Family Solanum (nightshade) is generally associated with toxins, and for good reasons, as most of the plants in this family are poisonous. This includes some of everyone’s favorite staple vegetables: potatoes, tomatoes and eggplant, with especially potatoes responsible for many poisonings each year. In the case of harvested potatoes, the chemical responsible (steroidal glycoalkaloids, or SGA) is produced when the potato begins to sprout. Now a team of researchers at the University of California have found a way to silence the production of the responsible protein: GAME15.
The research was published in Science, following earlier research by the Max Planck Institute. The researchers deleted the gene responsible for GAME15 in Solanum nigrum (black nightshade) to confirm that the thus modified plants produced no SGA. In the case of black nightshade there is not a real need to modify them as – like with tomatoes – the very tasty black berries they produce are free of SGA, and you should not eat the SGA-filled and very bitter green berries anyway, but it makes for a good test subject.
Ultimately the main benefits of this research appear to be in enriching our general understanding of these self-toxicity mechanisms of plants, and in making safer potatoes that can be stored without worries about them suddenly becoming toxic to eat.
Top image: Different potato varieties. (Credit: Scott Bauer, USDA ARS)
It would be more helpful if they figured out how to add poison to potatoes that had none. ;)
Fry them
And then serve ’em with a tin of red bull :)
“It would be more helpful if they figured out how to add poison to potatoes that had none.
Wow, that’s just what Bill Gates is probably funding!
Nuf said…
Once we remove the toxin we are going to realize why it was there in the first place and we will replace it with more pesricides.
Fun thing is, the tubers already grow with a low solanin content and sometimes suffer from pests like click beetle larave burrowing into them.
It’s only when they get dug up and exposed to light that the solanin content increases beyond a point where they are edible.
Also, the solanum nigrum that grows in my region often has its leaves chewed as well, not to speak of what potato beetles can do to the foliage of the fiels crop.
The stuff they spray on potatoes after harvest btw. (CIPC) is there to inhibit sprouting… it’s not a pesticide. Not super healthy, but not a substitute for solanin.
They already know why the toxin’s there, it’s there to prevent the plant from being eaten.
What they’re trying to do is isolate the toxin more to the leaves, not just shut it off entirely. There’s no reason you couldn’t do it with selective breeding, it’d just take forever.
as others have said, it’s a pesticide. and the funny thing is, when i grew potatos one year as a lark, they were the most bug-eaten plant in my garden. probably lots of reasons for that (i’m not really in the right environment for growing potatos) but obviously the natural pesticide is not perfect :)
Fry them
wiki:Solanine
“Effects of cooking on solanine levels
Alkaloids like solanine have been shown to start decomposing and degrading at approximately 170 °C (338 °F), and deep-frying potatoes at 210 °C (410 °F) for 10 minutes causes a loss of ~40% of the solanine.”
That’s not going to be popular among those making mashed potato dishes. It’s also far out of reach using a pressure cooker, which can just pull off 120°C – a temperature around which the formation of acrylamide becomes a concern. It certainly is when frying above 175°C.
What’s more, solanine is poorly soluble in water (a few mg/L). Unless we’d want to boil potatoes in hot ethanol, that’s a non-starter.
Incas, a whole culture which lasted hundreds of years, was based on potatoes, not to mention the extra 500 years consumption after them
This attempt of eliminating something that’s NOT a problem is a ludicrous attempt ate justifying just another GMO crime
Get your stuff straight. Basically everyone who regularly makes potato dishes had to throw out a batch that went bad – at the very least have the decency to acknowledge that simple bias.
Also, the proposed tweak only comes into effect when potatoes are not stored in darkness.
We’re already harvesting green bananas and rock hard tomatoes so they don’t get tossed before arriving in a kitchen, and supermarkets are entirely unbothered when it comes to presenting potato sacks under a spotlight or two, putting quality at risk.
Go ahead, put potatoes on the windowsill until they develop green patches or sprout, eat them and see how you like it. Oh what’s that you say, nobody has been that stupid? There’s a long history of people poisoning themselves with potatoes, and to non-zero part because it’s either that, or starving.
I for one am rather sensitive to solanine in potato and eggplant, know how to properly store them and still end up with high solanine produce every now and then. Potatoes sans pro-inflammatory toxins? Yes please.
Get your stuff straight. You come from a culture which needed to BE FORCED to acknowledge potatoes and tomatoes are NOT poisonous or “devil’s fruit”. You are ALWAYS looking for excuses to believe something is dangerous – at the very least have the decency to acknowledge that simple bias.
I’ve been eating potatoes for 50+yrs and I’ve NEVER thrown ONE SINGLE greenish potato EVER
In my country NO ONE cares about greenish potatoes NEVER
But again, I’m talking to people which could die from not drinking bottled water when abroad and used to refuse to eat “poison apple”
Just to expand the cultural point, you can check Michael Moore’s great explanation of WASP paranoia in the cartoon included in “Bowling for Columbine”, where he beautifully explains how that paranoia is behind key aspects of USA culture.
That’s a big part of why you’re so eager to believe greenish potatoes are so dangerous and require yet another GMO “solution”, and you couldn’t care less about what was inca culture’s food base, non-GMO potatoes or Big Macs & Coke
addendum: https://www.researchgate.net/publication/380663301_Solanine_Poisoning_Effects_Risks_and_Management_Strategies
has a few more numbers for us, noting poisoning through potatoes containing 41mg/100g solanine, and somptoms at 2.5mg/kg body weight – well within reach with a single serving.
I imagine rinsing thin potato slices for 24-72h with room temperature water might do the trick when it’s circulated through an activated charcoal filter.
At that point we might as well be making acorn flour.
This reminded me of the classic example of genetic engineering being safer than conventional selective breeding:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lenape_potato
This. people have been “genetic engineering” for millenia. Crossbreeding, selective breeding, etc. No idea what they were doing, which genes were affected, what the outcomes would be. But do it in a laboratory tube while wearing a white coat and suddenly it becomes scary.
Generally nature is given a “say” in traditional selective breeding and will allow crossing plants within the same family given the right conditions are met. Laboratory based genetic engineering at the cellular level gives us the ability to take nature out of the discussion and cross family boundaries. You want corn crossed with chrysanthemum? Sure, why not. Can we fuse human cells with tobacco? Let’s find out!
You want an Audrey? Because this is how you end up with an Audrey.
You almost certainly brush your teeth every day with stuff that came from a guy burying a chunk of ludicrously radioactive material around a circle of plants and poking around them in a lead-lined suit to find something neat.
It’s not the lab tubes and white coats that make it scary, it’s the nutjobs who want to pretend that buying expensive snake oil and avoiding cheaper and better things makes them More Elite.
Different times, different techniques. This does not mean that they were bad. That slow and local process allowed people to understand which plants were toxic, avoiding large-scale errors (as is currently the case). Thinking the future of food will be traditional farming and agriculture, “improved” with genetic engineering and some drones is an agribusiness illusion. Much food in the future will probably be produced in factories with the help of GMOs. But these GMOs will be bacteria and fungi producing many tons of proteins in bioreactors, not cows or corn plants using huge vast spaces to produce only a portion of that.
Crossbreeding, selective breeding, etc is FOLLOWING THE RULES
GMO is BREAKING THE RULES
So what you say is that, since people has been buying goods for millenia, nobody should be scared for stealing goods because it’s basically the same.
Do you see the sophism?
You do realize that crossbreeding is “blind,” right? You have no idea what will come up, nor do you know what caused some supposed positive trait.
That’s why the potatos made “following the rules” were dangerous. They were bred to be resistant to a pest, and they were. They were also “resistant” to people. The trait that made them resistant to pests was a high level of poisons in the plant.
GMO is targeted. You have to know what the result is so that you can pick which gene(s) to transfer to your new plant.
“dangerous…resistant to people”
Inca culture was BASED on potato and lasted for HUNDREDS of years of perfectly healthy people
I’ve been eating NON-“safe” potatoes for 50+ years
Your grand grand parents were FORCED to eat potatoes and “discovered” they’re NOT poisonous. Now their Scientism-affiliated descendants are believing AGAIN that potatoes are poisonous while laughing at terraplanists for being so primitive
Would be funny if it wasn’t tragic and criminal
This whole thing screams Chesterton’s fence. Nature ain’t stupid, these things were there for a reason.
And as someone already pointed out, overly confident “scientists” will happily remove a gene (or mod the expression), only to be forced to spray the crops to oblivion with pesticides later.
I mean, sometimes I really think we won’t make it as species for all the hubris displayed. Thankfully, nature’s resilient to many of our follies. So far.
Civilization brought down by questioning nature’s intention that lies in making potatoes toxic as they sit in supermarket shelves, or by making the solaum leaves grown in a space module edible.
All while as per your claim making it such that the new cultivar would have an evolutionary disadvantage nullifying its spread in the wild.
Your complaints are anachronistic. The overall trend is to cut down on pesticide use.
If you had bothered to read the article & paper, you’d have realised that scientists aren’t doing any of those things. If used with potatoes, it’d only remove the production of GAME15 in the potatoes, not the rest of the plant. Since this is only produced when the potato is beginning to sprout, this is a non-issue when the potato plant is growing in the fields.
Fair, thanks for the feedback.
Doesn’t make me feel any less icky about gen tech, but I stand corrected.
RTFA? Surely you jest, Ms Posch?
How unconventional of you to suggest that your readers make a well-informed reply.
But please, do consider remaining unconventional.
It’s an even funnier comment considering the article is about potatoes.
Potatoes are a good example of a “human maintained crop.” Without humans, the potatoes you eat would probably be gone extremely fast. We literally maintain production of disease-free plants in specific areas and then distribute them to be cloned worldwide. When diseases pop up we cross-breed the original stocks with other species, which is a royal pain because cultivated potato is sooo far away from wild stocks.
They ain’t doing anything “natural.”
Oh yes, and “cientists” made corn to produce Bt toxin to KILL the pest
But what happened is thetoxin production is VARIABLE and that created toxin-RESISTANT pests
At this point, defending vendor claims in GMO technology should be legally liable
“Nature ain’t stupid, these things were there for a reason.”
waitwaitwait. You think that these things are natural?
A ton of potato cultivars are propagated clonally. How the heck can it be “natural” if it doesn’t actually, y’know, propagate via nature?
1-Because the solaning didn’t get there due to “cloning”
2-Becausa “natural” means “no manual insertion of genes”
Scientism adepts simply cannot sustain a debate without sophisms
This will allow predators to kill new potato plants and destroy a natural ecosystem. Humans are ruining this planet.
lol at potatoes being part of “a natural ecosystem”
So are we looking at a second movie here ??? Attack of the Killer Tomatoes 2 ?
There was already a sequel to that one!
The Attack of the Attack of the Killer Tomatoes?
The Revenge of the Killer Tomatoes?
The Attack of the Killer Tomatoes, Part Deux?
El Dos Attacko del Tomatillos?
The Attack of the Killer Tomato Killers?
Stop jacking with our food!! There is a reason why so many people have reactions to food now.
Please enlighten us how removing a toxin causes processed foods with emulsifiers and additives.
If he talks about connection between “jacking” with food and food reactions, and you want him to demonstrate the connection between GMO-potato and ultra-processed food, you’re using a strawman fallacy
But let’s suppose it’s not a fallacy but an honest approach. Then the answer is simple:
The ideology that makes people believe technology can “dramatically improve” food is the same that makes people believe that “jacking” with food and mangling with DNA is OK
Irrational and uninformed kneejerk response. Sir ALL of your produce and meats are selectively bred. Gene editing is not killing us, saturated fats, high sodium and low fiber is killing us. Disease resistant crops are keeping 8 billion, some not so well fed folks, alive.
Stupid. How many people get potato poisoning per year? Practically none. Nobody has even heard of this stuff. And of course there will be second-order effects that are ignored, and the new “safe” potatoes will be patented and carefully controlled by rent-seekers, which is the real and only reason this is ever done. People who say otherwise are filthy little liars
“How many people get potato poisoning per year? Practically none. ”
That’s because stores discard potatoes that sprout.
“Nobody has even heard of this stuff.”
Seriously? No one ever taught you to cut out the eyes on a potato or throw them out if they’ve sprouted?
“and the new “safe” potatoes will be patented and carefully controlled by rent-seekers”
Potatoes are clonally propagated and already carefully controlled and certified. You don’t go out and romp through wild potato fields. I’ve been to potato growing areas that have active quarantines where every car in and out is searched.
“That’s because stores discard potatoes that sprout”
8, maybe 9 out of 10 people IN THE WORLD do NOT get their potatoes from a store
Maybe it’s time for you to discover honey-sweetened milk is not poisonous either
Also gaining a partial immunity from said compounds by low dose exposure to them is a thing that is often over looked.
Same thing as letting your kid play in the dirt vs freaking out if they ever get dirty.
They sure didn’t build up tolerance and OD’ed: https://www.smithsonianmag.com/arts-culture/horrific-tales-of-potatoes-that-caused-mass-sickness-and-even-death-3162870/
Fun consideration: replacing caffeine with solanine (mg for mg) in an energy drink is basically a ticket to the hospital.