what is animal biotecnology ?

   B iotechnology  provides new tools for improving human health and animal health and welfare and increasing livestock productivity. Biotechnology improves the food we eat - meat, milk and eggs. Biotechnology can improve an animal’s impact on the environment. And biotechnology enhances ability to detect, treat and prevent diseases. 

         Just like other assisted reproduction techniques such as artificial insemination, embryo transfer and in vitro fertilization, livestock cloning improves animal breeding programs allowing farmers and ranchers to produce healthier offspring, and therefore producer healthier, safer and higher quality foods more consistently.
What Is Animal Biotechnology?
          Animals are playing a growing role in the advancement of biotechnology, as well as increasingly benefiting from biotechnology. Combining animals and biotechnology results in advances in four primary areas:
1. Advances in human health
2. Improved animal health and welfare
3. Enhancements to animal products
4. Environmental and conservation benefits
                Animal biotechnology includes all animals: livestock, poultry, fish, insects, companion animals and laboratory animals. Applications developed through research have led to the emergence of three scientific agricultural animal biotechnology sectors:
1. Animal genomics
2. Animal cloning
3. Genetic engineering of animals
                           The Technology Sectors in the Animal Biotechnology Industry
Animal genomics:
               Genomics defines and characterizes the complete genetic makeup of an animal. By understanding the genomes of animals, we can better understand the basis for disease resistance, disease susceptibility, weight gain, and determinants of nutritional value.
Animal cloning:
               Using somatic cell nuclear transfer, livestock breeders can create an exact genetic copy of an existing animal – essentially an identical twin. Cloning does not manipulate the animal’s genetic makeup nor change an animal’s DNA: it is simply another form of sophisticated assisted reproduction.
 Transgenic animals :
              A transgenic animal is one which has had genetic material from another species added to its DNA. This breakthrough technology allows scientists to precisely transfer beneficial genes from one species t

Plant Tissue Culture

What is Tissue Culture ?

            The propagation of a plant by using a plant part or single cell or group cell in a test tube under very controlled and hygienic conditions is called "Tissue Culture".

Plant tissue culture:

            Plant tissue culture is a practice used to propagate plants under sterile conditions, often to produce clones of a plant. Different techniques in plant tissue culture may offer certain advantages over traditional methods of propagation, including:

• The production of exact copies of plants that produce particularly good flowers, fruits, or have other desirable traits.
• To quickly produce mature plants.
• The production of multiples of plants in the absence of seeds or necessary pollinators to produce seeds.
• The regeneration of whole plants from plant cells that have been genetically modified.
• The production of plants in sterile containers that allows them to be moved with greatly reduced chances of transmitting diseases, pests, and pathogens.
• The production of plants from seeds that otherwise have very low chances of germinating and growing, i.e.: orchids and nepenthe s.
• To clean particular plant of viral and other infections and to quickly multiply these plants as 'cleaned stock' for horticulture and agriculture.

Plant tissue culture relies on the fact that many plant cells have the ability to regenerate a whole plant (totipotency). Single cells, plant cells without cell walls (protoplasts), pieces of leaves, or (less commonly) roots can often be used to generate a new plant on culture media given the required nutrients and plant hormones.

APPLICATION :

          Plant tissue culture is used widely in plant science; it also has a number of commercial applications. Applications include:

• Micro propagation is widely used in forestry and in floriculture. Micro propagation can also be used to conserve rare or endangered plant species.
• A plant breeder may use tissue culture to screen cells rather than plants for advantageous characters, e.g. herbicide resistance/tolerance.
• Large-scale growth of plant cells in liquid culture in bioreactors for production of valuable compounds, like plant-derived secondary metabolites and recombinant proteins used as biopharmaceuticals ^[2].
• To cross distantly related species by protoplast fusion and regeneration of the novel hybrid.
• To cross-pollinate distantly related species and then tissue culture the resulting embryo which would otherwise normally die (Embryo Rescue).
• For production of doubled monoploid (dihaploid) plants from haploid cultures to achieve homozygous lines more rapidly in breeding programmes, usually by treatment with colchicine which causes doubling of the chromosome number.
• As a tissue for transformation, followed by either short-term testing of genetic constructs or regeneration of transgenic plants.
• Certain techniques such as meristem tip culture can be used to produce clean plant material from virused stock, such as potatoes and many species of soft fruit.

Reproductive and therapeutic cloning

reproductive cloning (creating duplicate humans):

	Conservative position:st "...scientists who envision medical breakthroughs using stem cells from human embryos are now moving on to human cloning -- breeding people for the purpose of havering their tissues and organs from their bodies, then disposing of them."
	Liberal position: "Human cloning allows man to fashion his own essential nature and turn chance into choice. For cloning's advocates, this is an opportunity to remake mankind in an image of health, prosperity, and nobility; it is the ultimate expression of man's unlimited potential."

therapeutic cloning (creating human organs for transplanting):

	Conservative position: "Cloning, even so-called therapeutic or experimental cloning, creates a new life without a father, and reduces a mother to the provider of an almost emptied egg. Nonetheless, it is a new human life and the determination to destroy it and limit its use to scientific research for therapeutic ends compound further the moral issues rather than protect mankind. As such, cloning embryonic human life under any circumstance crosses an ethical line, takes an irrevocable step, from which science can never turn back."
	Liberal position: "Therapeutic cloning will in time allow scientists to create organs that are a perfect match for those in need of a transplant. The cloned organ would be based on the recipient’s genetic material and would not require the use of debilitating immuno suppressive therapies. There would also be no chance of rejection, which is fatal. Therapeutic cloning represents the ideal in organ transplantation, as it would provide an unlimited source of organs to anyone who needs them. The need for these organs is dire."  The three different types of "cloning" are: Embryo cloning: This is a medical technique which produces mono zygotic (identical) twins or triplets. It duplicates the process that nature uses to produce twins or triplets. One or more cells are removed from a fertilized embryo and encouraged to develop into one or more duplicate embryos. Twins or triplets are thus formed, with identical DNA. This has been done for many years on various species of animals; only very limited experimentation has been done on humans. Adult DNA cloning : This technique which is intended to produce a duplicate of an existing animal. It has been used to clone a sheep and other mammals. The DNA from an ovum is removed and replaced with the DNA from a cell removed from an adult animal. Then, the fertilized ovum, now called a pre-embryo, is implanted in a womb and allowed to develop into a new animal. As of 2002-JAN, It had not been tried on humans. It is specifically forbidden by law in many countries. There are rumors that Dr. Severino Aninori has successfully initiated a pregnancy through reproductive cloning. It has the potential of producing a twin of an existing person. Based on previous animal studies, it also has the potential of producing severe genetic defects. For the latter reason alone, many medical ethicists consider it to be a profoundly immoral procedure when done on humans. Therapeutic cloning : This is a procedure whose initial stages are identical to adult DNA cloning. However, the stem cells are removed from the pre-embryo with the intent of producing tissue or a whole organ for transplant back into the person  who supplied the DNA. The pre-embryo dies in the process.  The goal of therapeutic cloning is to produce a healthy copy of a sick person's tissue or organ for transplant. This technique would be vastly superior to relying on organ transplants from other people. The supply would be unlimited, so there would be no waiting lists. The tissue or organ would have the sick person's original DNA; the patient would not have to take immunosuppressant drugs for the rest of their life, as is now required after transplants. There would not be any danger of organ rejection. There are major ethical concerns about all three types of cloning, when applied to humans.

Introduction

The definition of biotechnology varies, but a simple definition is the " use of living organisms by humans". One example of biotechnology is cloning.  We have been cloning plants for centuries. Each time a leaf is excised from a violet plant and placed in soil to grow a new plant, cloning has occurred. Today, we are not only doing the physical manipulation at the visual level but also on the molecular level. In modern or molecular biotechnology, we physically select the desired characteristic at the molecular level and add it to the organism's genetic makeup.

Biotechnology is the science for this century. With its advances, we are on the first part of a great journey. Humans have expanded their understanding of the biosphere by journeying into space and exploring the depths of the ocean. We have not only been able to look at the surrounding universe and the depths below with the advancement of tools and techniques, but we also have been able to live there. Advanced tools and techniques are now allowing us to look at the universe of atoms. Biotechnology is utilizing the sciences of biology, chemistry, physics, engineering, computers, and information technology to develop tools and products that hold great promise. Humans have spent thousands of years selecting for and cultivating the best traits nature has to offer. Now with the help of biotechnology, nanotechnology and a host of other sciences, we are able to harness these traits at the atomic level to develop safe and beneficial crops, medical treatments, bio fuels and household products.

Both traditional and modern biotechnology share the same foundation:  the use of living organisms to enhance crops, fuels, medical treatments and a host of other tools that can help humans.  The two schools of thought about what biotechnology is can elicit much debate.  Whereas modern biotechnology manipulates the genes of organisms and inserts them into other organisms to acquire the desired trait, traditional biotechnology harnesses the potential of processes performed by living organisms, such as fermentation.