History of

Biotechnology
It is generally considered that
there have been 3 stages in the
history of Biotechnology:

Ancient
Classical
Modern
Ancient Biotechnology
Ancient Biotech
 It is not known exactly when it began, but
likely to have been with early civilizations.
 Improvements in agriculture and food
production.
 Few records exist. What we know comes
from:
 Archeologists research.

 Ancient carvings and sketches sources of

information.
Ancient Biotech. focused on having
food and other human needs available
when needed.

 Useful plants
brought from the
wild, planted near
caves where people
lived.
 As food became
more available, the
ability to store and
preserve it emerged.
 Food supplies often seasonal
 Winter food supplies may get quite low.
 Discoveries about food preservation
most likely came from unplanned events
such as a fire or freeze.
 Domestication of animals and
plants:
 Likely began 15,000 years ago with large
animals that were hard to capture.
 Likely Reasons:
 People only had meat when they found a dead
animal.
 Came up with ways of capturing fish and small
animals.
Oldest Domesticated Animal
14 – 30,000 ya
Domestication
 Domestication is the adaptation of
organisms so they can be cultured.
 It is seen by scientists as the
beginning of biotech.
Plant Domestication
 Most likely began around 14,000
years ago in the middle east.
 Involved the collecting of seed from
useful plants and growing crude
crops from that seed.
 Involved the knowledge that the
seed had to properly mature.
Plant Domestication Requires
that people understand:
Proper planting procedures;
Need for water;
Light requirements;
All other conditions for plant
growth.
Earliest plants domesticated
were likely grains and other
seeds used for food.
 Animal Domestication
 Raising animals in captivity began about
the same time in history as plants.
 Reason: it was easier to have an animal
close by, than to hunt and capture a wild
one.
 Humans had to learn:
 Thatanimals have specific food & water.
 About simple breeding processes.

 How to raise young animals.

Cattle, goats and sheep were the
first domesticated food animals.
Farming:
 By about 10,000 years ago, people
had learned enough about plants
and animals to grow their own food.
 This is the beginning of farming.
Food Preservation
 Farming resulted in food supplies
being greater at certain times of the
year than others.
 Products were gathered and stored.
 However
 Some foods rotted.
 Others changed form and were still
good to eat.
Food Preservation
People learned that:
Foods stored in a cool cave did
not spoil as quickly.
Foods heated by fire also did
not spoil as quickly.
Immersing in sour liquids
prevented food decay.
 Food Preservation Lessons Learned:
 Use processes that prevent or slow
spoilage.
 Heating, cooling, keeps micro-organisms
from growing.
 Storage can be in bags of leather or jars of
clay.
 Fermentation occurs if certain M.O.s are
present.
 Creates an acid condition that slows or
prevents spoilage.
 Fermentation
 An alternate metabolic pathway in the
Cellular respiration process.
 Used by many micoorganisms to create
energy or APT.
 Fermentation
 When sugar is converted
into energy, in the
absence of oxygen, the
first waste product
produced in ethyl alcohol.
 Alcohol is converted to
acetic acid by additional
microbe activity.
 Acetic acid is vinegar,
and has a sour taste.
 Vinegar prevents growth
of some bacteria.
 Waste products from the process are toxic
to microorganisms (even the ones that
produced them).
 Helps prevent food from spoiling.
 Fermented foods: Cheese
 One of the first food products
made through biotechnology.
 Discovered about 4,000
years ago by nomadic tribes
in Asia.
 Strains of bacteria were
added to milk, resulting in
sour milk.
 An enzyme called “rennet”
was added as well.
 Rennet comes from the lining
of the stomachs of calves.
 Fermented foods: Cheese
 Rennet is genetically
engineered today.
 Not all cheese is made
from produced rennet.
 Important organism for fermentation:
Yeast
 Species of fungi.
 Single-celled
eukaryote.
 Some are useful in
making or preserving
food.
 Some may cause
diseases.
Yeast
 Long used in food preparation and
preservation.
 In bread baking, yeast produces a
gas in the dough causing the dough
to rise.
Yeast: Fermentation Products
 Require the use of yeast in at least one stage
of production:
 Vinegar
 Pickles
 Olives
 Soy Sauce
 Hot Sauce
 Canned Meat
 Sauerkraut
 Wine
 Beer
 Cheese
6000 BCE – 4000 BCE
 6000 BCE - Yeast was used to make beer by
Sumerians and Babylonians.
 4000 BCE –
 The Egyptians discovered how to bake leavened bread
using yeast.
 China: The preservation of milk by lactic acid bacteria
resulted in yogurt.
 Molds were used to produce cheese, and vinegar and
wine via fermentation.
 Food preservative: Vinegar
 Used in ancient biotech to preserve
food.
 Juices and extracts from fruits and
grains can be fermented into alcohol.
 These can then be processed into
vinegar, which is used in pickling.
 It keeps foods from spoiling.
 Biblical references to wine indicate
the use of fermentation over 3,000
years ago.
1000 BCE – 300 BCE
 1000 BCE - Babylonians
celebrated pollination of date
palm trees with religious
rituals.
 420 BCE - Socrates (Greek
philosopher) speculated why
children don't always
resemble their parents by
remarking that the sons of
great statesmen were
usually lazy.
 1000 BCE – 300 BCE
 400 BCE - Hippocrates determined
that the male contribution to a child's
heredity is carried in the semen. He
also reasoned there was a similar
fluid in women, since children have
traits from both parents.
 320 BCE - Aristotle chose to reject
Hippocrates. He said all inheritance
comes from the father. While the
mother merely provides the material
from which the baby is made.
 100 AD – 1000 AD
 Romans speculated that
mares were fertilized by the
wind.
 Hindu philosophers first
pondered the nature of
reproduction and inheritance.
 Later Hindus observed that
certain diseases may "run in
the family."
 Moreover, children inherit all
their parents' characteristics.
 Law of Manu - "A man of base
descents can never escape his
origins."
1100 - 1700 AD
 Spontaneous Generation is the
dominant explanation that
organisms arise from non-living
matter. Maggots, for example,
were supposed to arise from
horsehair.
 1300 AD - The Aztecs in
Mexico harvested algae from
lakes as a food source.
Classical Biotechnology
 Follows ancient. Classical Biotech:
 Makes wide spread use of
ancient methods, especially
fermentation.
 Methods are adapted to
industrial production to make
large quantities of food, etc.
in a short amount of time.
 Meet demands of growing
populations.
 Many methods developed
through classical biotech are
still widely used today.
 Fermentation Control
 Advancements occurred in the 1800’s and early
1900’s which advanced the control over the
fermentation process.
 Fermenter - Specially designed chamber that
promotes fermentation.
 Allowed better control and created new products
such as glycerol, acetone, and citric acid.
Baking:
 Thedevelopment of yeasts that were
predictable and readily available led to
modern baking industry.
1630 AD – 1675 AD
 1630 - William Harvey concluded that both
plants & animals reproduce in a sexual
manner: males contribute sperm; females
contribute eggs.
 1665 - Robert Hooke observed the cellular
structure of cork. He named the very small
compartments he saw “cells”.
 1668 - Francesco Redi attempted an
experiment to disprove spontaneous
generation. He testes to see if maggots arise
on rotting meat.
1630 AD – 1675 AD
 1673 - Anton van Leeuwenhoek a Dutch
merchant, ground glass lenses as a hobby.
Improving on the microscope. He used it to
make discoveries in microbiology. He was
the first scientist to describe protozoa and
bacteria and to recognize that such
microorganisms might play a role in
fermentation.
Use of fermentation hastened the
development of Antibiotics
 Antibiotic- drug used to combat bacterial
infections.
 Penicillin:
 Developed in the late1920’s.
 Introduced in the 1940’s
 First drug produced by microbes.
 Antibiotics:
 Many kinds available today.
 Limitations in their use keep
disease producing organisms
from developing immunity to
specific antibiotics:
 Use antibiotics only when needed.
 Overuse may make the antibiotic
ineffective when really needed later.
 Some disease organisms are now
resistant to certain antibiotics.
 Used in both human and vet
medicine.
Modern Biotechnology
 Modern Biotech
 Progressed to the
manipulation of
genetic material within
organisms.
 Based on genetics.
 Emerged in mid
1900’s.
 Often called genetic
engineering, it was
made possible by
rDNA technology.
 Modern Biotech
 Deals with manipulating genetic info.
 Microscopy and advanced computer
technology are used.
 In-depth knowledge of science.
 Based on genetics research from the mid
1800’s.
Genetics:
 Study of heredity.
 Genes – determiners of heredity.
 Carry the genetic code.
 Understanding genetic structure
essential for genetic engineering.
 Most work has focused on non –human
animal and plant genetics.
Heredity is
 How traits are passed
from parents to
offspring.
 Members of the same
species pass the
characteristics of that
species.
 Differences exist within
each species.
 Differences are known
as variability.
 Heredity & Variability
are used in modern
biotechnology.
 rDNA – Recombinant DNA
 Genetic material is moved from one
organism to another.
 Material amounts involved are quite small.
 Challenging and often controversial.
 Many have opposing or negative views of
biotechnology.