Introduction

During the twentieth century there have been the greatest gains in health in most parts of the world due to dramatic reductions in infant mortality, eradication of life-threatening diseases, such as smallpox, and considerable improvements in life expectancy in developing and industrialised countries. In the past, life for most people was coarse, lacking in adequate nutrition, poor housing and, above all, short in years. With the advent of improved sanitation and better living conditions, together with the availability of vaccinations and antibiotics, there has been, for many, a vast improvement in health status. However, health status still differs widely among nations and by geographical region. For instance, life expectancy is less than 50 years in some sub-Saharan African countries but over 75 in established industrialised countries. The wealthiest economies appear to be the healthiest. A crucial factor related to life expectancy is access to safe water! In much of the developing world, simply drinking water is a high-risk exposure.

Undoubtedly, the real gains in health over the last century can be attributed mainly to the impact of public health and disease prevention rather than to medical interventions. Public health can be primarily distinguished from clinical medicine by placing emphasis on the prevention of disease rather than the curing, and having a main focus on populations and communities rather than the individual patient. It is essential to continue to develop a public health approach that will protect populations and create prevention strategies for groups and not just for individuals.

Introduction

In the present climate of increasing globalisation, biotech companies must seek to acquire strong protection for their products and technologies in all the areas of the world where they wish to operate. It has been projected that the sales worldwide from new biotechnology alone could exceed £60 billion per annum by early this century. This will be derived from a wide range of biotechnology-based products and processes, which have evolved in most cases from many years of expensive research and development. How can such biotechnology products and processes, often referred to as intellectual property (IP), be protected and the due financial profits returned to the rightful inventors and industrial developers? Inventors in the area of biotechnology can be protected by way of different titles of protection including patents for invention, plant breeders' rights and trade secrets.

Intellectual property rights are designed to allow new technologies to be available, so that the originating scientist or company receives a reward for the initiative demonstrated. Intellectual property assets can be any codified knowledge, innovation or anything of actual or potential economic value that has arisen from basic research, analysis and manipulation of biological systems, biological property, industrial application or commercial use.

It is important to differentiate between invention and innovation. Because an invention may not always involve the commercialisation of a new idea, it follows that not all inventions result in innovation.

Introduction

Bioprocess or fermentation technology is an important component of most ‘old’ and ‘new’ biotechnology processes and will normally involve complete living cells (microbe, mammalian or plant), organelles or enzymes as the biocatalyst, and will aim to bring about specific chemical and/or physical changes in biochemical materials derived from the medium. In order to be viable in any specific industrial context, bioprocessing must possess advantages over competing methods of production such as chemical technology. In practice, many bioprocessing techniques will be used industrially because they are the only practical way in which a specific product can be made (e.g. vaccines, antibiotics). Biochemical engineering covers the design of vessels and apparatus suitable for performing such biochemical reactions or transformations.

The very beginnings of fermentation technology, or as it is now better recognised, bioprocess technology, were derived in part from the use of microorganisms for the production of foods such as cheeses, yoghurts, sauerkraut, fermented pickles and sausages, soya sauce and other Oriental products, and beverages such as beers, wines and derived spirits (Table 4.1). In many cases, the present-day production processes for such products are still remarkably similar. These forms of bioprocessing were long viewed as arts or crafts, but are now increasingly subjected to the full array of modern science and technology. Paralleling these useful product formations was the identification of the roles microorganisms could play in removing obnoxious and unhealthful wastes, which has resulted in the worldwide service industries involved in water purification, effluent treatment and solid waste management.

Introduction

A major challenge to creating a sustainable future for the world's populations will be to secure adequate food supplies for the majority. By 2030 it has been estimated that the size of urban populations will be at least twice that of rural, agricultural-based populations. The growth of urbanisation, together with ensuing environmental degradation, is already causing serious losses in the availability of productive agricultural land. Furthermore, worldwide climate changes and increasing civil strife continue to make accurate predictions of future food supplies difficult. What role can traditional and new biotechnology play in achieving food sustainability?

Food production is the largest worldwide industry, and in industrialised nations the expenditure on food can account for at least 20–30% of household budgets. However, whereas food is in general in excessive production in most parts of the world, scarcity and insufficient production exists in Africa, Central China and most parts of South America. The food industry has evolved through specialist trades or occupations, e.g. butchers, bakers, confectioners, etc., to national and multinational organisations involved in the manufacture and distribution of food on a worldwide scale. With the improvement in means of transportation, foods are available on a worldwide basis, and developments in food preservation methods give independence from seasonal availability.

In essence, the food industry now serves the function of supplying society with high-quality, wholesome foods, all the year round, and at a distance, in time and location, from the place of primary production.

Introduction

Major events in human history have, to a large extent, been driven by technology. Improved awareness of agriculture and metalworking brought mankind out of the Stone Age, while in the nineteenth century the Industrial Revolution created a multitude of machinery together with increasingly larger cities. The twentieth century was undoubtedly the age of chemistry and physics, spawning huge industrial activities such as petrochemicals, pharmaceuticals, fertilisers, the atom bomb, transmitters, the laser and microchips. However, there can be little doubt that the huge understanding of the fundamentals of life processes achieved in the latter part of the twentieth century will ensure that the twenty-first century will be dominated by biology and its associated technologies.

Societal changes are increasingly driven by science and technology. Currently, the impact of new biological developments must be absorbed not just by a minority (the scientists) but by large numbers of people (the general public). If this does not happen, the majority will be alienated. It is increasingly important to ensure a broad understanding of what bioscience and its related technologies will involve, and especially what the consequences will be of accepting or rejecting the new technical innovations.

The following chapters will examine how the new biotechnologists are developing new therapies and cures for many human and animal diseases; designing diagnostic tests for increasing disease prevention and pollution control; improving many aspects of plant and animal agriculture and food production; cleaning-up and improving the environment; designing clean industrial manufacturing processes; exploring the potential for biological fuel generation; and unravelling the power of stem cell technology.

Global warming and the significance of fossil fuels

Energy for industrial, commercial and residential purposes, electricity generation and transportation is primarily supplied by fossil fuels (coal, gas and oil) and nuclear power. It is now widely believed that climate change is strongly linked to the increased level of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere, and that human activity especially through the combustion of fossil fuels is a major contributing factor.

One of the main greenhouse gases, accounting for 65% of global warming, is carbon dioxide. Fossil fuels are the stored energy or ‘ancient sunlight’ of aeons and millennia ago that mankind has been burning extensively over a few centuries and more prolifically in recent decades. When such fossil fuels are burned for energy, carbon dioxide that has been locked away for all those years is released into the atmosphere greatly adding to global greenhouse gases. In contrast, when present-day plant material is burned the carbon locked into the biomass for a relatively short period of time is released back into the atmosphere thus recycling the carbon dioxide. Consequently, the system is relatively carbon neutral unlike the burning of fossil fuels.

Global emissions of carbon dioxide from fossil fuels over the first five years of this third millennium were four times greater than for the preceding ten years, despite the decisions of the Kyoto Agreement to reduce carbon dioxide emissions.

The nature of stem cells

Within the mammalian body there is a ranking system of cells from the undifferentiated to the highly specialised cell types and tissues, e.g. liver, brain, lung, blood, skin, etc., which have arisen by the process of cellular differentiation. Cellular differentiation occurs by a variety of biological processes that involve the switching on and off of specific genes, of cell signalling and, especially, where the cell is situated in the body. When a cell achieves terminal differentiation it cannot reproduce itself. Yet, it has long been recognised that systems and tissues of the adult body must have some ability to replace cells such as cells of the blood system (haematopoietic cells) and skin cells (epidermal tissue). The body does, however, retain certain undifferentiated cells within tissues and such cells are termed tissue or adult stem cells (TS).

What are stem cells? Stem cells are undifferentiated cells that have the capacity to self-renew and to achieve multilineage differentiation. Within a particular cell population they can remain in an undifferentiated state and, as such, do not have any specialised function. However, when required they can be induced to differentiate into specific cell types. Stem cells have specific enzymes and cell-specific antigens and have the ability to express developmentally regulated genes. Stem cells have been characterised as totipotent, pluripotent and multipotent.