Transcript AG-PSB-02.441-01.2p History_of_Biotechnology

History of
Biotechnology
Modified by Georgia Agricultural
Education Curriculum Office
June, 2002
August 2008
Stages of Biotech
• Ancient
• Classical
• Modern
August 2008
Ancient Biotech
• Begins with early civilization
• Developments in agriculture
and food production
• Few records exist
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Ancient Biotech
• Archeologists research
• Ancient carvings and
sketches sources of
information
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Classical Biotech
• Follows ancient
• Makes wide spread use of
methods from ancient,
especially fermentation
• Methods adapted to industrial
production
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Classical Biotech
• Produce large quantities of
food products and other
materials in short amount of
time
• Meet demands of increasing
population
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Classical Biotech
• Many methods developed
through classical biotech
are widely used today.
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Modern Biotech
• Manipulation of genetic
material within organisms
• Based on genetics and the use
of microscopy, biochemical
methods, related sciences and
technologies
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Modern Biotech
• Often known as genetic
engineering
• Roots involved the
investigation of genes
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Ancient Biotech
• Not known when biotech
began exactly
• Focused on having food
and other human needs
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Ancient Biotech
• Useful plants brought from the
wild, planted near caves where
people lived
• As food was available, ability
to store and preserve emerged
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Ancient
• Food preservation most
likely came from unplanned
events such as a fire or
freeze
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Domestication
• 15,000 years ago, large
animals were hard to capture
• People only had meat when
they found a dead animal
• Came up with ways of
capturing fish and small
animals
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Domestication
• Food supplies often seasonal
• Winter food supplies may get
quite low
• Domestication is seen by
scientists as the beginning of
biotech
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Domestication
• Adaptation of organisms so
they can be cultured
• Most likely began 11,000 –
12,000 years ago in the
middle east
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Domestication
• Involved the collecting of seed
from useful plants and growing
crude crops from that seed
• Involved the knowledge that
the seed had to properly
mature
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Domestication
• Proper planting
• Need for water, light and other
conditions for plant growth
• Earliest plants likely grains and
other seeds used for food
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Domestication
• Raising animals in captivity
began about the same time in
history
• Easier to have an animal close
by that to hunt and capture a
wild one
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Domestication
• Learned that animals need
food and water
• Learned about simple
breeding
• How to raise young
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Domestication
• Cattle, goats
and sheep
were the first
domesticated
food animals
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Domestication
• About 10,000 years ago,
people had learned enough
about plants and animals to
grow their own food
• The beginning of farming.
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Food
• Domestication resulted in food
supplies being greater in
certain times of the year
• Products were gathered and
stored
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Food
• Some foods rotted
• Others changed form and
continued to be good to eat
• Foods stored in a cool cave
did not spoil as quickly
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Food
• Foods heated by fire also
did not spoil as quickly
• Immersing in sour liquids
prevented food decay
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Food preservation
• Using processes that
prevent or slow spoilage
• Heating, cooling, keeps
microorganisms (mo’s) from
growing
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Food preservation
• Stored in bags of leather or jars of
clay
• Fermentation occurs if certain
mo’s are present
• Creates an acid condition that
slows or prevents spoilage
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Cheese
• One of the first
food products
made through
biotechnology
• Began some
4,000 years
ago
• Nomadic tribes
in Asia
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Cheese
• Strains of bacteria were added
to milk
• Caused acid to form
• Resulting in sour milk
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Cheese
• Enzyme called “rennet” was
added
• Rennet comes from the lining
of the stomachs of calves
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Cheese
• Rennet is genetically
engineered today
• Not all cheese is made from
produced rennet
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Yeast
• Long used in food
preparation and
preservation
• Bread baking
• Yeast produces a
gas in the dough
causing the
dough to rise
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Yeast
• Fermented products
• Vinegar
• Require the use of yeast in at
least one stage of production
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Yeast
• Species of fungi
• Some are useful
• Some may cause diseases
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Vinegar
• Ancient product used to
preserve food
• Juices and extracts from fruits
and grains can be fermented
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Fermentation
• Process in which yeast
enzymes chemically change
compounds into alcohol
• In making vinegar the first
product of fermentation is
alcohol
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Fermentation
• Alcohol is converted to acetic acid
by additional microbe activity
• Acid gives vinegar a sour taste
• Vinegar prevents growth of some
bacteria
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Vinegar
• Keeps foods from spoiling
• Used in pickling
• Biblical references to wine
indicate the use of
fermentation some 3,000
years ago
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Fermentation control
• In ancient times, likely
happened by accident
• Advancements occurred in the
1800’s and early 1900’s
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Fermenters
• Used to advance fermentation
process
• Specially designed chamber
that promotes fermentation
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Fermenters
• Allowed better control,
especially with vinegar
• New products such as
glycerol, acetone, and citric
acid resulted
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Development
• Of yeasts that were
predictable and readily
available led to modern baking
industry
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Antibiotics
• Use of fermentation hastened
the development of antibiotics
• A drug used to combat
bacterial infections
August 2008
Antibiotics
• Penicillin
• Developed in the late1920’s
• Introduced in the 1940’s
• First drug produced
by
microbes
August 2008
Antibiotics
• Many kinds available today
• Limitations in their use keep
disease producing organisms
from developing immunity to
antibiotics
August 2008
Antibiotics
• Use antibiotics only when
needed.
• Overuse may make the
antibiotic ineffective when
really needed later
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Antibiotics
• Some disease organisms are
now resistant to certain
antibiotics
• Used in both human and vet
medicine
August 2008
Modern Biotech
• Deals with manipulating genetic
info
• Microscopy and advanced
computer technology are used
• In-depth knowledge of science
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Modern Biotech
• Based on genetics research
from the mid 1800’s
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Genetics
• Study of heredity
• Most work has focused on
animal and plant genetics
• Genes – determiners of
heredity
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Genes
• Carry the genetic code
• Understanding genetic
structure essential for genetic
engineering
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Heredity
• How traits are passed from
parents to offspring
• Members of the same species
pass the characteristics of that
species
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Heredity
• Differences exist within each
species.
• Differences are known as
variability
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Heredity & Variability
• Are used in modern
biotechnology
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Modern Biotech
• Use of biotech to produce new
life forms
• Emerged in mid 1900’s
• Made possible by rDNA
technology
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rDNA
• Recombinant DNA Process
• Genetic material is moved
from one organism to another
• Materials involved are quite
small
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rDNA
• Challenging and often
controversial
• Many have opposing or
negative views of biotechnolgy
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People in Biotech
• Zacharias Janssen
• Discovered the principle of the
compound microscope in 1590
• Dutch eye glass maker
August 2008
Anton Van Leeuwenhoek
• Developed single lens
microscope in 1670’s
• First to observe tiny organisms
and document observations
August 2008
Anton V.L.
• Work led to modern
microscopes
• Electron microscope
developed in 1931 by group of
German scientists
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Gregor Mendel
• Formulated basic laws of
heredity during mid 1800’s
• Austrian Botanist and monk
• Experimented with peas
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Mendel
• Studied inheritance of seven pairs
of traits
• Bred and crossbred thousands of
plants
• Determined that some traits were
dominant and other recessive
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Mendel
• Findings were
published in
1866
• Largely ignored
for 34 years
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Johan Friedrich Miescher
• Swiss Biologist
• Isolated nuclei of white blood
cells in 1869
• Led to identification of nucleic
acid by Walter Flemming
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Walter Sutton
• Determined in 1903 that
chromosomes carried units of
heredity identified by Mendel
• Named “genes” in 1909 by
Wilhelm Johannsen, Danish
Botanist
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Thomas Hunt Morgan
• Studied genetics of fruit flies
• Early 1900’s
• Experimented with eye color
• His work contributed to the
knowledge of X and Y
chromosomes
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Thomas Hunt Morgan
• Nobel Peace Prize in 1933 for
research in gene theory
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Ernst Ruska
• Build the first electron
microscope in 1932
• German electrical engineer
• Microscope offered 400X
magnification
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Alexander Fleming
• Discovered penicillin in 1928
• First antibiotic drug used in
treating human disease
• Observed growth of molds
(Penicillium genus) in a dish
that also contracted bacteria
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Alexander Fleming
• Bacteria close to the molds
were dead
• Extracting and purifying the
molds took a decade of
research
• Penicillin first used in 1941
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Alexander Fleming
• Penicillin credited with saving
many lives during WWII when
wounded soldiers developed
infections.
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Rosalind Elsie Franklin
• Research in France and
England in mid 1900’s
• Led to discovery of structure of
DNA
• Her early research was used
to produce an atomic bomb
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Rosalind Franklin
• Set up X ray diffraction lab
• Photographs of DNA showed
that it could have a double
helix structure
August 2008
Rosalind Franklin
• Some questions surround the
theft of her work in 1952
• Including x ray photographs
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Watson and Crick
• James Watson
• Francis Crick
• Collaborated to
produce the first
model of DNA
structure in 1953
August 2008
Watson and Crick
• Described DNA dimensions
and spacing of base pairs
• Had major impact on genetic
engineering carried out today
August 2008
Watson
• Born in the US
• Crick – born in England
• Collaborative research at
Cambridge University in
England
August 2008
Norman E. Borlaug
• Developed wheat varieties producing
high yields
• Research in Mexico
• Semi dwarf varieties
• Developed wheat variety that would
grow in climates where other varieties
would not
August 2008
Borlaug
• Nobel Peace Prize in 1971
• Credited with helping relieve
widespread hunger in some
nations
August 2008
Mary Clare King
• Research into nature of DNA
during late 1900’s
• Determined that 99% of
human DNA is identical to
chimpanzee
August 2008
Mary Clare King
• 1975 found similar gene pools
between humans and
chimpanzee made it possible
to research hereditary causes
of breast cancer
August 2008
Ian Wilmut
• Cloning of a sheep named
Dolly in 1997
• Produced from tissue of an
adult sheep
• Previous cloning efforts had
been from early embryos
August 2008
Research
• Use of systematic methods to
answer questions.
• Problems may be basic or
applied
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Basic
• Require generating new info to
gain understanding
• Applied – involve use of
knowledge already acquired.
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Research
• Supplies facts that can be
used to improve a process or
product
• Settings range from elaborate
labs to field plots
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Field Plot
• Small area of land that is used
to test questions or hypothesis
• Belief is that same result
would be obtained if carried
out on larger scale
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Field Plots
• Often tested several times
• Known as replication
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Research
• Done by agencies, universities,
private companies, individuals
• Biotech research in ag is carried
out by ag experiment stations and
large corporations
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Development
• Creation of new products or
methods based on findings of
research
• Carefully studied before being
put into full scale use
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Development
• New products tested before
approval
• Government agencies such as
the FDA are involved
• Prototype is developed –
research model that is carefully
tested
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Prototype
• Becomes a pattern for the
production of similar products
• After being fully tested, full
scale production begins.
August 2008