The Genetic Modification of Crops
The use of genetic engineering for developing new medicines and treating disease
is often in the news, but the genetic modification of crops is also important
(people spend vastly more money on food than they do on medicine). The
techniques involved are explained on "The Soybean Tissue Culture and Genetic
Engineering Center" web site. Click on the "Protocols" button. Soybeans don't
interest you because you don't eat them? Explore the site a bit (especially the
"WWW" and "Members" pages) and you may be surprised.
Plants and Space Travel
NASA's Space Research website provides great information on studies of the
effects of weight and endogenous rhythms are carried out by NASA. It is
important to know how microgravity and artificial rhythms affect not only humans
in space flight, but also how microgravity affects plants that might be the
subjects of experiments, or that might be used as food crops or to purify the
air on long-duration space travel. Check out the articles on plants and general
biology under the General Information tab. Then under the Research and Projects
tab, use the navigation bar on the left to explore the current Programs.
Interesting topics include: microgravity, fundamental space biology and space
product development.
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