One gene, one protein, one function - not so

Our current understanding tells us that genes behave in complex inter-related non-linear networks: causation is multi-dimensional and circular; and genes are subject to environmental feedback regulation. All these factors are excluded by the central reductionist dogma of the biotech industry, which prefers to adhere to the “one gene, one protein, one function” model of yesteryear.

This narrow reductionist mindset allows GM companies to assert that their foreign gene will only produce the one intended protein and therefore will behave in the precise and controlled way they expect. Control and precision is also what biotech investors demand.

That the GM companies assume that their inserted foreign gene will only express the one intended protein is a manifestly risky assumption. In fact, the number of genes in nature that actually express a single protein can be counted on two hands. Most genes code for many proteins. In fact, the fruit-fly holds the record for the highest number of proteins expressed by a single gene - 38,016! It’s the gene’s ability to produce multiple proteins together with the location specific nature of gene expression that is believed to be responsible for the unexpected effects described in the experiments above. Disturbingly, the biotech industry and our food regulators do no testing for theses possible outcomes.

But there is a growing body of evidence that suggests that they should. Allergies have skyrocketed in the UK since the introduction of GM soy. In the US, a GM food supplement produced an epidemic of Eosinophilia Myalgia Syndrome (EMS) which killed 37 people and maimed thousands more. Mice fed GM soy had unexplained changes in testicular cells and rats fed GM corn showed significant changes in their blood cells, livers and kidneys.

All these GM products had been tested and approved for human consumption. Could the narrow reductionist lens with which the biotech industry views genetic engineering be resulting in unintended effects slipping through and onto our dinner plates?

Like the proverbial man looking for his car keys under the street lamp because there’s more light there, the biotech industry is using the dim candle of 1960’s genetics to assure us that GM food products in the 21st century are safe.

Applying an entirely random and uncontrolled gene insertion method, together with an outdated model of genetics to the profoundly fundamental question of food safety is literally taking a shot in the genetic dark with our health.