Common Sense for the Biochemist

According to a press release from Icon Genetics, the company has started field trials for one of their transgenic lines in Lexington, KY with collaboration from the KTRDC (Kentucky Tobacco Research and Development Center).. According to the release permits, this will be at most a 0.25 acre plot. Remeber, Robert Irwin, who is chairman of the supervisory board for Icon is also the Chairman of the Board at Large Scale Biology. I would look for production of larger quantites of this line to be shifted to Owensboro and processed at LSBC's manufacturing plant there in the next year or two. The University of Kentucky has an interest in LSBC through their for-profit economic development arm, Kentucky Technology, Inc, who loaned LSBC 2.9 million back in December. LSBC used their manufacturing plant as collatoral for this loan. It doesn't look like ICON will be using their new Magnifection technology for this trial. According to the press release, this gene of interest is being expressed behind a native promoter in the chloroplast(as part of a polycistronic transcript, those primitive chloroplasts!) . The product being produced is a phenylalanine ammonia lyase from Arabidopsis that has commercial value as an enzyme used in the production of chiral chemical compounds and can also be used to treat the disease, phenylketonuria. I am having trouble pulling up the release permit for this trial at this time but I'll have more (hopefully) in a few days. Note added in proof: Here is a link to the USDA-APHIS permit review