What Is Biotechnology
What Is Biotechnology
The UN Convention on Biological Diversity states, “Biotechnology is any technological application that uses biological systems, living organisms, or derivatives thereof, to make or modify products or processes for specific use”. The OECD (the Organization of Economic Co-operation and Development) defines biotechnology as “…the application of scientific and engineering principles to the processing of materials by biological agents”. Therefore, “Biotechnology” basically means using biology as the idea for a technology that’s applied to research and products development in areas like agriculture, food science, and medicine.
The Tutorial Standards for Science and Technology defines Biotechnology as the ways that that humans apply biological ideas to supply merchandise and offer services. This is often terribly true if we tend to think about a section of biotechnology in which the directed manipulation of organisms is employed for the merchandise of organic product like beer, milk products, food etc.
Biotechnology had already been performed long before the term itself was coined, though on a very basic level. For instance, man had already learnt the tactic of fermenting fruit juices to concoct alcoholic beverages throughout the amount around 6000 BC. But, it had been thought of more of an art then. Biotechnology became a real science solely about two decades ago when genes were found to contain info that would enable the synthesis of specific proteins. This was in the Seventies, when new advances in the field of molecular biology enabled scientists to simply transfer DNA – the chemical building blocks that specify the characteristics of living organisms – between a lot of distantly related organisms.
Then in the mid-eighties and early-nineties, it absolutely was confirmed that the transformation or modification of the genetic structure of plants and animals was terribly possible. The introduction of “Transgenic” animals and plants additionally led to a lot of resistance to disease and increased the rate of productivity etc. Modern biotechnology is additionally now additional usually than not related to the employment of genetically altered microorganisms like E. coli or yeast for the production of substances like insulin or antibiotics. New innovative biotechnology application like plant-created pharmaceuticals has conjointly now been developed.
Sub-fields in Biotechnology:
Red Biotechnology is the utilization of genetically altered microorganisms for the assembly of drugs like insulin, antibiotics, vitamins, vaccines and proteins for medical use, and is therefore connected to medical processes. Genomic manipulation is also an example of Red Biotechnology.
Biomanufacturing or White Biotechnology is emerging field at intervals trendy biotechnology that involves the coming up with of organisms such as moulds, yeasts or bacteria, and enzymes to produce bound useful chemicals, and is related to the industrial sector. It’s additionally called Gray Biotechnology.
Inexperienced Biotechnology or agricultural Biotechnology, like the name suggests, is the area of biotechnology involving applications to agriculture. This essentially involves the genetic manipulation of plants and animals so as to form more productive, environmentally friendly, disease resistant species. An example of ancient agricultural biotechnology is the event of disease-resistant wheat varieties by cross-breeding different wheat sorts until the desired disease resistance variety is achieved.
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Question by : alittle help from people who know biology?? thank you!?
1. Restriction enzymes are useful in recombinant DNA studies because they:
a. can separate pieces of DNA and RNA from each other.
b. can reproduce in bacteria.
c. give plasmids antibiotic properties.
d. cut DNA only at specific locations.
e. join the cut ends of small DNA molecules.
2.Restriction enzymes:
a.can cut only bacterial DNA.
b. randomly cut DNA into small pieces.
c. produce single-stranded DNA fragments with “sticky ends.”
d. will cut DNA only if it contains methyl groups.
3.Which of the following applications of biotechnology results in an insect-resistant plant?
a. banana-based vaccine against pathogenic E. coli
b. Bt toxin production by soybeans
c. insulin production by bacteria
d. growth hormone-treated cows
e. herbicide-resistant corn
Best answer:
Answer by hcbiochem
1. d. cut DNA only at specific locations.
2. I don’t really like any of the 4 choices. a. is incorrect since restriction endonucleases can cut ANY DNA if it has the right sequence of bases. b. is incorrect because the enzyme cuts at absolutely specific sites…the cutting is not random. c. is incorrect because double-stranded DNA remains double-stranded after it is cut. d. is incorrect because for most restriction endonucleases, the presence of methyl groups blocks the ability of the enzyme to cut its sequences. Is there an e. choice that you didn’t include?
3. b. Bt toxin production by soybeans
Add your own answer in the comments!
