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The Irish are renown for their many sins, among them garrulousness, boastfulness, unreliability, excessive drinking, belligerency, chronic impecuniousness, and unrepentant papist mary worshiping cathylicks. God saw fit to punish them in 1845 with a potato famine that has heretofore withstood the test of time. Meanwhile, the Irish have seen fit to emigrate to other lands to inflict their insufferable behavior on other God Fearing Christians (most notably the United States).
We're all waiting to see if this latest attempt to undo God's Righteous punishment will succeed, but don't hold your breath.
We're all waiting to see if this latest attempt to undo God's Righteous punishment will succeed, but don't hold your breath.
Scientists develop GM potato that's immune to Irish famine fungus, late blight
Genes from South American potato were inserted into normal Desiree
17 February 2014
A potato genetically modified to resist the fungus which caused the devastating Irish potato famine of 1845 has been developed by British scientists.
Late blight, caused by the organism Phytophthora infestans, remains the potato farmer's greatest enemy to this day.
Each year UK farmers spend around £60 million keeping the infection at bay with pesticides. In a bad year, losses and control measures combined can account for half the total cost of growing potatoes.
In the latest of a series of field trials, conducted in 2012, the fungus was unable to break down the defences of any of the new strain of GM potatoes.
Non-modified plants grown at the trial site were all infected after being denied protection from chemicals.
However, no-one can say at this stage how long the GM strain will hold out against blight, which is notorious for its ability to overcome resistance.
And EU approval is needed before commercial cultivation of the GM crop can take place.
Scientists are now conducting further research aimed at identifying multiple resistance genes that will thwart future blight attacks.
"Breeding from wild relatives is laborious and slow and by the time a gene is successfully introduced into a cultivated variety, the late blight pathogen may already have evolved the ability to overcome it," said lead scientist Professor Jonathan Jones, from The Sainsbury Laboratory.
"With new insights into both the pathogen and its potato host, we can use GM technology to tip the evolutionary balance in favour of potatoes and against late blight."
The Irish potato famine of 1845 was a disaster for the poorer people of Ireland who depended on potatoes for food and income.
Over the following 10 years, more than 750,000 Irish men, women and children died and another two million left their homeland. Within five years of the famine, the Irish population was reduced by a quarter.
…
Genes from South American potato were inserted into normal Desiree
17 February 2014
A potato genetically modified to resist the fungus which caused the devastating Irish potato famine of 1845 has been developed by British scientists.
Late blight, caused by the organism Phytophthora infestans, remains the potato farmer's greatest enemy to this day.
Each year UK farmers spend around £60 million keeping the infection at bay with pesticides. In a bad year, losses and control measures combined can account for half the total cost of growing potatoes.
In the latest of a series of field trials, conducted in 2012, the fungus was unable to break down the defences of any of the new strain of GM potatoes.
Non-modified plants grown at the trial site were all infected after being denied protection from chemicals.
However, no-one can say at this stage how long the GM strain will hold out against blight, which is notorious for its ability to overcome resistance.
And EU approval is needed before commercial cultivation of the GM crop can take place.
Scientists are now conducting further research aimed at identifying multiple resistance genes that will thwart future blight attacks.
"Breeding from wild relatives is laborious and slow and by the time a gene is successfully introduced into a cultivated variety, the late blight pathogen may already have evolved the ability to overcome it," said lead scientist Professor Jonathan Jones, from The Sainsbury Laboratory.
"With new insights into both the pathogen and its potato host, we can use GM technology to tip the evolutionary balance in favour of potatoes and against late blight."
The Irish potato famine of 1845 was a disaster for the poorer people of Ireland who depended on potatoes for food and income.
Over the following 10 years, more than 750,000 Irish men, women and children died and another two million left their homeland. Within five years of the famine, the Irish population was reduced by a quarter.
…
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