Science Controversies
Farm to Fork strategy: New EU Agriculture Commissioner wants to boost organic farming
The EU Commissioner for Agriculture, Janusz Wojciechowski, highlighted the promotion of organic farming as a key aim for the new ...
US GMO, CRISPR crop regulations could face major ‘overhaul’ in 2020
USDA officials are confident that a finalized proposal to overhaul the country’s regulatory framework for biotech crops can be achieved ...
USMCA trade deal boosts American agriculture, supports gene-editing technology, USDA says
U.S. Secretary of Agriculture Sonny Perdue issued the following statement after United States Trade Representative Robert Lighthizer and Speaker of ...
$1 million for anti-aging gene therapy? ‘Dubious’ treatment raises ethical concerns
Would you pay $1 million and fly to South America for a chance to live longer? Libella Gene Therapeutics, a ...
High yielding, gene-edited potato could help prevent future french fry shortages
Panic is setting in about a potential french fry shortage in the near future, due to a poor potato harvest ...
French seed firm strikes gene editing licensing deal, despite CRISPR’s uncertain future in EU
Despite the ongoing legal uncertainty over the future of new plant breeding innovation in Europe, US agricultural company Corteva Agriscience ...
Mind games: Do placebos have a place in modern medicine?
Doctors in Australia commonly give their patients a placebo treatment intended mainly to ease their minds, according to a new ...
South Australian Parliament rejects second bid to rescind state’s GMO crop ban
A second attempt by South Australia's Liberal government to lift a longstanding ban on genetically modified crops has failed. After ...
First chimeric part-monkey piglets born in China
Scientists in China created piglets whose organs contained some monkey cells. The piglets all died within a week, illustrating the challenges ...
Viewpoint: Spinal muscular atrophy treatment Zolgensma a gene therapy trailblazer, despite controversy
In August, the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) gave drug manufacturer AveXis, Inc, a subsidiary of Novartis AG, a ...
‘Search and destroy’: Precision stem cell treatments could be safer against blood cancers
Scientists are experimenting with ways to selectively target the body’s blood-making cells for destruction. Early studies in animals and people ...
3 experimental vaccines could be ‘game changer’ for HIV treatment
The global fight against the human immunodeficiency virus is poised to make important advances thanks to three experimental HIV vaccines ...
EU CRISPR-edited crop rules still unclear, a year after landmark court ruling
After the controversial European Court of Justice (ECJ) ruling in 2018 that organisms obtained by new plant breeding techniques (NBTs) ...
New dengue fever defense? Mosquitoes infected with common bacteria can’t transmit dangerous virus
Mosquitoes infected with Wolbachia bacteria and released into the wild are associated with a sharp decrease in dengue fever infections in humans, ...
Viewpoint: USDA bioengineered food labels could clear up GMO confusion—if consumers educate themselves
In this day of ready-to-eat, highly processed food, it is understandable that consumers want to know what is in their ...
European Union green lights imports of eight GMO crops
[Nov. 28], the [European] Commission authorized eight Genetically Modified Organisms (GMOs), all for food/feed uses (maize MZHG0JG, maize MON 89034 ...
South Australia’s leadership split over decision to lift GMO crop ban
The Opposition [Dec. 3] voted against Primary Industries Minister Tim Whetstone’s legislative bid to scrap the GM ban passed by ...
Two promising Ebola drugs ‘dramatically reduced’ risk of dying from disease
Final data from a landmark clinical trial of four Ebola therapies conducted in the current outbreak in the Democratic Republic of the ...
CRISPR-edited pigs could blunt swine fever epidemic threatening China’s food supply
Inside a fortresslike megafarm on the outskirts of Beijing, dozens of pink and black pigs forage and snooze, unfazed by ...
3 German science institutes say CRISPR-edited plants not GMOs, call for new EU biotech crop rules
The EU science community continues to put pressure on regulators to reform Europe's genetic engineering law. On [Dece. 4] ...
More children sickened by polio vaccine than by wild virus
Nigeria, Democratic Republic of Congo, Central African Republic, and Angola have experienced nine new cases of polio caused by the ...
Are we ignoring ‘staggering risks’ of human gene editing, including a wider gap between haves and have nots?
Biologists recently revealed a new form of the gene-editing tool known as Crispr that allows researchers to make precise changes ...
It’s been a year since the CRISPR baby controversy. Why are we still without global gene-editing rules?
Around this time last November, Chinese scientist He Jiankui stunned the world when he revealed the birth of the first ...
Bluebird Bio defends as ‘simple and human’ its pricing of costly gene therapy for beta thalassemia
[J]ust as we spent the past years cracking the code to make gene therapy work, we now need to work ...
Zambian food makers directed to label GMO products
Zambia’s National Biosafety Authority (NBA) has directed food producers to clearly label products containing genetically modified organisms (GMOs) so that ...
Aggressive cancer adapts quickly thanks to odd ‘doughnut-shaped’ DNA
Cancer cells may owe some of their destructive nature to unique, "doughnut-shaped" DNA, according to a new study. The study, published ...
EU Health Commissioner defends GMOs, warns against ‘regulation by public opinion’
Outgoing EU Health and Food Safety Commissioner Vytenis Andriukaitis has hit out at regulation by public opinion rather than science-based ...
