Path: utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!clyde.concordia.ca!mcgill-vision!bloom-beacon!mit-eddie!bu.edu!bu-cs!mirror!prism!john
From: john@prism.TMC.COM
Newsgroups: sci.bio
Subject: Why tobacco?
Message-ID: <203100003@prism>
Date: 16 Jan 90 19:17:00 GMT
Lines: 18
Nf-ID: #N:prism:203100003:000:902
Nf-From: prism.TMC.COM!john    Jan 16 14:17:00 1990


The 1/16/90 New York Times has an article in the Science section, 
about putting human genes in plants.  "Tobacco procuces sun screen 
and antibodies".  My question:  Why tobacco?  Is there something 
kind of fishy here, like the major tobacco companies funding this 
research?, or finding alternative uses for the stuff so it's harder 
to just quit growing the damn stuff?  I would think that almost 
any other plant would be a better practical candidate for this kind 
of thing.  Tobacco is very hard to grow, and takes a lot out of the soil.  
I've read of other genetic research on this plant as 
well.  I remember that somebody got tobacco plants to make the same 
enzymes that fireflies do, and the plants would grow in the dark.  Now this.
What gives?  Why tobacco? 
 
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JOHN DOWD	john@mirror.TMC.COM
{mit-eddie, pyramid, harvard!wjh12, xwait}!mirror!john
Mirror Systems	Cambridge, MA  02140