The Glowing Bunny

from the artwork? dept

ABC News tonight had a report about Alba, the glowing bunny. It seems an artist, Eduardo Kac, had jellyfish DNA mixed with a rabbit, to create this bunny whose fur and eyes glow under a blacklight. Apparently, it was created in order to bring attention to some of the debates on genetic engineering. Of course, the lab in France that created the bunny won't release it because they're afraid it might escape into the wild and breed like... well... rabbits. They're not sure what sort of effect that might have on the environment.
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  1. identicon
    mhh5, 18 Sep 2000 @ 10:18pm

    SciFi overlooked...

    Why didn't anyone seriously talk about this when the Wrath of Kahn came out? Or GATTACA? Or Bladerunner? Genetically engineered people are coming! Maybe GM people will all glow green to identify them. Then we can all be 'truly' created equal... :)

    link to this | view in thread ]

  2. identicon
    Ryan, 19 Sep 2000 @ 4:23am

    Effects

    As long as the Rabbit is sterilised (i.e. made none fertile) then there's no problem with releasing him to the artist.

    However, I noticed that they mentioned very little about the effects of releasing a glowing rabbit, the reality of it is that it probably wouldn't last that long in the wild (there's a reason why animals don't normally grow in the dark), predators would easily find the rabbit and eat him (end of Rabbit line). But if it manages to breed with other rabbits it may lead to unforeseen problems.

    In my opinion a very silly point to make but it doesn't really harm the rabbit or anyone else.

    link to this | view in thread ]


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