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Re: Bio-technology=Green Fluorescent Fish



Its good to know at least part of my idea was fulfilled!  Yes!  I can feel
the FIRE burning in the belly again! :-)  Though Singapore is sooo far
away.  This Dr Gong obviously chose Zebra danios because they:

1.	Produce relatively big eggs.
2.	Grow fast.
3.	Are small at sexual maturity.

I will e-mail the Prof. to see if he has had success w/ sustaining this
expression in F2,F3....etc succeeding generations.  He seems to have
published only the Abstract of his paper.  I wonder if by now the DNA
cloning procedures have become efficient enough (and cheaper)  so you won't
need a 50,000 ---> 100,000 rpm centrifuge to achieve to purify the PCR
extract...uhh

Are there any graduate students out there not too busy to tell me if the
state of the art in DNA isolation, cloning, purification and cellular
re-introduction has progressed far enough so results can be achieved using
low tech methods?  For obvious reasons I'd love to pursue this inquiry
off-list.  

With the hysterical race to "ban everything DNA" w/in the USA (anything FUN
at least w/o descent debate as exemplified by Clinton's
"mad-dash-to-ban-human-cloning") I won't be suprised if the state of the
art hasn't already moved wwwaayyy offshore.  

If it hadn't been for Rifkin and his hysterical influence State side, that
zebra danio and many more like it, would have been an American Lab's
success 12years ago!  Keep an eye on this Dr Gong;
http://www.dbs.nus.edu.sg/research/Fish%20bio/green_fluorescent_fish_to_ligh
t_.htm  he clearly has seen the $ potential of his work in the aquarium
trade.  It won't be long now (if he isn't already doing it) before he
recognizes the relative ease Aquatic plants cells and hereditary lines can
be manipulated compared to animal cells.


At 08:43 PM 4/19/00 -0400, you wrote:
>I think this might wet your dreams a bit.  JiM C.
>
>
http://www.dbs.nus.edu.sg/research/Fish%20bio/green_fluorescent_fish_to_ligh
t_.htm
>
>Date: Mon, 17 Apr 2000 10:23:16 -0400
>From: Dwight <boukmn at mindspring_com>
>Subject: Bio-technology
>
>Years ago when I was but a wild-eyed undergrad,  I hoped to do graduate
>work w/ a Prof. whose research focus was transgenetics and their
>application in fish.  I had this idea of one day be able to transfer the
>genetic sequence that coded for a firefly's phosphorescence to aquarium
>plants (swords) and/or fish (Oscars) in order to get them to glow in the
>dark.
>
>Green plants would glow green, red plants would glow red (imagine Rotala
>Macrandra, Tropic Sunset or Nymphaea zenkeri glowing RED!)..etc.
>
>I was partly motivated by the destruction I saw taking place worldwide as
>reefs were being stripped of exotic looking fish to supply the saltwater
>trade.  I thought eventually transferring genetic pigmentation patterns
>from saltwater angelfish to freshwater angels would stem the demand for the
>saltwater species if MORE exotic freshwater species could be artificially
>mass-produced.
>
>I answered concerns of genetic distortion of wild populations by the
>possibility of escaping hybrids by suggesting only triploid chromosome
>(sterile) versions of the trans-genic fish could be produced to mitigate
>against that possibility.
>
>Unfortunately, back then "Jurassic Park"  was only a just-released book so
>the public only had Jerry Rifkin's "doom-'an-gloom" scenarios with which to
>understand genetic engineering.  Negative legislation was pending...my
>Prof. couldn't even get $10,000 minimum funding from the Florida growers to
>allow him to take on a graduate student.  They just "didn't get it".
>
>I got disillusioned, and left that dream behind.  That was 1987.
>
>Does anyone know if any graduate students under a professor with the
>vision, resources and/or the tenacity to back and support them are doing
>similar work these days?




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