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Originally Posted by applesoffh
Does Monsanto use chemicals to genetically modify the crops? I seriously doubt they use cross breeding of desired traits, as has been done for generations, as that would be too time consuming. If genetically modified seed transfers to the soil in which it is planted, and that soild becomes resistant to pesticides, that's got to be horrendous for the water supply. Somehow, in spite of all the talk about how good Monsanto's genetically modified seed is, there are still sane arguments in opposition.
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Step by Step, How to Genetically Modify A Seed
Using nature as a guide, geneticists build plants with qualities evolution could never produce
Behind every single seed is at least a decade of research involving geneticists, engineers and farmers, working to produce a seed that will grow exactly as expected, and in a way nature may not have intended.
(Article is 2 pages long)
How To Genetically Modify a Seed, Step By Step | Popular Science
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http://www.popsci.com/technology/gal...-modified-seed
Ginny Ursin, head of technology prospecting at Monsanto, has been studying plants most of her life; at age 10, she cobbled together a makeshift greenhouse in the front yard. It was well-built enough that a city building inspector dropped by to inquire about a permit, she recalled. After obtaining her Ph.D in genetics from the University of California-Davis, she studied the biochemical pathways that allow plants to accumulate oil. She has spent more than a decade developing a new omega-3 soybean, which actually produces a precursor fatty acid that our bodies convert into a heart-healthy type of omega-3 — fish oil without the fish. Its history includes Alaskan wildflowers, a type of mold used in Indonesian cooking and years of patient cultivation.
Monsanto is working with the African Agricultural Technology Foundation to license the technology it used to make drought-tolerant corn, which it hopes will debut in this country by 2012. Corn is a huge cash crop in this country, so Monsanto isn’t exactly giving it away — but the public-private partnership, financed in part by a $47 million grant from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation and the Howard G. Buffett Foundation, will help African companies develop their own strains, which theoretically can thrive in dry areas of western Africa.