1. Introduction to Plant Biotechnology By associate prof. D. Yu Golikov

2. Contents Introduction Definition History Traditional biotechnology Practical Applications of Biotechnology Biotechnology today Different branches of biotechnology Modern biotechnology Future biotechnology Active form: Discussion References

3. Objectives: Be able to define modern biotechnologies and understand how they are used in food and drink production. To consider the possible future developments in biotechnology for food production. To explain the scientific principles of different modern biotechnologies e.g. genetically modified organisms.

4. What is biotechnology? Biotechnology is defined as the “use of living systems, organisms, or parts of organisms to manipulate natural processes in order to develop products, systems, or environments to benefit people”. Biotechnology is widely used in industry, agriculture and medicine. It has the potential to improve efficiency of agriculture and allow sustainable food production.

5. History Károly Ereky (German: Karl Ereky; October 20, 1878 – June 17, 1952) was a Hungarian agricultural engineer. The term 'biotechnology' was coined by him in 1919. He is regarded by some as the "father" of biotechnology. Ereky coined the word "biotechnology" in Hungary during 1919 in a book he published in Berlin called Biotechnologie der Fleisch-, Fett- und Milcherzeugung im landwirtschaftlichen Grossbetriebe (Biotechnology of Meat, Fat and Milk Production in an Agricultural Large-Scale Farm) where he described a technology based on converting raw materials into a more useful product. He built a slaughterhouse for a thousand pigs and also a fattening farm with space for 50,000 pigs, raising over 100,000 pigs a year. The enterprise was enormous, becoming one of the largest and most profitable meat and fat operations in the world. Ereky further developed a theme that would be reiterated through the 20th century: biotechnology could provide solutions to societal crises, such as food and energy shortages. For Ereky, the term "biotechnologie" indicated the process by which raw materials could be biologically upgraded into socially useful products.

6. Paul Berg (born June 30, 1926) is an American biochemist and professor emeritus at Stanford University. He was the recipient of the Nobel Prize in Chemistry in 1980, along with Walter Gilbert and Frederick Sanger. The award recognized their contributions to basic research involving nucleic acids. In addition to the Nobel Prize, Berg was presented with the National Medal of Science in 1983 and the National Library of Medicine Medal in 1986. Biotechnology is a collective term for an incredible number of processes, products and methodologies. According to the definition from the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD), biotechnology is “the application of science and technology to living organisms, as well as parts, products and models thereof, to alter living or non-living materials for the production of knowledge, goods and services”. History contd

7. Traditional biotechnology The use of biotechnology in food production is not new. It has been used for thousands of years. Early examples of biotechnology include the domestication of animals, planting of crops and the use of micro-organisms to make cheese, yogurt, bread, beer and wine.

8. Practical Applications of Biotechnology

9. In other words: The application possibilities of biotechnology are not limited to a single area, but are in fact extremely varied. Biotechnologists conduct research into large and small organisms, plants, animals and humans, but also into the very smallest components, such as individual cells or molecules. As a branch of science, biotechnology is also not as young as some might think. For millennia, people have made use of living microorganisms in their daily lives, for example in the production of beer, wine and bread. Modern biotechnology - as it is applied today - is characterized most of all by the targeted utilization of the methods of molecular biology. The fundamentals for this area of science were first laid down in the 18th and 19th Centuries as the knowledge surrounding microbiology began to grow. For example, with the discovery of the first enzymes as biocatalysts, or of bacteria as producers of substances.

10. Today Today, biotechnology is multitalented. It used to develop new medicines, breed new varieties of crops, or make the manufacturing of everyday products such as detergents and cosmetics more efficient. To distinguish these different application areas, a color code has emerged: Thereby, a distinction is made between red, green and white biotechnology, which refers to the areas of medicine (red), agriculture (green) and industry (white).

11. Blue biotechnology is a term that has been used to describe the marine and aquatic applications of biotechnology, but its use is relatively rare. It involves the use of these organisms, and their derivatives, for multiple purposes, one of the most remarkable,, process and development of new active ingredients from marine origin. No doubt using raw materials from the sea represents the most widespread blue biotechnology in many different sectors. These materials, mostly hydrocolloids and gelling are already being widely used in food, health, treatment, etc. Medicine and research are other major beneficiaries of development in blue biotechnology. Some marker molecules from marine organisms are now commonly used in research. Enzymatically active molecules useful in diagnostics and research have also been isolated from marine organisms. Some biomaterials and pharmacological or regenerative active agents are being produced or investigated for their use in these sectors. Finally, sectors such as agriculture and cosmetics analyze the potential of blue biotechnology for its future development. Subdivision of Biotechnology

12. Red biotechnology applied to medical processes. Some examples are the designing of organisms to produce antibiotics, and the engineering of genetic cures through genetic manipulation. MANY new treatments for diseases and conditions Examples: diabetes, stroke, anemia, cystic fibrosis, hemophilia, leukemia and other cancers; hepatitis; rheumatoid arthritis; growth deficiencies; transplant rejection

13. White biotechnology, also known as industrial biotechnology, is biotechnology applied to industrial processes. White biotechnology pays a special attention to design low resource-consuming processes and products, making them more energy efficient and less polluting than traditional ones. There can be found many examples of white biotechnology, such as the use of microorganisms in chemicals production, the design and production of new materials for daily use (plastics, textiles...) and the development of new sustainable energy sources such as biofuels. An example is the designing of an organism to produce a useful chemical. Another example is the using of enzymes as industrial catalysts to either produce valuable chemicals or destroy hazardous/polluting chemicals. White biotechnology tends to consume less in resources than traditional processes used to produce industrial goods.

14. Grey biotechnology includes all those applications of biotechnology directly related to the environment. These applications can be split up into two main branches: biodiversity maintenance and contaminants removal. Regarding the first, it should be mentioned the application of molecular biology to genetic analysis of populations and species that are part of ecosystems, their comparison and classification and also cloning techniques aimed to preserve species and genome storage technologies. As for pollutants removal or bioremediation, grey biotechnology uses microorganisms and plants to isolate and dispose of different substances such as heavy metals and hydrocarbons, with the added possibility of subsequently making use of these substances or by-products from this activity.

15. Green biotechnology focused on agriculture as working field. Green biotechnological approaches and applications include creating new plant varieties of agricultural interest, producing biofertilizers and biopesticides, using in vitro cultivation and cloning plants. The first approach is the one to undergo further development and attract the most interest and social controversy. Producing modified plant varieties is based almost exclusively on transgenesis, or introducing genes of interest from another variety or organism into the plant. Three main objectives are pursued by using this technology. First, it is expected to get varieties resistant to pests and diseases -for example, currently used and marketed maize varieties resistant to pests such as corn stalk borer. Secondly, use of transgenic plants is aimed at developing varieties with improved nutritional properties (eg, higher content of vitamins). Finally, transgenesis in plants is also studied as a means to develop plant varieties able to act as bio-factories and produce substances of medical, biomedical or industrial interest in quantities easy to be isolated and purified. Another agricultural application —forests: to create disease- and insect-resistant trees to help meet demand for wood products.

16. Modern biotechnology Modern biotechnology is based on a range of genetic discoveries in 1950-75. These included finding that DNA is the substance which carries genetic information and the discovery of the structure of DNA.

17. Future biotechnology First some historical perspective: -Thomas Malthus (1803): “The power of population is so superior to the power of Earth to produce sustenance for man, that premature death must in some shape…visit the human race.” -Paul Ehrlich (1967): “…the battle to feed all of humanity is over…In the 1970s and 1980s hundreds of millions of people will starve to death in spite of any crash programs embarked upon now.” -Food and Agricultural Organization of the UN (2002): “Massive strides have been made in improving food security. Global shortages are unlikely, but serious problems already exist at national and local levels and may worsen unless focused efforts are made. -The World Bank: “Food crop prices are likely to remain high… in 2009 and then begin to decline. But they are likely to remain well above 2004 levels through 2015 for most food crops.” -International Food Policy Research Institute: “World agriculture has ended a new, unsustainable and politically risky period.” It is estimated that global population is to rise to around eight billion by 2030 and probably to over nine billion by 2050. (The Future of Food and Farming: Challenges and choices for global sustainability 2011)

18. Discussion As the population of the world continues to rise, the demand for plants and foods have pushed the research for better yield of crops, better shelf life of food, better resistance of plants to diseases and pests through genetic engineering. This is done by inserting DNA from other organisms. Among those crops that have been successfully produced through genetically modified process are soya beans and corn. Today, Biotechnology is a multidisciplinary activity involving chemists, biologists, engineers and many other specialists. Its scope is enormous. There are sophisticated new drugs produced in the milk of transgenic sheep, microbial cocktails that can clean up contaminated land transgenic plants and fish that yield more food or resist disease - and hundreds of different micro- organisms able to produce fermentation products such as amino acids, vitamins, enzymes and antibiotics. It is playing a major role in serving the mankind. Be it in forms of improved plant varieties or developing vaccines. It is widely used in food industry, enabling cattle to grow faster and produce new enzymes for making cheese.

19. Summary The aim of agricultural and plant biotechnologies are: - rapid multiplication of useful micro-organisms, - micro propagation of plants, - production of diagnostic tools for the identification of plant disease and detection of contaminants, - Introduction of genetic mapping technologies and more efficient systems of plant germplasm preservation, - Genetically engineer plants – i.e., alter their basic structure which have now new characteristic to improve the efficiency of crop production. - The goal of all the above is to produce more and better crops at lower cost.

20. References 1.An introduction to biotechnology [electronic resource]: the science, technology and medical applications W. T. Godbey. Author: Godbey, W. T. Published: London, [England] : AP, 2014. http://catalog.lib.ncsu.edu/record/NCSU3308848 http://catalog.lib.ncsu.edu/record/NCSU3308848 2.An introduction to biotechnology [electronic resource] : the science, technology and medical applications by W.T. Godbey. Author: Godbey, W. T., http://catalog.lib.ncsu.edu/record/NCSU3316830http://catalog.lib.ncsu.edu/record/NCSU3316830 3.Future Trends in Biotechnology [electronic resource] edited by Jian-Jiang Zhong. Author: Zhong, J.-J. (Jian-Jiang) Published: Berlin, Heidelberg: Springer Berlin Heidelberg: Imprint: Springer, 2013. http://catalog.lib.ncsu.edu/record/NCSU2777061 http://catalog.lib.ncsu.edu/record/NCSU2777061 4.Biotechnology [electronic resource] : prospects and applications R.K. Salar, S. K. Gahlawat, P. Siwach, J.S. Duhan, editors. Published: New Delhi ; New York : Springer, [2013] http://catalog.lib.ncsu.edu/record/NCSU3064466http://catalog.lib.ncsu.edu/record/NCSU3064466