Golden rice is a bioengineered variety of rice that produces beta-carotene, a precursor to vitamin A. This innovation aims to address vitamin A deficiency (VAD), a prevalent public health issue affecting millions, particularly children and pregnant women, in regions where rice is a staple food.

2. INTRODUCTION
• Golden rice is a variety of
Oryza sativa rice produced
through genetic engineering.
• Golden rice was developed
as a fortified food to be used
in areas where there is
malnutrition and vitamin A
deficiency are common.

3. Why Rice??
• Global staple food
• Cultivated from ancient times
• Rice provides as much as 80 percent or more
of the daily caloric intake of 3 billion people,
which is half the world’s population.

4. Who Began the Golden Rice Project?
• Started in 1982 by
Professor Ingo Potrykus
and
Dr. Peter Beyer
• Funded by the Rockefeller Foundation, the
Swiss Federal Institute of Technology, and
Syngenta, a crop protection company.

5. Effects of Malnutrition
• Symptoms of vitamin A deficiency include;
night blindness, increased susceptibility to
infection and cancer, anemia, deterioration of
the eye tissue, and cardiovascular disease.
• Nearly 9 million children die from malnutrition
each year. A large proportion of those children
die from common illnesses that could have
been avoided through adequate nutrition.

6. We Aim For
• Mutate rice plants to produce carotenoids, or
organic pigments, specifically β-carotene (pro-
vitamin A) in the endosperm, the edible part
of the grain.
• The rice plant can naturally produce
β-carotene, which is a carotenoid pigment
that occurs in the leaves and is involved in
photosynthesis.
Vitamin A
(Retinol)

7. • The addition of 2 genes in
the rice genome will
complete the biosynthetic
pathway –
1. Phytoene synthase (psy)
– derived from daffodils
2. Lycopene cyclase (crt1)
– from soil bacteria Erwinia
uredovora
How Does It Work?

8. Continue……
• The psy and crt1 genes were transformed into
the rice nuclear genome and placed under the
control of an endosperm-specific promoter,
so they are only expressed in the endosperm.
• The end product of the engineered pathway is
lycopene, but if the plant accumulated
lycopene, the rice would be red.

9. • Recent analysis has shown the plant's
endogenous enzymes process the lycopene to
beta-carotene in the endosperm, giving the
rice the distinctive yellowish-orange color,
thus, the name “Golden Rice”.
Continue……

10. Different Techniques for producing Golden
rice

11. Agrobacterium tumefaciens
plasmid DNA
Plasmid DNA is
cut open with
an enzyme.
chromosomal
DNA
A specific gene is
“cut out” of the
donor DNA using
the same enzyme.
New gene is
inserted into
the plasmid.
Plasmid is transformed
into Agrobacterium.
When mixed with plant
cells, Agrobacterium
duplicates the plasmid.
The new gene is transferred
into the chromosomal DNA
of the plant cell.
When the plant cell
divides, each daughter
cell receives the new
gene, giving the whole
plant a new trait.

12. Biolistic bombardment
(gene gun)
Transformation of
Agrobacterium
Cloned Gene in Vector DNA Molecule
Protoplast transformation
followed by cell wall
regeneration
Agrobacterium-mediated
transformation of plant
cell
Migration and integration of
gene into nucleus
Plant cells
grown in
tissue culture
Regeneration of
genetically
modified plant
from tissue
culture

13. GOLDEN RICE
GENE CONSTRUCTS
I-SceI KpnI I-SceI
LB Gt1p psy nos! 35Sp tp crtl nos! RB
LB
I-SceI
35Sp Gt1p RB
I-SceI
ˆSpeI
35S! aphIV 35S! Icy

14. Wild type
rice
Low levels
β-carotene
High levels
β-carotene

15. Potential use to combat
vitamin A deficiency
• Initial analyses of the potential nutritional benefits of
golden rice suggested consumption of golden rice
would not eliminate the problems of vitamin A
deficiency, but should be seen as a complement to
other methods of vitamin A supplementation.
• Since then, improved strains of golden rice have
been developed containing sufficient provitamin A to
provide the entire dietary requirement of this
nutrient to people who eat about 75g of golden rice
per day.

16. • Potrykus has spearheaded an effort to have
golden rice distributed for free to subsistence
farmers. This required several companies which
had intellectual property rights to the results of
Beyer's research to license it for free.
• Free licenses, so called Humanitarian Use
Licenses, were granted quickly due to the positive
publicity that golden rice received, particularly in
TIME magazine in July 2000.
• Monsanto Company was one of the first
companies to grant the group free licenses.
Intellectual property issues

17. Opposition
• Critics of genetically engineered crops have raised
various concerns.
• One of these is that golden rice originally did not
have sufficient vitamin A. This problem was
solved by the development of new strains of rice.
• However, there are still doubts about the speed
at which vitamin A degrades once the plant is
harvested, and how much would remain after
cooking. A 2009 study of boiled golden rice fed
to volunteers concluded that Golden Rice is
effectively converted into vitamin A in humans.

18. Opposition
• Greenpeace opposes the release of any
genetically modified organisms into the
environment, and is concerned that golden
rice is a Trojan horse that will open the door
to more widespread use of GMOs.

19. References
• Paine, Jacqueline A; Shipton, Catherine A; Chaggar, Sunandha; Howells, Rhian M; Kennedy,
Mike J; Vernon, Gareth; Wright, Susan Y; Hinchliffe, Edward et al. (2005). "Improving the
nutritional value of Golden Rice through increased pro-vitamin A content". Nature
Biotechnology 23 (4): 482–7
• Dawe, D.; Robertson, R.; Unnevehr, L. (2002). "Golden rice: what role could it play in
alleviation of vitamin A deficiency?". Food Policy 27: 541–560
• Zimmerman, R.; Qaim, M. (2004). "Potential health benefits of Golden Rice: a Philippine case
study"
• Then, C, 2009, "The campaign for genetically modified rice is at the crossroads: A critical look
at Golden Rice after nearly 10 years of development." Foodwatch in Germany
http://www.foodwatch.de/foodwatch/content/e6380/e23456/e23458/GoldenRice_english_f
inal_ger.pdf
• Tang G, Qin J, Dolnikowski GG, Russell RM, Grusak MA (2009). "Golden Rice is an effective
source of vitamin A". Am J Clin Nutr 89 (6): 1776–83. doi:10.3945/ajcn.2008.27119
• Greenpeace. 2005. All that Glitters is not Gold: The False Hope of Golden Rice
• "Golden Rice is Part of the Solution." Golden Rice Project Home Page. 2009. 09 June 2009
http://www.goldenrice.org
• Sanday, Peggy R. "Eggi's Village: Rice Cycle." School of Arts&Sciences - University of
Pennsylvania. 09 June 2009 http://www.sas.upenn.edu/~psanday/eggiricecycle.htm