Posted on 22-4-2002

Corn & Corporate Meddling in Academia
By PAUL ELIAS, AP Biotechnology Writer (Photo shows Ignacio Chapela)

When a prestigious scientific journal backed away from a study that found
genetic contamination in Mexican corn, it was a big public relations
victory for the biotechnology industry. But the public debunking of the
work of an outspoken opponent of genetic engineering also renewed questions
about the increasing role that industry plays in funding academic research.

Much is at stake for biotech companies, which are planting more genetically
modified plants each year around the world even as they battle consumer
skepticism. Their victory in the Mexican corn debate helped compensate for
several embarrassing revelations that genetic experiments had escaped to
the wild - despite repeated promises that such tinkering was tightly
controlled. Researchers now splice foreign genes into a wide variety of
plants to enhance desirable traits such as herbicide tolerance and pest
resistance. Supporters envision growing more food for a hungry world. But
the science involved troubles many who say the consequences of such
tinkering are unknown.

Nature's publication of the corn study in September created a furor.
Ignacio Chapela and David Quist of the University of California, Berkeley,
found that maize in the Mexican state of Oaxaca contained traces of
genetically modified DNA widely used by U.S. biotech companies. In 1998,
Mexico had banned the planting of genetically modified corn to protect its
indigenous maize. Nature's publication of the study in September almost
immediately galvanized the Biotechnology Industry Organization into action.
Led by the lobbying group, sympathetic scientists inundated the journal
with complaints that the study's science was sloppy. They also denounced
Chapela and Quist as politically biased. Nature eventually published the
criticism this month after receiving what it considered to be compelling
evidence that the researchers had not conclusively proved that
contamination had occurred.

Despite this episode, many biotech proponents concede that co-mingling of
natural and genetically modified plants is almost inevitable, and even
critics of Chapela and Quist say it's possible that genetically engineered
corn has in fact mixed with native maize in southern Mexico. But they argue
that any contamination is safe and may even benefit the local varieties by
boosting their resistance to herbicides and insects. "The fact is that the
biotech traits really don't pose any unique risk to the local maize," said
Eric Sachs, director of scientific affairs for Monsanto Co., a St.
Louis-based biotechnology company. Monsanto made a similar argument last
week to the Food and Drug Administration after it learned that its Canadian
canola seed has trace amounts of genetically modified material unapproved
in the United States. Monsanto wants the U.S. government to declare any
food contaminated by the unapproved canola seed fit for consumption,
arguing that its gene tinkering is safe.

Chapela, an assistant professor up for tenure this year, argues that his
academic reputation is under attack because he continues to speak out
against a growing private-sector involvement in academic research. In 1998,
Chapela led an unsuccessful campaign against a five-year, $25 million deal
Berkeley signed with Novartis Corp., a Swiss-based agriculture giant. A
Novartis spinoff, Syngenta, now oversees research in Berkeley's department
of plant and microbial biology. In exchange, Syngenta gets first commercial
rights to much of the research in the department. Researchers who accept
Syngenta's money are barred from showing some of their work outside the
university without permission, which Chapela and others say limits academic
freedoms.

The deal polarized the campus. Some welcomed the money as a godsend that
has brought their research to a higher level; others saw it as a dance with
the devil. The university recently commissioned Michigan State University
to study the deal's effect and issue a report, which is awaited by several
other institutions said to be considering similar deals. Department chair
Andrew Jackson, who receives $100,000 a year from the deal for his
research, says it has benefited faculty and students with extra equipment
and research they couldn't afford to do otherwise. Jackson said his
research decisions have never been influenced by the deal. But Chapela
still considers it unethical, and says the money forces Berkeley to focus
most of its energies on biotechnology at the expense of more traditional
crop sciences. His supporters allege Chapela is the subject of "academic
intimidation" and a "McCarthyist campaign" instigated by a biotechnology
industry that is increasing the amount of genetically modified crops grown
around the world each year. Chapela's critics deny that charge and say
Chapela wouldn't be in the position he is now if he conducted his study
more carefully.

Jackson called Chapela's continued campaign against the Novartis deal
upsetting, but said the Mexican corn debate is based on scientific
disagreements.