{"id":21675,"date":"2014-01-07T10:28:19","date_gmt":"2014-01-07T20:28:19","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/?p=21675"},"modified":"2020-06-25T13:25:17","modified_gmt":"2020-06-25T23:25:17","slug":"uhs-reproductive-technique-produces-glowing-green-pigs","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/2014\/01\/07\/uhs-reproductive-technique-produces-glowing-green-pigs\/","title":{"rendered":"UH<\/abbr>\u2019s reproductive technique produces glowing green pigs"},"content":{"rendered":"Reading time: <\/span> 2<\/span> minutes<\/span><\/span>
\"glowing
South China Agricultural University in Guangzhou, Guangdong Province, China, 2013. (Photo courtesy of JABSOM<\/abbr>)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

In Guangdong Province in Southern China, 10 transgenic piglets were born in 2013, and under a black light, they glow a greenish tint. A technique developed by reproductive scientists from the University of Â鶹´«Ã½<\/span> at Mānoa’s John A. Burns School of Medicine<\/a> was used to quadruple the success rate at which plasmids carrying a fluorescent protein from jellyfish DNA were transferred into the embryo of the pig.<\/p>\n

Zhenfang Wu and Zicong Li<\/strong> of the South China Agricultural University have detailed the research that produced the transgenic pigs in an academic manuscript submitted to the Biology of Reproduction<\/em>. Li is a UH<\/abbr> alumnus. Also assisting in the manuscript was Johann Urschitz<\/strong>, an assistant research professor in the Â鶹´«Ã½medical school’s Institute for Biogenesis Research<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The green color indicates that the fluorescent genetic material injected into the pig embryos has been incorporated into the animal’s natural make-up. “It’s just a marker to show that we can take a gene that was not originally present in the animal and now exists in it,” says Associate Professor Stefan Moisyadi<\/strong>, a veteran bioscientist with the Institute for Biogenesis Research.<\/p>\n

Moisyadi said the animals are not affected by the fluorescent protein and will have the same life span as other pigs. “The green is only a marker to show that it’s working easily.”<\/p>\n

The ultimate goal is to introduce beneficial genes into larger animals to create less costly and more efficient medicines. “[For] patients who suffer from hemophilia and they need the blood-clotting enzymes in their blood, we can make those enzymes a lot cheaper in animals rather than a factory that will cost millions of dollars to build,” Moisyadi said.<\/p>\n

Read the School of Medicine’s story for more.<\/a><\/p>\n

—By Tina Shelton<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The green pigs demonstrate the success of the Institute for Biogenesis Research’s reproductive science technique.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":16,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[30],"tags":[454,31,9],"class_list":["post-21675","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-research","tag-institute-for-biogenesis-research","tag-john-a-burns-school-of-medicine","tag-uh-manoa","entry","has-media"],"aioseo_notices":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21675","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/16"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=21675"}],"version-history":[{"count":11,"href":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21675\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":121500,"href":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21675\/revisions\/121500"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=21675"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=21675"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=21675"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}