So carrots with slightly higher calcium aren't going to change anything - the researchers themselves were the first to say so.

Think of the carrots instead as a proof of concept. Carrots with higher calcium make us one step closer to maize with higher iron, wheat with higher folate, or a number of other changes that could help prevent vitamin deficiencies (and, consequently, prevent much disease and death). Sure, people like you and me who can afford a computer can also afford a balanced diet or fancy vitamins, but many people can not.

This is the beneficial sort of genetic engineering that was discussed back before biotech companies focused only on crop improvements that would bring in the most profit, like herbicide resistance. The corporations have no impetus to develop for qualities that will benefit consumers - the possibility of profit does not warrant the R&D expense. That's why it's necessary for university scientists to research such things, often with funding from sources such as the USDA, or non-profits such as HarvestPlus. I, for one, am excited that a genetically engineered food designed to improve human nutrition is being publicized. I imagine that Mr. Madrigal feels similarly.

The fact that they chose an Arabidopsis gene is irrelevant here. Its genome is sequenced, and  most of the genes have been categorized though projects like Arabidopsis 2010. Carrots have a similar gene themselves, but it likely isn't as well characterized as the one from Arabidopsis. It works as well as a native gene, and the carrots are still carrots.

For more scientific discussion on GMOs, visit my blog: GeneticMaize.

What a concept. It's most likely that osteoporosis is caused by a lack of variety in the diet combined with lack of exercise during crucial bone-forming years. It just so happens that the best source of bio-available calcium is also where the cow gets it; leafy green vegetables.

The continuos greenwashing of the GMO food industry just sickens me. It benefits only the agribusiness giants like Monsanto and damages everything and everyone else. The worst part of it all is that it represents an unacceptable destruction of the potential of genetic science.

We could have everbearing cherry, plum, and peach trees. Mulberry's that produce fat starch-rich seeds like rice, Avocados' with smaller pits. Any number of tree crops modified slightly to reduce the need for hired labor or that would produce grain equivalents to rice or corn, perennial grains that don't expose the soil to the wind.

Instead we get glow-in-the-dark tobacco, poison-proof corn and herbicide resistant rapeseed plants. It's a damn waste.

Put the Carbon Back

Perhaps it would be more sensible to try different cultivation techniques to increase calcium availability rather than engineering for those charactaristics. Maybe put some oyster shell in the soil when one grows those carrots.

Oh, sorry, that's crazy talk.

But while all this is going on, there are some perennial brassicas like sea chard and tree collards that both provide lots of calcium and other nutrients and make an excellent building material (i.e. they need thorough cooking).

Eat what you grow, grow what you eat

... so I looked at the USDA food nutrient database...

http://fnic.nal.usda.gov/nal_display/index.php?info_cente ...

Sorted foods by calcium content...

http://www.nal.usda.gov/fnic/foodcomp/Data/SR20/nutrlist/ ...

[There is a lot of processed foods toward the top of the list, but there are also a lot of fruits, vegetables, and grains long before you see carrots.]

I appears one could increase their calcium intake by replacing that serving of carrots with a serving of tomato, almonds, papaya, garbanzo beans, and a lot of other things that contain 50% more calcium than carrots.

Or perhaps just eat a kosher dill pickle or mango in addition to the carrots. That would give you 50% more calcium than from carrots alone.

I was wondering if this was important because some people can't or don't want to eat dairy products, but there are clearly far easier ways to add calcium, and a whole bunch of other important nutrients, to our diets -- even in areas where there might be a shortage of good food -- than via "supercarrots".

Hey Matt,

Glad you went in-depth on the GM carrot's environmental impact. That wasn't really the intent of my post. Wired is a tech/biz mag with a some environmental reportage. It has a different focus from Grist, which is a fantastic publication that I don't look to for tech reporting.

I do take issue with the representation of my post.Where did I say that this carrot would affect the nation's nutrition? I said it "had a powerful marketing hook" and pointed to the same overheated headlines that you did! That wasn't an endorsement of its marketability. In fact, the major thrust of the post, as seen by its introduction in the 2nd sentence, was to use the carrot as a proof point for the agritech biz's plans to introduce produce, which I had previously discussed in a post entitled, "The Difficult Science and Economics of Genetically Modified Produce" (http://blog.wired.com/wiredscience/2007/11/the-difficult- ...)

That post makes a lot of the points you just made about the nature of GM crops.

Carrots, or any other produce, with nutrient enhancements will meet with an "uninformed marketplace." AND they could have an impact in that marketplace. Just because we don't want that to be the case doesn't make it untrue! Isn't the media supposed to report on reality as best we determine it? I mean, if we had a very informed marketplace, we wouldn't have a corn-based food system and we certainly wouldn't eat meat from the places where it's grown and harvested.

One thing that has occurred in the GM debate that I find very strange and disconcerting is that anti-GMO people jump on simply reporting on GM crops as supporting them in any form that the most evil agribusinessman  might see fit to plant them.  And that's just not the case.

Do I know about the failure of golden rice and its cousins? Yes. Do I know that GM crops haven't delivered on their promises in the last 15 years? Yes. Does that mean that no genetically modified crop could ever have a positive impact in the world? I don't know and we don't know. And as long as we don't know, attempts to make them more nutritious or more marketable will remain a story. Very few other places, outside the dedicated green media, are even reporting on agritech's plans to bring GM produce into the marketplace.

I mean, don't you WANT people to know what Monsanto and Syngenta are planning?

In any case, all press is good press, right? Thanks for the link and sorry for the rant.

Best,

Alexis Madrigal