Practical Applications of Recombinant DNA Technologies

Molecular biology and its attendant techniques have had a bewildering variety of applications in government, industry, and medicine. We mention only a few here. For example, the observation that human genomes carry different numbers of short variable repeats has led to a powerful tool for forensics. The ability to clone proteins in bacteria or yeast has allowed the production of hundreds of protein reagents essential for therapeutics or diagnosis that were difficult to obtain directly from their natural source. Gene therapy seems more and more to be practical and of immense potential. The production of genetically modified plant species, resistant to insects or to insecticides, has become an enormous industry. Whole animals can be cloned, and their genetics modified at will. The possibilities seem endless.