Name: Date:

Student Exploration: GMOs and the Environment

[Note to teachers and students: This lesson was designed as a follow-up to the Genetic
Engineering lesson. We recommend doing that activity before trying this one.]

Vocabulary: herbicide, insecticide, genetically modified organism, pesticide, refuge field,

resistance

Prior Knowledge Questions (Do these BEFORE using the Gizmo.)

1. How might genetic engineering help farmers create more robust crops?
Farmers could choose the most desirable traits for crops that would make them better tasting and etc

2. How might GM crops affect the environment?

Using GM crops will decrease biodiversity in an environment

Gizmo Warm-up
In the Genetic Engineering Gizmo™, genetically modified
(GM) corn was created that was resistant to insect pests and
tolerant of herbicides. In the GMOs and the Environment
Gizmo, you will use these strains of corn to maximize corn yields
while seeing how these techniques affect the environment.

On the Controls tab, make sure One-year is selected for the Mode and None is selected for the
Resistance type. Make sure both sliders are set to zero. Click Play ( ).

1. Describe the corn field shown in the SIMULATION tab on the left.
The corn field grew at a consistent rate but when I clicked on one of the stalks, there were many
insects were on it

2. Click Reset ( ). Drag the Herbicide and Insecticide sliders all the way to the right. Click

Play. Describe the corn field treated with these pesticides.

A majority of the stalk grew at a good rate, however a few of the stalks died at an early age and
some stalks even had insects still on them
 Get the Gizmo ready:
Activity A:
 Click Reset and drag the Herbicide and
One-year analysis
Insecticide sliders back to zero.

Introduction: In a corn field, about 75,000 plants are grown per hectare (2.47 acres) of land. In
this simulation, a small sample of test plants are grown on about 0.0005 hectares of land.

Question: How can we maximize corn yield using different strains of corn?

1. Observe: When the Resistance type is None, the corn isn’t resistant to insects or herbicide.

A. Click Play. Click on a few different corn plants to see a close-up. What do you

observe? Almost all the corn plants have insects on them.

B. What is the corn yield at the top right of the SIMULATION tab? 7.7 tons/hectare

Yield is the amount of crops harvested, and can be sold, per area of land.

C. Select the TABLE tab. Based on the recorded data, what factors do you think have
reduced the corn yield from its maximum amount of close to 15 tons/ha? (Note:
Spiders eat harmful insects but do not damage corn.)

insects have reduced the corn yield from its maximum because harmful insects will eat
the corn and infect the stalk and can then infect other stalks

2. Hypothesize: What Gizmo settings do you think would maximize crop yield?

Resistance type of caterpillars and herbicides, 100 herbicides L/ha, and 80 insecticides (L/Ha)

3. Investigate: Click Reset. On the TABLE tab, click Clear to delete the current data. With the
resistance type None still selected, adjust the Insecticide and Herbicide sliders until you
get the best yield. (Note: Yields within 1.0 tons/ha are not significantly different.)

A. What is the maximum yield? 9.9 tons/ha

B. How much insecticide did you use? 180 tons/ha

C. How much herbicide did you use? 0

D. Why didn’t it help to add more herbicide to the corn?

By inhabiting the target site (enzyme), herbicides cause substances to build up and damage
the plant. This explains why herbicides would have negative effects on the corn and cause
the total yield to decrease
(Activity A continued on next page)
Activity A (continued from previous page)

4. Experiment: For each of the remaining resistance types, try to maximize corn yield by
adjusting the amount of herbicide and insecticide used. Then, fill out the table below.

Resistance type Herbicide Amount Insecticide Amount Yield

Herbicide 300 180 13.4

Caterpillars 0 180 10.2

Caterpillars and herbicide 300 180 14.3

5. Explore: When using caterpillar-resistant corn, does it help to add insecticide?

not significantly, just a bit because caterpillar’s are harmful to the corn so when you
Explain. already use caterpillar-resistant corn, it prevents caterpillars from harming the corn

6. Challenge: Try to maximize corn yield without using any chemicals at all. Which resistance
type did you choose, and what was the yield?

Resistance type: caterpillars and herbicide Yield: 10.1

7. Observe: Clear any data in the table. Select the herbicide resistant corn. Set the Herbicide
slider to 300 L/ha. Starting with no insecticide, run several simulations, adding an additional
20 L/ha insecticide after each simulation until the maximum is reached.

Switch to the GRAPH tab. Change the dropdown menu on the right to Insecticide.

A. Describe the shape of the graph.

At first, when I added insesticed, the total yield increased by a little bit until I used 40 l/ha
of insecticides. Then the yield for the corn decreased

B. What does the shape of the graph indicate about the amount of insecticide needed

to be effective?
The shape of the graph indicates you need a certain amount of insecticide (around20 l/ha)
for the yield to increase

8. Apply: What is the minimum amount of chemicals (herbicide and insecticide) required to get
a yield above 13 tons per hectare? You can use any resistance type. Fill in the table below.

Resistance type Herbicide Amount Insecticide Amount Yield

Catepillar and Herbicide 220 L/Ha 70 L/Ha 13.1
 Get the Gizmo ready:
Activity B:
 Select Multi-year for the Mode.
Long-term yield  Set Resistance type to None.
 Set Insecticide and Herbicide to 0 L/ha

Question: What are the long-term effects of GMOs on the corn field?

1. Review: In Activity A, you determined how to maximize yield for each type of resistance. List
the settings you used and the resulting yields in the table below.

Resistance type Herbicide Amount Insecticide Amount Yield

None 0 180 10.5
Herbicide 300 180 14.0
Caterpillars 0 0 10.4
Caterpillars and herbicide 300 0 14.0

A. How do you think the yields might change over a long period of time?
Over a long period of time, they may decrease because they have adapted to the herbicides
or insecticides so they won’t be affected so the yield will be lower.

B. Which method do you think will cause the least amount of harm to the environment?
I think using the caterpillar resistance corn will have the least amount of harm on
Explain. the environment, because no herbicides or insecticides are needed to maximize
the yield. This means the bad effects of insecticides and herbicides like
decreasedbiodiversity won’t happen

2. Observe: Run a simulation for each resistance type using the settings in the table above.
(For the caterpillars and caterpillars and herbicide resistant corn, use 0 L/ha insecticide.)

Select the GRAPH tab. Below, roughly sketch the Corn yield graph for each resistance
type. Fill in the final yield after 30 years below.

None Herbicide Caterpillars Both

14 14
10
10

Yield: 10.5 14 10.4 14

(Activity B continued on next page)

Activity B (continued from previous page)

3. Observe: Click Reset. Select the Caterpillars and herbicide corn. Set Herbicide to 300
L/ha and Insecticide to 0 L/ha. Run the simulation for 30 years.
Throughout the years, the yield of the corn declined pretty substantially to
A. Describe the corn field. what it previously was. At around 20 years, the yield decreases

B. Switch to the GRAPH tab. You can change the data the graph displays using the
dropdown menu. Roughly sketch the following graphs below.

Corn yield Weeds Caterpillars

C. Describe what happens to the population of caterpillars over time.

Overtime, the caterpillar population increases. This is an example of exponential growth, as
once it starts increasing, it increases rapidly and the population surges
The sudden increase in the caterpillar population caused
D. How did this affect corn yield? the yield of corn to decrease

E. Why do you think this is occurring?

This is most likely because the caterpillars consume corn plants. This probably killed off a
lot of the corn thus decreasing the yield

Caterpillars have evolved tolerance to the insect-resistant corn. This means they are
no longer killed by the proteins the corn produces.

4. Explore: Click Reset and select the Refuge field box. A refuge field is a separate field that
contains non-GMO corn. Click Play. What is the shape of the caterpillar graph now?

In general, the shape of the caterpillar graph is pretty similar, however within 30 years it did
not really exponentially grow. Towards the end of the 30 years, the population of caterpillars
was only slightly increasing

A refuge field allows caterpillars that are not tolerant of the GMO corn to survive. This slows
the spread of tolerance in the caterpillar population.

5. Think and discuss: Why is it necessary to continually produce new types of GMOs?
It is necessary to continually produce new types of GMOs because we require different types of
resistances within plants for specific situations. Sometimes they need to be resistant to
herbicides and types of organisms, so to keep maximum yield, we need to keep producing new
GMOs
 Get the Gizmo ready:
Activity C:
 Click Reset to reset the Gizmo.
Effects on the
 Set Resistance type to None.
environment
 Set Insecticide and Herbicide to 0 L/ha

Introduction: Chemical pesticides from farms can pollute nearby water supplies, negatively
affecting the environment. Water pollution from pesticides can harm sensitive animals and
plants living in nearby streams, reducing populations and decreasing the number of species.

Question: What effects do pesticides and GM corn have on the environment?

1. Hypothesis: How do you think GMO’s affect the environment over the long term?

GMOs contribute to a loss of biodiversity with surrounding environments.

2. Observe: Click on the stream.

A. What species do you observe? Turtles, fish, lobsters, and frogs

B. How many total species are there? around 9

C. Run a simulation using 0 L/ha herbicide and 0 L/ha insecticide. Do you observe any

changes in the stream over time? no

3. Compare: Run a simulation with maximum herbicide and insecticide. Observe the stream.

A. How does the stream change?

Only one species is left so the use of herbicides and insecticides greatly decreased the biodiversity of the river

B. Switch to the GRAPH tab. Roughly sketch the following graphs below.

Spiders Frogs Trout Total species

C. How do chemical pesticides affect the environment?

Overall, chemical pesticides greatly decrease biodiversity in the environment

(Activity C continued on next page)

Activity C (continued from previous page)

4. Challenge: Using the Gizmo, try to maximize the 30th year corn yield while retaining 35 or
more species in the stream. Then, try to maximize the yield with 50 or more species. Fill in
the table below to show how you did it.

Resistance type Refuge? Herbicide Insecticide Total species Yield

Caterpillars and herbicides yes 0 180 35+ 10.5

Caterpillars yes 0 0 50+ 10

Why did you make the choices you did in the table above?
Knowing that the levels of insecticides and herbicides affected the total species negatively, I kept them low

5. Challenge: Choose the non-resistant corn.

A. What is the best yield you can get while still retaining 50 or more species? 7.6

B. How does this compare to the GM corn?

The non-resistant corn proved to yield less corn than the GM corn

6. Think and discuss: Use everything you’ve learned to answer the following questions.

A. What are the benefits of GM corn to the farmer?

GM crops to lead to a higher yield which leads to more profit that the farmer makes.

B. What are the environmental benefits of using GM corn?

A benefit associated when using GM corn can be the fact that it tends to use less insecticide
and herbicides

C. How can GM corn be harmful to the environment?

GM corn can be harmful to the environment as it can greatly decrease biodiversity

(especially in aquatic environments)