Glofish are have a copyright BEWARE
After some direct contact with Yorktown Technologies, I can tell you all that the CEO is one of the NICEST guys in the world. He was very polite in all respects, and is a big supporter of the use of glos in student research and education.
I’m glad that the company was able to share some information directly about the suspected issues with the glo-fish, and put some research to back some of the unfounded worries about their release to the public.
For those of you who are interested–the idea of patenting gene insertions and gene sequences is not new. It would be totally legal for anyone to inject other genes into other danios or other fish species and market the fish. The idea of gene injection/developing GMOs is now somewhat old in the world of molecular genetics, and there are MANY MANY documented types of danios and other organisms. These have all been produced using identical or similar methods.
So, although I cannot be sure as I am not a patent lawyer nor have I read the patent myself, it would seem highly unlikely that the US patent and trade office would patent the production of ALL transgenic/GMO fish, since there were others produced prior to the glofish. The growth hormone gene in salmonids comes to mind–I was fortunate enough to meet some of these individuals years ago when they came to give a seminar on the methods. VERY neat, and if we are to meet the world’s growing demand, their efforts were a step in the right direction.
Why aren’t more people doing it? It takes time, $$$$, and some equipment, and it is a very tedious process. I’ve microinjected LARGE trout eggs, and those hours in front of the scope nearly made me blind : ) so it’s not without work and dedication that these things get done. Even so, many of the injected eggs fail to develop, so the % of success is not high.
The fact that this group has what we call “stable germ-line transmission” (meaning it can be passed on reliably from parent to offspring) is another huge achievement…few injected genes actually become stable and are able to be passed on.
As for identifying offspring vs purchased, as long as you had a receipt and traded what you bought with someone, I can’t imagine there would be a problem. Also, if you crossed their glos with other danios, one could easily determine this by examining the fish’s microsatellites–which gives a genetic fingerprint.
I understand–from being in the lab–how important it is for people to get back $$ from their brain, time, and monetary investments. I’m glad that some of this $ goes back to research.
Amanda
Category: Philippines Internet Koi Society
