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the first recombinant bST to use in his studies. He treated four cows with the recombinant version and four with the drug extracted and purified from pituitary glands. In both cases, he saw about a 15 percent mastitis in treated herds. Bauman says he is perplexed about the public concerns over the human health risks. Since bST is a protein, he says, if humans consume it orally it is digested like any other ing situation." Engineering Prof. Lynn Jelinski, the director of the Cornell Center for Advanced Technology's biotechnology program, puts much of the burden of communication on scientists "/ think, scientists have done a very bad job of explaining what they do to the public. .. •. If we as scientists can't explain things so our mothers can understand, then we're doing something wrong. " increase in milk production after just six days. "For the first time we had identified one of the key controls of how animals use nutrients," Bauman remembers. Until the mid-1980s, there was some question as to whether the recombinant protein itself could be commercialized. Bauman remained part of a small group of researchers studying bST as a way to answer certain questions about the biology of the dairy cow. "At national scientific meetings, my group would be the only one that really had much information about this particular aspect of the biology," he says. But shortly after the results of his experiments were published, the area "expanded exponentially" and scientists around the world started to conduct bST research, in some cases replicating the results of the Cornell experiment: bST was demonstrated to improve productivity dramatically, without, Bauman says, changing what's in the bottle. It was around this time that Bauman became aware of the Foundation on Economic Trends and its position on bST. FET petitioned unsuccessfully to have Cornell release all of Bauman's research records, claiming that bST-treated cows had developed serious health problems. Since then, he has been frequently called upon to defend his research or clarify interpretations of the work by FET or other consumer groups, on subjects ranging from human health to the incidence of dietary protein. He points out that research on bST's effect on the human body goes back at least 40 years, when medical researchers thought bST might be useful in the treatment of pituitary abnormalities, in much the same way injections of insulin are used to control diabetes. Even when injected directly into the bloodstream, Bauman says, bST proves to be inactive in humans. "They not only tested bovine [somatotropin in humans], they tested somatotropin from whales, pigs, sheep and horses, and none of them worked," he says. That's because the hormone differs from species to species. Between humans and cows the order of amino acids differs by about 35 percent, making it impossible for the bovine molecule to be used by the human body: It is simply flushed out. He also maintains that concerns about the health of animals have been examined and found to have no scientific basis. As a researcher in a public institution, Bauman feels scientists have a responsibility to participate in the public discussion of new technologies, but he has found it a difficult and frustrating task. "It's amazing to me how these groups have been able to get center stage with the media to make it appear as if knowledgeable people disagree about the safety," he says. "I think that doesn't speak well for our system or for the job those of us in academe are doing explaining our results to the public or dealing with public perceptions. It's an amaz- CORNELL MAGAZINE 26 and educators, who have failed to get through to a public scared by past errors and ill-equipped to evaluate the benefits of a technology as well as the risks. "I think scientists have done a very bad job of explaining what they do to the public," she says. "I think it's a terrible mistake to have this veil of secrecy, with scientists saying, Όh, just trust me.' If we as scientists can't explain things so our mothers can understand, then we're doing something wrong." Jelinski has made communication a central part of her responsibilities. She has given dozens of talks across the country in the last two years to thousands of non-scientists. In fielding "a lot of pointed questions" about bST from concerned citizens, executives and farmers, Jelinksi says that "there's mainly a problem in understanding what it is. People don't realize that Mama cow is making bST all the time, and your best cows make more of it." Jelinski is forcing undergraduates in her "Physics of Life" course— most of whom are hoping to become engineers—to explain some of their research in oral presentations. You may view this as torture, she tells the students, but communication skills will have to become an integral part of any scientist's training. Each biotechnology product that reaches the market will have to be explained in a way that people without scientific degrees can understand, says Jelinski. She points to
chymosin, made through a recombinant process, as an example of a product that had obvious benefits. Approved by the FDA in 1990 with little fanfare and no apparent protest, it is used in cheese-making as the first step in milk coagulation. Recombinant chymosin is a copy of the active ingredient in rennin, a natural substance that can be found only in the fourth stomachs of calves. Making it recombinantly eliminated the need to extract it from the natural source. In her own work, Jelinski is examining the properties of spider silk produced by 30 golden orb weavers, which spin "gorgeous golden webs" of extraordinarily strong material. But "it takes forever to collect silk," she says. Biotechnology could solve this problem by cloning the gene for the silk protein, inserting it into fastgrowing microbes or into plants and producing enough to replace high tensile materials made from petrochemical products. Says Jelinksi: "This would have a tremendous positive benefit for the environment." One area that she finds particularly promising is genetic probing to test for dangerous organisms that contaminate foods, such as the recent outbreak of a deadly strain of E. colt. (Although normally found in the small intestine of most mammals, the presence of E. colt is a sign of contamination. In bioengineering, however, E. coli is a workhorse because of its ability to reproduce quickly.) Food science Prof. Carl Batt is developing a probe that can pinpoint the dangerous organism in food. Batt also has developed DNA probes to detect the herpes virus in cows. In other work at Cornell, geneticists are looking for ways to insert foreign genes into apple trees to confer resistance to diseases such as fire blight or to improve shelf life. But the Union of Concerned Scientists' Rissler wonders if such projects are just more of the same— conventional farming technologies coming from people who designed an agricultural system that has led to erosion, pesticide-resistant super insects and pollution. "Biotechnology is bringing us magic bullet solutions and they're being brought to us by the same people who brought us pesticides as a magic bullet— Monsanto, Ciba-Geigy, DuPont," she says. "These are the folks who are saying now, This is the answer to problems in agriculture/ hoping that we'll forget that they once brought us the pesticides that we are now trying to reduce." "We are not opposed to the technology," explains Rissler. "But we are skeptical about the benefits and worried about the risks." The Union of Concerned Scientists has three goals concerning biotechnology—to ensure that biotech products are regulated and used safely, to get people to look at alternatives to biotechnology and to make sure the public is involved in the debate. Rissler says she would also like to see public tax dollars diverted from biotechnology and put into sustainable agriculture, a system that emphasizes crop rotation and other practices. Recognizing the need for open debate among different factions, Boyce Thompson's Hardy in 1988 organized the National Agricultural Biotechnology Council, a consortium of about 20 not-for-profit institutes on both sides of the biotechnology issue. "It was established as an open forum where all points of view could be brought together to address what were perceived to be key issues," he says. Rissler acknowledges that biotech companies and scientists take a dim view of her opinions. Plant pathology Prof. Zaitlin, for example, believes that the UCS has put up "unreasonable barriers, not backed up in facts." Rissler maintains that open debate is essential. "I think it's healthy to have this discussion on biotechnology," she says. "Even though people feel threatened by it, I think it's healthy. I think, ultimately, even the industry folks will look back and be grateful." a Mara Bovsun is managing editor of Biotechnology Newswatch. JUNE 1994 27 SUPPORT OUR ADVERTISERS THEY SUPPORT Cornell Magazine When you respond to an 800 number, mention the Ivy League® Magazine Network when asked where you saw the ad.
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