CBN.com – RICHMOND, Virginia — DNA molecules are the genetic instructions of life. Scientists have been swapping DNA from one organism to another since 1973. Some of it seems strange, like putting firefly genes into tobacco so it glows in the dark. But on the practical side, gene-splicing promises advanced medicines, super-foods and new wonder substances.

A Canadian company recently stunned the world with news of putting spider DNA into goats. Their goal: to have goat milk contain super-strong spider webs. But this milk is not for drinking. The military hopes to use large quantities of this "biosteel" extracted from altered goat's milk to develop new lightweight protective gear for troops.

So maybe for gene splicing, the sky's the limit. But what is gene splicing? The process, known as transgenic technology, uses incredibly tiny biological scissors to take a gene out of one organism and put it in another, with the hope that the gene will perform in the same way as it did in the old organism.

Michael Fumento with the Hudson Institute said, "So, for example, with insulin what they did was they took a gene that was already producing insulin in human beings and they spliced it into bacteria, and suddenly these bacteria are a protein- or insulin-producing factory."

And that insulin is 100 percent human insulin, whereas the older insulin extracted from cows carried the danger of infectious viruses.

But then think about it. Isn't this, despite the benefits, really weird?

Fumento said, "You're not dealing with, and I've heard this expression, you know, half goat-half spider. Now that would be a strange thing. No, this goat is still 99.99999% goat with a single spider gene."

In other words, they are still goats and not some kind of monsters — just farm factories for futuristic fibers.

But despite the apparent safety of gene splicing, many people have a fear of biotech. After all, how did Spiderman become a freak of nature? A gene-spliced spider bit him. Such a transformation is actually no more possible than turning the sun into a big cheeseburger.

Educator and psychologist Susan Hardwicke commissioned a U.S. poll on knowledge of genetics. She found that public understanding of DNA is quite shallow, and that Hollywood has generated part of the problem by hyping genetic mutants and rampaging clones.

"They tend to elicit people's fears, they make people more fearful about genes, genetic research and almost anything that you see in Hollywood has some negative consequence or has some evil force behind it," Hardwicke said.

Even without Hollywood, fear of biotech has spread around the world to places like Zambia. They refused millions of dollars of gene-spliced corn for their starving people, fearing it might cause health problems. But Americans have been safely eating gene-altered corn and soy for years.

Some European countries reportedly warned African nations not to take U.S. biotech food aid, or they would face diplomatic or economic retaliation. After all, Europe has banned any new gene-spliced foods since 1998. Their rejection of biotech does not appear to be scientific.

"It's fostered by their alarmist media, it's fostered by their farmers' groups. There are many, many groups that are out to keep Europeans completely ignorant of the benefits and the non-problems of biotech food," Fumento said.

Agricultural economists also suspect European leaders don't want the competition from cheaper, gene-spliced U.S. food.

A poll in Europe did find extensive ignorance of genetics. Fumento explained, "A third of them believe transgenic fruit would alter their own DNA. We're talking massive ignorance."

As a result, they may miss the fruit revolution.

Did you ever imagine that eating bananas might protect millions of children in underdeveloped countries from deadly dysentery? Gene splicing may save the ordinary banana as well. The current varieties are very vulnerable to disease and face extinction, scientists say, in as little as ten years.

"And they are being clobbered by disease. You even hear talk about bananas are going to be extinct in 10 years. It's not going to happen. And it's not going to happen because of gene splicing. They're already working on splicing genes into bananas that will completely stop these diseases in their tracks," Fumento said.

But what is this about talk of eating medicinal bananas and saving millions of children from deadly disease?

Fumento explained, "Many researchers are looking at splicing antigens into bananas that will confer immunity that you get in a needle-type vaccine."

And what about plugging medicine-producing genes into veggies and other plants? Scientists are working at putting an anthrax gene into spinach to make a better anthrax vaccine, while other developers are using tobacco to develop vaccines.

 

"These are going to be where they take the product, grind it up and they extract the proper proteins and they are injected in the old-fashioned way," Fumento said.

But Medicinal chemist Don Abraham says gene splicing into humans is more complex. He says a problem could arise if you switched on unwanted, harmful genes in the process.

"Even splicing in genes where somebody has a genetic disease and they just die — as several have for other associated causes — of turning on unwanted genes. But it's coming, that part will come," he said.

Abraham literally prays that a gene-splicing cure will come for sickle cell anemia, a disease he has been working on for years.

With coming developments and a public lacking knowledge, Abraham and Hardwicke developed an educational game. "Metanon: The BioCode Adventure" is a board game that teaches children about the patterns of DNA while using strategy and decision making.

"They begin to understand how each different creature has a different pattern. But it's all made up of the same thing. So here's another card for the same creature, but this is for the wings," Hardwicke said while showing us the game.

The game's DNA alphabet uses cards of four colors which mimics real DNA's four biochemicals — four substances constituting the letters for the language of life.

Future versions of Metanon may add gene splicing options. That could fulfill one current goal of splicing an interest in science into the public.

"Too many individuals think science is too complex, and my take home message is: I think almost anybody who wants to do it can make it and learn it," Abraham said.

Fumento says with that kind of can-do American outlook, the future does promise remarkable benefits from the growth of the safe and innovative biotech industry.

In the last 10 years, biotech revenues for publicly traded U.S. companies tripled to $28.5 billion. Employment in that sector has doubled, approaching 200,000 workers.

With more and more states supporting gene splicing with biotech research centers, the public can expect some innovations that rapidly become part of everyday life, and others, like the spider-goat milk, that simply boggle the mind.