The initialism stands for “genetically modified organism,” but it’s a term lacking scientific precision. Moreover, it’s hard to find an organism in any way connected to humans that hasn’t been genetically modified, says Alison Van Eenennaam, a geneticist at UC-Davis who specializes in animal biotechnology. “I might argue that a great Dane or a Corgi are ‘genetically modified’ relative to their ancestor, the wolf,” she tells Mental Floss. “‘GMO’ is not a very useful term. Modified for what and why is really the more important question.”
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These days, when people say “GMO,” they tend to mean one particular modification method that scientists refer to as transgenesis. As Van Eenennaam explains, transgenesis is “a plant-breeding method whereby useful genetic variation is moved from one species to another using the methods of modern molecular biology, also known as genetic engineering.”
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Transgenic crops and animals have been modified with the addition of one or more genes from another living organism, using either a “gene gun,” Agrobacteria—a genus of naturally occurring bacteria that insert DNA into plants—or electricity, in a process called electroporation.
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