I just got back from an ID conference and was surprised at the growth in this movement! Below is an article I just noted about my roommate, a retired Cornell professor. It is my conclusion that it will continue to grow.
Progressive Farmer's Man of the Year: John Sanford
Man of the Year: John Sanford Progressive Farmer, January 2001 http://www.progressivefarmer.com/issue/0101/sanford/default.asp (thanks to HANU PAPPU <[email protected]> for this alert to Agbioview) From a simple BB gun, this scientist fired the shot heard around the world-the promise of biotechnology to feed the hungry. The revolution of agricultural biotechnology came to be through the business end of a Crossman BB gun-a dime-store toy wielded by many a rambunctious youth. This is the pistol that powered the first gene gun, a low-tech, "laughable" idea, mocked in the scientific community. It will never work, they said. But it did. And it transformed agriculture in a way no one understands. From an idea of Cornell University scientist John Sanford, the world now has corn and cotton that kill insect pests, plants that are resistant to herbicides, a rice resistant to insects (from the genes of potatoes) and tolerant of salt and drought (genes from barley). The gene gun was used to create a virus-resistant fruit that will save Hawaii's $45-million-a-year papaya crop from a viral killer. In less developed countries, the technology Sanford pioneered is embraced as a miracle, perhaps a real way to beat chronic crop failures and hunger. Also evolving from his BB gun is a hand-held gene gun for use on humans and animals that shoots genetic vaccines directly into the skin. The vaccines, says Sanford friend and University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center researcher Stephen Johnston, are safer than today's vaccines and produce "whopping" immune responses. It is because so much human good has come from the barrel of an air pistol that Progressive Farmer is honored to elect John Sanford its 2001 Man of the Year in Service to Agriculture. Agriculture's newest production revolution began in the fall of 1983 when Sanford was waging an aggravating backyard battle with plundering squirrels. So it was BBs Sanford had on his mind when Cornell University electrical engineer Ed Wolf asked him this question: Exactly what speed is needed to force bits of genetic material through the fragile, semipermeable walls of plant cells? Wolf and Sanford had done some hard thinking about Sanford's ideas for moving genetic material into living plant cells, and had come upon the notion of "shooting" it in. But what about that speed? Wolf wondered. Sanford thought for a moment. "About the speed of a BB," he said. Wolf looked over his array of electromagnetic accelerators and ion beams. The less-than-blazing speed of a BB can be achieved with much less sophistication he thought. Wolf came across the right tool on a cluttered shelf in Fay's Drug Store near the Cornell campus-a Crossman air pistol. Christmas break 1983 brought together Sanford, Wolf and Nelson Allen (the head machinist in Wolf's lab who modified the BB gun and, later, vastly improved versions of it) for the first tests of this low-tech but elegant tool for moving genetic material. Into a hole drilled in the barrel of the gun, the three poured bits of powdered tungsten. The target was a whole onion, which Sanford chose for its large cells. The first blasts of air were so violent that bits of onion splattered back onto the researchers, donning the customary white gowns, booties and hats of ultra-clean laboratories. As the roomed filled with the pungent smell of splattered onion, Sanford made adjustments and soon had tungsten hitting the bull's-eye-the insides of onion cells. Sanford took what Allen and Wolf jokingly called the macroparticle accelerator back to his lab. There he soon proved the cells survived the shots of tungsten and that DNA could be delivered into the cells on these particles. He soon realized bursts of air from air guns where too uncontrollable-too close and the cells were blasted apart; too far away and the particles failed to penetrate. So in the spirit of Tim Allen's TV character Tim the Toolman, he added more power. Sanford brought into the employ of the fragile craft of plant biotechnology .22-caliber blanks (the kind used in nail guns). The blanks powered a plunger that ran into a stopping plate that was pierced with a small hole. The tip of the plunger was treated with DNA-covered bits of tungsten. When fired, the rod shot forward, striking the stopping plate. The DNA-coated tungsten flew forward through the hole into the target cells. That's the theory. In practice, it fell to a sometimes powder-burned Ted Klein, a young researcher now working at DuPont, to fire the gun and dodge bits of high-velocity debris. Klein soon began tying a length of string to the trigger and leaving the room before firing the gun. Researchers on the second floor of Cornell's Hedrick Hall never did get used to the sporadic gunfire coming coming from Sanford's lab. And neither did the cells. They often died from the effect of blast and gunpowder. But Sanford and Klein slowly improved their techniques. Klein's work eventually led to the first successful biolistic transformations of plants. By 1986, with improvements in the gun-today's gene guns are most likely powered by gas, such as helium-Sanford's lab, in collaboration with Pioneer Hi-Bred International, Inc., produced the first transformation of corn. Sanford and Klein's gun shattered the biotech bottleneck. Researchers knew what some genes did and even how to get some inside plants, but the gun made the process faster, more reliable and less expensive. Plus it worked in a wide variety of applications. From that work, Sanford has moved on. After selling the rights to his gene gun to DuPont and selling Sanford Scientific, a company he founded, a financially-secure Sanford opened the doors to his Feed My Sheep Institute in Waterloo, N.Y. A deeply religious man, Sanford hoped to transfer for free the benefits of plant genetic engineering to Third World nations. Although his intentions were honorable, the real-world costs were too high. So Sanford has mothballed Feed My Sheep. Today, he works some on his own human gene gun, but more often he is engaged in what he calls the field of Christian spiritual nutrition. He won't say much about it, except that his work takes on some of the rougher edges of TV of the Internet. With regard to some of today's biotechnology controversies-particularly charges about Aventis' StarLink seed potentially causing allergic reactions in humans-Sanford admits some confusion. He points out that the proteins of dispute are very similar to ones that, for decades, have been an important tool in organic farming. What's more, he says, "We're exposed to tens or hundreds of thousands of proteins in a normal diet. There are a bewildering array of potential allergens. They have never been regulated. But now there seems to be [a movement to] arbitrarily and artificially raise barriers [to their advanced use]." He finds today's loud and angry biotech debate a bit ironic. As a student in the 1970s, Sanford remembers his alarm at the prospect of mass starvation. The thought of the "population bomb" drew him into the field of plant breeding. And with the fruits of his labor, Sanford has helped bring the promise of genetic engineering to all who must eat to live.
