The copyright of the original article belongs to the WeChat public account
"Bring science home" all
Written by Su Chengyu
When you think of nuclear fission, the first thing that comes to mind is nuclear weapons. There is no doubt that nuclear weapons are the most deterrent weapons on the planet, and since its inception, mankind has long faced the fear of nuclear strikes.
It would be sad if humans were to use only this type of atomic technology for war, so we have nuclear power plants that account for about 10% of the world's energy sources. In addition, humans have also wanted to use atomic technology to modify organisms, and have created a nuclear radiation botanical garden for this purpose.
Brookhaven Gamma Botanical Garden
Beginning in the 1950s, the Gamma Garden was built at the Brickhaven National Laboratory in New York to study the effects of gamma rays on plants. Gamma rays are one of the rays released by nuclear fission. This ray wavelength is at 0.01 nanometers, the penetration is very strong, carrying high energy, and it is easy to cause DNA breaks in cells in the organism to cause genetic mutations.
In the first few years, most of the research was to analyze the effects of radiation on plants, and later began to study whether gamma rays can bring beneficial genetic mutations to plants.
Some of these gardens are very large, reaching more than 20,000 square meters, and usually the gardens are arranged in a large circle with concentric circles, in which plants are planted. The same species is planted in a small pie-shaped area.
In the center of the garden, there is a magnetic pole containing radioactive isotopes (usually cobalt-60) that radiates for about 20 hours a day. When the researchers went into the garden to see the results, they would first remotely sink the radiation source into an underground bunker made of lead, and then go through the high fence into the perimeter of the botanical garden center to examine the plants around the radiation center.
Radiation source structure of the Gamma Botanical Garden
Usually, the plants closest to the radiation source die directly, and even those who survive will be stunted or covered with tumors. The plants located around the edge of the circle generally look normal, of course, from the appearance alone, they will further check whether it is really a beneficial mutation, to see if the size is getting bigger, whether the taste is more delicious.
High school biology tells us that genetic mutations are always present in living cells, but most of the time they occur very infrequently. Through some external factors, such as radiation, the process of mutation will be accelerated and the frequency of mutations will be increased.
Scientists at the time thought that radiation could accelerate the evolution of species and then create crops that would better withstand harsh growing conditions and diseases, and even thought their work could end global famine and turn the world into a smiling Garden of Eden.
Not only in the United States, but in the late 1950s, similar radiation experiments were being done in Norway, Sweden, Costa Rica, and the Soviet Union. Most of them are dominated by governments and universities, while a small percentage are done by curious citizens.
Advertisement of radiation seeds
At the time, a Tennessee oral surgeon CJ CJ Speas built a small bunker in his backyard, where he irradiated seeds every day with radioactive sources from the government. After the painting, the seeds are sold to gardeners or small children with scientific work.
The one who bought his family's seeds was a big customer, a man named Muriel British horticulturist at Muriel Howorth. She founded the Atomic Gardening Society in 1959 to get ordinary people to participate in radiation experiments as well.
Muriel · Haworth
After getting the seeds, she distributes the irradiated seeds to the members of the association, asks them to plant and cultivate the seeds, and then reports the planting data to her.
Member of the Atomic Horticultural Association
At first, everyone was very enthusiastic, but slowly they lost interest. The main reason for this is that most of the time you don't see any visible changes with the naked eye. It is difficult for genetic mutations to change the shape of the appearance, and it is even more difficult to produce changes that are beneficial to humans. In addition, some changes may be relatively subtle, ordinary people have not been scientifically trained, and there is no corresponding science and technology to find these changes.
Atomic Horticultural Society Experimental Report Template
Over time, the Radiation Botanical Garden gradually faded from public view. Still, research into genetically modified plants through radiation hasn't gone away.
There is a radiation breeding institute in Japan, and the radiation botanical garden inside is a concentric circle with a radius of 100 meters, and the radiation source is also cobalt-60.
Japan Radiation Breeding Institute
For example, the morning glory on the left side of the figure below is the radiation breeding results of the institute, and the normal morning glory flower on the right side.
The International Atomic Energy Agency and the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations have similar breeding groups dedicated to radiation breeding research.
Radiation breeding has not disappeared because radiation breeding technology is cheaper than gene editing technology. In addition to the different costs, radiation breeding and gene editing principles are also different, radiation will only change the existing DNA, without introducing any new genetic material, radiation crops themselves are not radioactive. The point is that radiation does create quite a few beneficial variants of plants.
Believe it or not, more than 2,000 crop varieties are now in the global food system. In Texas, USA, a genetically modified Rio star grapefruit accounts for 75% of all grapefruits, and this variety is known as the sweetest grapefruit. In Vietnam, about half of the soybeans grown are mutant varieties.
On the far left is the Rio star grapefruit, which has a redder flesh than regular grapefruit
Today, crops bred through radiation still exist, why is there no one paying attention? Because the focus of the public has shifted to genetically modified crops...
Cover Source:
Resources:
https://shimo.im/docs/1lq7Mpg5mxHzWWAe/
Addicted? Pay attention to the WeChat public account "Bring science home" and exhaust the interesting and informative science popularization!
The copyright of articles, pictures, audio, video files and other materials reproduced or quoted in this official account belongs to the copyright owner, so the relevant consequences are borne by the copyright owner, the original publisher and the content provider, if there is any infringement, please contact to delete.