Genetic Engineering
Biology: AQA GCSE Higher, topic 6.2.8
Genetic Engineering
Genetic engineering involves modifying (changing) an organism’s genome by introducing a gene from another organism to produce a desired characteristic. Examples of this are:
Insulin-producing gene
- The gene that produces insulin can be inserted into bacteria. Those bacteria can then mass-produce insulin to treat people with diabetes.
Vitamin A rice
- A lack of vitamin A can lead to blindness.
- A lot of communities that were lacking in vitamin A were found to use rice as the core of their diet.
- Therefore, a gene that produced vitamin A was taken from bacteria and added to rice, producing rice (golden rice) that was rich in Vitamin A.
Test yourself on Genetic Engineering
What organism is used to produce human insulin via genetic engineering?
Why are bacteria genetically engineered to produce insulin?
Scientists added a vitamin A producing gene to rice because many vitamin A deficient communities rely on rice as their staple food. What would most likely happen if the gene was added to a crop those communities rarely eat instead?
A lack of vitamin A can lead to blindness, and golden rice is rich in vitamin A. What would likely happen to blindness rates in a vitamin A deficient community if golden rice became their main food?