You may have heard of organisms genetically modified organisms, certainly you have already seen some transgenic food, but maybe you do not know very well about the cisgenics. But what does all this mean? In Brazilian legislation, a GMO is an organism whose genetic material has been modified by any technique of genetic engineering.
So the GMO is an organism that has been modified using genetic engineering, either with the use of genetic material from other species or not. This definition is not fixed and this is quite discussed, but we can consider it as correct. In most cases, when talking about Genetically Modified Organisms, we are more specifically talking about a transgenic organism.
But GMOs and transgenics are not synonymous: All Transgenic is a GMO, but not all GMO is Transgenic. A transgenic is a genetically modified organism which has a DNA sequence (or part of the DNA) from another organism of a different species. This is the case of the transgenic salmon: researchers placed a growth hormone gene of Chinook Salmon (Oncorhynchus tshawytscha) together with a promoter sequence of a third specie of fish, Ocean Pout (Zoarces americanus), this promoter allows the growth hormone gene to work all year long.
The addition of these sequences from two different species into the salmon (Salmo salar) genome allows it to grow faster, reaching the market size in less time and using less resource. But a GMO may be an organism that has been modified genetically but not necessarily received a sequence from another organism. For example, a bacterium can be modified to super express a gene it already has.
That does not mean it is a transgenic bacterium, but since it have its genetic material modified it is a GMO. Another type of GMO is the cisgenic. The cisgenic is an organism that has went through genetic material modification, but with the use of species that can be crossed naturally.
That is, it would be possible that the genetic material mixture occured naturally among these close species. One of the best known examples comes from research to make potatoes (Solanum tuberosum L. ) resistant to a pathogenic fungus.
To achieve the desired result, researchers put in the potatoes a fungus resistance gene that is already present in wild potatoes (Solanum bulbocastanum). Now you know the difference between Genetically Modified Organisms, Transgenics and Cisgenics. If you liked this video, give a thumbs-up and also share it.
See you next time!
