Biotechnology in few words

Biotechnology, the use of biological organisms and processes to provide useful products in industry and medicine, is as old as cheese making and as modern as creating a plant-based energy cell or the newest treatment for diabetes. Everyday, newspaper articles proclaim a new application for biotechnology. Often, the media
raises alarms about the potential for new kinds of biotechnology to harm the environment or challenges our ethical values. As a result of conflicting information, sorting through the headlines can be a daunting task. These books are designed to allow you to do just that—by providing the right tools to help you to make better educated judgments.

The new biotechnologies share with the old a focus on helping people lead better, safer, and healthier lives. Older biotechnologies, such as making wine, brewing beer, and even making bread, were based on generations of people perfecting accidental discoveries.

The new biotechnologies are built on the explosion of discoveries made over the last 75 years about how living things work. In particular, how cells use genetic material to direct the production of proteins that compose them, and provide the engines used to produce energy needed to keep them alive. These discoveries have
allowed scientists to become genetic engineers, enabling them to move genes from one living organism to another and change the proteins made by the new organism, whether it is a bacterium, plant, mouse, or even a human.