Bananas, Nuts, Persimmon And Tea. GMOs You Didn't Know About

Bananas, nuts, persimmon and tea. GMOs You Didn't Know About

Many common foods are natural GMOs. These include, for example, tea, bananas, sweet potatoes, peanuts, and walnuts. This was shown by a study published in the journal Plant Molecular Biology.

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Many common foods are natural GMOs. These include, for example, tea, bananas, sweet potatoes, peanuts, and walnuts. This was shown by a study published in the journal Plant Molecular Biology. Forbes columnist Steven Salzberg figured out what this means.

There is little evidence that genetically modified organisms (GMOs) are harmful to health. However, campaigns that target them are often successful: in many countries, the use of GMOs is limited.

Forbes jokingly reports that all restrictions are in vain, since nature has mastered the method of "producing" transgenic organisms a long time ago. Genes from bacteria called Agrobacterium have been spontaneously inserted into the DNA of many plants for a long time. This has led to the fact that many common products can be called natural transgenic GMOs.

Research published in November 2019 by Tatyana Matveeva of St. Petersburg University and Léon Otten of the Institute for Plant Molecular Biology in France shows that DNA fragments from Agrobacterium bacteria are embedded in many popular foods. Scientists examined the genomes of hundreds of plants, 39 of them turned out to be natural transgenic GMOs.

Forbes provides the following examples of natural GMOs:

bananas (Musa acuminata);

• hops (Humulus lupulus);
• cranberry (Vaccinium macrocarpon);
• persimmon (Diospyros lotus);
• guava (Psidium guajava);
• peanuts (Arachis hypogaea);
• pomelo (Citrus maxima);
• Surinamese cherry (Eugenia uniflora);
• Sweet potato or sweet potato (Ipomoea species)
• tea (Camellia sinensis, which is used for most teas);
• walnuts (Juglans species);
• purple sweet potato (Dioscorea alata).

Thus, GMOs can even be found in foods that are labeled "organic."

This is not the first data on "natural GMOs". In 2015, an international team of scientists reported that "foreign" areas are in the DNA of every sweet potato variety that people cultivate. The authors of the study compared their genomes with those of wild species.

The scientists explained that bacterial genes were embedded in the yam DNA long before humans began to cultivate them. It happened by chance that these particular types of sweet potatoes were tastier and were cultivated by humans.

Steven Salzberg writes:

“If you believe the anti-GMO movement's alarmist claims, then you have to start fearing a lot more products, including the ones listed above. And yes, beer is on their list."