the emerging fields of DNA electronics, structural DNA nanotechnology, DNA computing and DNA data storage, DNA machines and nanorobots. Future possibilities of innovative DNA-based technologies, such as DNA cryptography, DNA identity tags, DNA nanostructures in biosensing and nanomedicine, as well as DNA-based nanoelectronics are all covered, too. This book is valuable for university students studying engineering and technology; biotech, nanotech, and medical device R&D managers, practitioners and investors; and IP analysts who would like to extend their background in advanced DNA technologies. It is nicely illustrated, which makes it very readable, and it conveys science and principles in a lively language to appeal to a broad audience, from professionals and academics to students and lay readers. Advance Praise for DNA Beyond Genes: "Most students of DNA, and lay readers as well, are interested in the absolutely essential role it plays in biology. However, the properties which make DNA the carrier of genetic information also make it an extraordinary material that can be used as the backbone for a wide variety of nanoengineering applications - these range from information storage and computation to molecular machines and devices to artfully designed logos and symbols. The perfect self-recognition of DNA sequences makes it an ideal building block to synthesize more and more elaborate constructions and imaginative scientists have probably only just scratched the surface of what can eventually be created. Here for the first time in this wonderful book Vadim Demidov explores the full range of the non-biological applications of DNA." Charles R. Cantor Professor Emeritus of Biomedical Engineering, Boston University Member of the USA National Academy of Sciences

History will mark the twenty-first century as the dawn of the age of precise genetic manipulation. Breakthroughs in genome editing are poised to enable humankind to fundamentally transform life on Earth. Those familiar with genome editing understand its potential to revolutionize civilization in ways that surpass the impact of the discovery of electricity and the development of gunpowder, the atomic bomb, or the Internet. Significant questions regarding how society should promote or hinder genome editing loom large in the horizon. And it is up to humans to decide the fate of this powerful technology. Rewriting Nature is a compelling, thought-provoking interdisciplinary exploration of the law, science, and policy of genome editing. The book guides readers through complex legal, scientific, ethical, political, economic, and social issues concerning this emerging technology, and challenges the conventional false dichotomy often associated with science and law, which contributes to a growing divide between both fields.

History will mark the twenty-first century as the dawn of the age of precise genetic manipulation. Breakthroughs in genome editing are poised to enable humankind to fundamentally transform life on Earth. Those familiar with genome editing understand its potential to revolutionize civilization in ways that surpass the impact of the discovery of electricity and the development of gunpowder, the atomic bomb, or the Internet. Significant questions regarding how society should promote or hinder genome editing loom large in the horizon. And it is up to humans to decide the fate of this powerful technology. Rewriting Nature is a compelling, thought-provoking interdisciplinary exploration of the law, science, and policy of genome editing. The book guides readers through complex legal, scientific, ethical, political, economic, and social issues concerning this emerging technology, and challenges the conventional false dichotomy often associated with science and law, which contributes to a growing divide between both fields.

How the meaningless process of natural selection produces purposeful beings who find meaning in the world. In From Darwin to Derrida, evolutionary biologist David Haig explains how a physical world of matter in motion gave rise to a living world of purpose and meaning. Natural selection, a process without purpose, gives rise to purposeful beings who find meaning in the world. The key to this, Haig proposes, is the origin of mutable "texts"-genes-that preserve a record of what has worked in the world. These texts become the specifications for the intricate mechanisms of living beings. Haig draws on a wide range of sources-from Laurence Sterne's Tristram Shandy to Immanuel Kant's Critique of the Power of Judgment to the work of Jacques Derrida to the latest findings on gene transmission, duplication, and expression-to make his argument. Genes and their effects, he explains, are like eggs and chickens. Eggs exist for the sake of becoming chickens and chickens for the sake of laying eggs. A gene's effects have a causal role in determining which genes are copied. A gene (considered as a lineage of material copies) persists if its lineage has been consistently associated with survival and reproduction. Organisms can be understood as interpreters that link information from the environment to meaningful action in the environment. Meaning, Haig argues, is the output of a process of interpretation; there is a continuum from the very simplest forms of interpretation, instantiated in single RNA molecules near the origins of life, to the most sophisticated. Life is interpretation-the use of information in choice.

Much research has focused on the basic cellular and molecular biological aspects of stem cells. Much of this research has been fueled by their potential for use in regenerative medicine applications, which has in turn spurred growing numbers of translational and clinical studies. However, more work is needed if the potential is to be realized for improvement of the lives and well-being of patients with numerous diseases and conditions. This book series 'Cell Biology and Translational Medicine (CBTMED)' as part of SpringerNature's longstanding and very successful Advances in Experimental Medicine and Biology book series, has the goal to accelerate advances by timely information exchange. Emerging areas of regenerative medicine and translational aspects of stem cells are covered in each volume. Outstanding researchers are recruited to highlight developments and remaining challenges in both the basic research and clinical arenas. This current book is the sixth volume of a continuing series.

This book provides a comprehensive overview of the basic and advanced metabolic engineering technologies used to generate natural metabolites and industrially important biomolecules. Metabolic engineering has the potential to produce large quantities of valuable biomolecules in a renewable and sustainable manner by extending or modifying biosynthetic pathways in a wide range of organisms. It has been successfully used to produce chemicals, drugs, enzymes, amino acids, antibiotics, biofuels, and industrially important pharmaceuticals. The book comprehensively reviews the various metabolites detection, extraction and biosensors and the metabolic engineering of microbial strains for the production of industrially useful enzymes, proteins, organic acids, vitamins and antibiotics, therapeutics, chemicals, and biofuels. It also discusses various genetic engineering and synthetic biology tools for metabolic engineering. In closing, the book discusses ethical, patenting and regulatory issues in the metabolic engineering of microbes. This book is a valuable source not only for beginners in metabolic engineering, but also students, researchers, biotechnology and metabolic engineering based company.

This book reviews the chemical, regulatory, and physiological mechanisms of protein arginine and lysine methyltransferases, as well as nucleic acid methylations and methylating enzymes. Protein and nucleic acid methylation play key and diverse roles in cellular signalling and regulating macromolecular cell functions. Protein arginine and lysine methyltransferases are the predominant enzymes that catalyse S-adenosylmethionine (SAM)-dependent methylation of protein substrates. These enzymes catalyse a nucleophilic substitution of a methyl group to an arginine or lysine side chain nitrogen (N) atom. Cells also have additional protein methyltransferases, which target other amino acids in peptidyl side chains or N-termini and C-termini, such as glutamate, glutamine, and histidine. All these protein methyltransferases use a similar mechanism. In contrast, nucleic acids (DNA and RNA) are substrates for methylating enzymes, which employ various chemical mechanisms to methylate nucleosides at nitrogen (N), oxygen (O), and carbon (C) atoms. This book illustrates how, thanks to there ability to expand their repertoire of functions to the modified substrates, protein and nucleic acid methylation processes play a key role in cells.