Team:IIT Delhi/Achievements/Questions

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iGEM IIT Delhi 2014


Our team conducted discussion sessions and discussed over various topics, at the end we concluded over some important questions related to but not limited to ethics, sustainability, social justice, safety, security, or intellectual property rights.

Question 1: What constitutes suitable and unsuitable use of organisms by humans? Should organisms be ever used in research? Do organisms have "rights" as we have human rights? Answer:
    • ✔ According to Medical Dictionary 'An Organism is defined as ‘an individual from of life made of organs, organelles and other parts that work together to carry on the various processes of life'. Before considering the suitable and unsuitable uses of organisms by humans, we need to understand the reason behind the question. Such a question arises due to the inability of the current technologies to provide effective solutions to present day environmental concerns. This makes it necessary for researchers to delve into newer avenues and develop technologies competent to combat these problems. Genetic modification of organisms is one such novel approach being widely used by researchers these days as it gives the opportunity to integrate the various useful functions present over a wide range of organisms into one single organism. However like any new venture, genetic modifications raise ethical questions without obvious answers.
    • ✔ Our perspective of the unsuitable usage of organisms is that the modification should not lead to any disruption in the eco-system and the life cycle of these organisms. In our project we made sure that the rate of production of the next generation should be greater than the loss of the present generation of organisms used. Hence a positive equilibrium will be maintained and our project if produced on a large scale will have no negative effect on the life system of E-Coli.
    • ✔ The discoveries and innovations in most of the technologies have reached saturation, thereby calling for biotechnological developments involving organisms to sustain the future of our planet. Hence, it is the need of the hour to undertake organism based research.
    • ✔ Considering the fact that these modified organisms will affect future evolution, we need a new set of policies that address the dilemma of organism rights. There is no ‘simple bright line’ that distinguishes ‘right’ from ‘wrong’ in law. The law is open to debate and it is important that we consider the effect that these genetically modified organisms have on the future of mother earth while formulating new laws.
    • ✔ While pursuing our research, we tried our level best to make sure that ethics and science go hand in hand and made a table-top model that satisfies both the requirements.

Question 2:Going from genetic manipulation in microorganism to plants, animals and humans. Should we mark a line cautioning genetic manipulation and put a bound at some point ? Answer:
    • ✔ Yes, there is a need to tread carefully when it comes to genetic manipulation and proper regulatory measures need to be put in place. Genetic manipulation involves altering the genetic makeup of an organism to produce offspring with desired traits. Some of these traits may not occur in any members of the naturally occurring members of the species and may be introduced from a completely different organism altogether. Thus in effect genetic manipulation leads to creation of new organisms which did not previously exist in nature and have one or more traits that may provide the genetically manipulated organism a survival advantage over the naturally occurring members of its species.
    • ✔ There is an interesting account of the BT Cotton which highlights the need for caution while using genetic manipulation. BT Cotton plants were endowed with a gene from the bacterium Bacillus thuringiensis, which produces a natural insecticide called BT toxin which made the plant resistive to bollworm infection. This GM cotton plant became very popular initially as the yield increased greatly with the bollworm infection out of the picture. Moreover the farmers now had to use less pesticides on their cotton and thus it was an economically favorable proposition for them to invest in Bt Cotton. Consequently, more and more farmers started growing BT Cotton in hope of higher returns. However, soon other pests resistant to Bt toxin started emerging which led to the farmers to use expensive pesticides again. This was an unexpected outcome since the major concern from the beginning were the BT resistant bollworms and not much thought was given to resistance in other pests.
    • ✔ The above account shows that Genetic Manipulation is still in an early stage and there may have several effects which we are not be aware of. And these effects may not be easily reversible. Hence presently it is very important that proper research is done on the effects of releasing GM organisms in the wild and proper regulations are put in place to ensure that no harm comes to the environment and the people.

Questiom 3:
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The Case-Study Competetion
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