Abstract
Transgenic insecticidal plants based onBacillus thuringiensis (Bt) endotoxins, on proteinase inhibitors and on lectins, and transgenic herbicide tolerant plants are widely used in modern agriculture. The results of the studies on likelihood and non-likelihood of adverse effects of transgenic plants on the environment including: (i) effects on nontarget species; (ii) invasiveness; (iii) potential for transgenes to ‘escape’ into the environment by horizontal gene transfer; and (iv) adverse effects on soil biota are reviewed. In general, it seems that large-scale implementation of transgenic insecticidal and herbicide tolerant plants do not display considerable negative effects on the environments and, moreover, at least some transgenic plants can improve the corresponding environments and human health because their production considerably reduces the load of chemical insecticides and herbicides.
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Abbreviations
- AFLP:
-
Amplified fragment length polymorphism
- AM:
-
arbuscular mycorrhizal
- BBPs:
-
biotin-binding proteins
- Bt:
-
Bacillus thuringiensis
- CEWc:
-
chicken egg white cystatin
- CFU:
-
colony forming unit
- CPB:
-
Colorado potato beetle
- CpTi:
-
cowpea trypsin inhibitor
- ECB:
-
European corn borer
- GFP:
-
green fluorescent protein
- GNA:
-
Galanthus nivalis agglutinin
- GPA:
-
green peach aphid
- HT:
-
herbicide tolerant
- MIT-2:
-
mustard trypsin inhibitor-2
- PCN:
-
potato cyst hematodes
- PCR:
-
polymerase chain reaction
- PIs:
-
protease inhibitors
- PLFA:
-
phospholipid fatty acid analysis
- rNPT-II:
-
cloned neomycin phosphotransferase-II
- SBTI:
-
soybean trypsin inhibitor
- SSCP:
-
single-strand conformation polymorphism
- TPs:
-
transgenic plants
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Velkov, V.V., Medvinsky, A.B., Sokolov, M.S. et al. Will transgenic plants adversely affect the environment?. J. Biosci. 30, 515–548 (2005). https://doi.org/10.1007/BF02703726
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/BF02703726