GM Salmon Released Onto Our Plates

After much controversy and deliberation over a new species of genetically-modified salmon, this fish, American company Aqua Bounty's GM Atlantic salmon, is the first to be declared safe to grace our plates.

The US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has recently revealed that it could not find any bona fide reasons for prohibiting the release of the GM salmon into the consumer market. The product currently poses no threat to human health, but, being a genetically-modified species, it's existence raises issues about any potential dangers.

Having completed my Geography GCSE at the end of the last school year, this topic piqued my interest. I had studied the 'GM Revolution' and investigated the advantages and disadvantages of such developments; in total honesty, the problems far outweighed the profitability. What I was interested to find out about was how the company behind the fish, Aqua Bounty, had managed to minimise any risks in order to reassure the FDA so well.

The genes of a wild Atlantic salmon were engineered with genetic material from the Pacific Chinook salmon and the Ocean Pout.

The Chinook salmon is more commonly known as the spring salmon, and is the largest of the salmon family. It's flesh is high in nutritional omega 3 fatty acids.

This 'eel-like species', the Ocean Pout, has "antifreeze proteins in its blood, giving it the ability to survive in near-freezing waters." Thus enabling the GM salmon to grow all through the year, as it is able to survive and feed in the colder seasons.

The new salmon is designed to live in inland fish-farms, reducing the risk of the GM species meeting its wild cousins out at sea. On the off-chance that the two do meet, the escapees would be unable to reproduce as they each have three copies of each chromosome, producing sterile female GM salmon. Due to the placement of the inland fish-farm tanks, the GM salmon will be closer to its destinations, therefore reducing transport costs and carbon emissions.

Currently, fish stocks and marine ecosystems are under extreme stress from overfishing and destructive fishing techniques. Pro-GM scientists argue that rearing the salmon in fish-farms will be much more environmentally-friendly.

A 'draft environmental assessment' was published last Friday, 21st December, announcing the GM salmon fit for human consumption. But with so many objections to genetically-modified products, who knows how well this particular fishy will swim?

Would you be happy eating GM foods?

References: Wikipedia, BBC News, The Independent

Black Hole? Pfft, I Can Take It...

Black hole definition: a region of spacetime from which nothing, not even light, can escape. Around a black hole is an 'event horizon', which marks, as Wikipedia so perfectly put it, "the point of no return". Once matter has crossed this border, they can only move inwards to the heart of the black hole - their doom.

These things can swallow whole stars, dragging them by the ankles, with no say on the matter. Should we be anxious? Not even a little bit?

Black holes come in many sizes. The largest cause matter to collapse inwards and suck them into a deep, frankly angry pit of despair and whatnot. At the other end of the scale, the smallest black holes evaporate because of Hawking radiation.

The weighty, robust black holes can be detected due to how light bends around other objects as a cause of the black hole's pull of gravity. But what about the moderately-sized black holes; not the puny puffs of smoke, not the great, lumbering boulders. The smooth, handsome pebble, sitting in your hand with a comfortable, satisfying weight.

Sorry to go all poetic there - the pebbles of deep space I am waxing lyrical about are approximately 10⁹ to 10²⁰ tonnes, existing since the Big Bang and still cruising relatively peacefully through galaxy and solar system alike.

Now, if a black hole like that was to collide with our lush, green planet, we would know about it. At a speed of approximately a few hundred kilometres/second, this pebble would have a much larger impact than a small, thumb-sized rock plopping into the Pacific. It would actually penetrate the Earth, end to end, creating a tiny, nucleus-sized tunnel through our beloved planet and emerging out the other side. As though it was holding an apple corer in front of it as it charged at us. Or something like that.

As it exited from the Earth's outer core, the core would vibrate, creating "spherically symmetrical shock waves". The effect would be global, but not apocalyptic, fortunately. A magnitude-4 earthquake, yes. Many seismologists dropping their hats and exclaiming in a panicky, excitable fashion, yes. But not 'The Day After Tomorrow'-style, end of the world brouhaha.

No. That will come when Martians decide they want a taste of the high-life and overthrow the human race. Just you wait, they won't be able to resist Maltesers. Nobody can. It's a fact of life. And it will be our downfall. Cheerio!

References and Quotes: The New Scientist, Wikipedia

Lurking in the Depths... Shoot, My Biscuit Broke...

What is living in your PG Tips?

As I sit and write this, I have a steaming mug of milky tea beside my laptop. Over the past few months, I have grown more and more attached to the delightfully heart-warming beverage, thanks to Britain's cold snap in January-February, and Spring's belated arrival.

I have often heard that tea has many benefits, and heard even more often of its dangers. So I decided to investigate - what am I (and I'm sure, plenty of you) actually drinking?

The Good Stuff

White and green teas have the highest concentrations of antioxidants, but don't despair, black tea also has a substantial amount of them too. The specific antioxidant is called a catechin, pronounced "katt-eh-kin", I believe. Now, antioxidants, we hear about these all the time... but, if I'm honest, I'm as clueless about antioxidants as I am about quantum physics. Which is rather clueless to be frank, although I promise to master QP in a future post.

Antioxidants - molecules which inhibit oxidation of other molecules.

And oxidation is bad, so I'm warming to antioxidants. You see, oxidation is the loss of electrons from a substance, and these reactions produce free radicals.

Free radicals - atoms, molecules, ions with unpaired electrons, making them highly chemically reactive.

So these radicals start chain reactions in cells, catching the innocent cell unaware and fatally wounding it. Antioxidants stop these chain reactions by removing free radicals... by offering themselves up as juicy sacrifices to be oxidised by the radicals.

I sort of feel indebted to these antioxidants now...

Tea's antioxidant, the catechin, is also found in strawberries and some cocoa solids. Catechins are flavonoids - plant pigments which add the colour to their flowers. It can reduce the risk of 4 major health problems: stroke, diabetes, cancer and heart failure, apparently, but obviously, drinking 16 barrels of Earl Grey a day isn't going to make you invincible. You have to add routine exercise, balanced diet, banana face masks and a flowy red cape to the mix before you can really be invincible.

The Bad Stuff

Tea plants naturally absorb elements like fluoride and aluminium. Excessive amounts of fluoride leads to bone pains and fractures, whilst aluminium leads to an untimely death. But a mug of tea contains such small traces that you can wipe that anxious frown off your face.

And then, or course, there is caffeine. Some people live off the stuff, whilst others avoid it at all costs. Headaches and nausea are common symptoms of moderate caffeine intake, whilst long-term effects include the risk of developing cardiovascular and hepatic diseases. Oh, and diuresis, which, if you're not sure, means you pretty much have to carry your toilet around in your pocket all day (excessive urination).

Like most things, tea is a mix of good and bad, and I won't bore with the 'moderation' lecture. So, I'm off to microwave my mug now, as this post has taken long enough to freeze my tea into a brown ice lolly. Cheerio!