2016-03-30 12:51:36
It is curious how science and art go hand in hand much more than we are used to imagining. There are many proofs of this, Leonardo da Vinci is the clearest example of the art-science duality. It is not a strange case, in fact, the fondness for different forms of art is almost common among scientists: Einstein played the violin, Santiago Ramón y Cajal, father of neuroscience, was a skilled painter, Queen guitarist Brian May , to give a more current example, is a doctor in astrophysics, and, even on a more personal level, in the band in which I relax from my love of spreading science by playing the trombone, there are, mixed with students and professors of conservatory, researchers who, between scientific publications, play the euphonium or the clarinet.
Today we put before your eyes a work of art, whose author is our guest today: Teresa Capell CapellPhD in Pharmacy and Professor at the University of Lleida where she directs, together with Paul Christou, the Applied Plant Biotechnology Group.
Teresa Capell and her team have genetically improved a set of plants to provide them with properties that can be beneficial to humans. The reason is easy to understand. We know that there are medicinal plants from which compounds are extracted that help us treat certain diseases. In many cases, these plants are not very abundant, some are even in danger of extinction in their natural habitats. As if this were not enough, frequently, they generate the products that interest us in very little quantity or in such a way that their extraction is difficult and expensive. Teresa Capell belongs to the generation of scientists committed to improving the production of these substances by inserting selected genes into the genomes of other plants, easier to cultivate, using genetic engineering.
Among the achievements of the Applied Plant Biotechnology Research Group of the University of Lleida is the obtaining of genetically modified maize so that its ears produce a molecule that protects against the AIDS virus, HIV. It has also managed to create a variety of hyper-nutritious corn that contains vitamin A, vitamin C and folic acid, substances that are lacking in the diet of a good part of the poorest humanity. The same has been achieved by modifying rice or tobacco, among others. Thus has grown the set of plants that, thanks to biotechnology, have become natural factories of products that humanity needs.
That is the goal of the investigations. Teresa Capell, but she is not limited to research, she is also fond of painting and she decided to capture on canvas what she works for. This is how, from her hands a precious sheet emerged that today serves as a letter of introduction. It represents ears with colored grains, sunflowers, various flowers, tobacco leaves, etc. A set of brightly colored plants that contain in their leaves, flowers and seeds the ingredients that serve as the basis for making drugs that can cure our diseases or vitamins that can improve the quality of food for a good part of humanity. .
I invite you to listen to Teresa Capell Capell, Professor at the University of Lleida and director of the Applied Plant Biotechnology Group of the Department of Plant Production and Forest Science.
REFERENCES
Agrotecnio Researchers introduce the project Molecular Farming.
The International Society for Plant Molecular Farming
Rice endosperm produces an underglycosylated and potent form of the HIV-neutralizing monoclonal antibody 2G12. Evangelia Vamvaka et al. Plant Biotechnology Journal (2016) 14, pp. 97–108
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