“There is no evidence that these genetically engineered zebra danio fish pose any more threat to the environment than their unmodified counterparts which have long been widely sold in the United States,” it said in a statement published in 2003. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) showed little concern about the environmental risk these fish posed. company Yorktown Technologies obtained the marketing rights from the NUS scientists, and began producing and selling these fish under the trade name GloFish. In the late 1990s, the National University of Singapore created the first genetically modified fish by adding genes for red and green fluorescent proteins from sea anemones and jellyfish into wild zebrafish, a species native to South Asia that’s popular in the aquarium fish trade. Image by Rubem Porto Jr via Flickr ( CC BY-NC-SA 2.0). Despite these so-called GloFish being officially banned in the country, researchers caught specimens in all five sampled headwater creeks in the southeastearn Paraíba do Sul River Basin. Engineers produced several colored versions of black tetras, zebrafish and other ornamental fish, giving them sensational names such as “Electric Green,” “Galactic Purple” “Sunburst Orange” and “Starfire Red.” Image by Robert Kamalov via Wikimedia Commons ( CC BY-SA 4.0). “We don’t know how severe the problems will be, as they are escaping into a little studied region.” This Cosmic Blue GloFish is a genetically modified version of the black tetra (Gymnocorymbus ternetzi).
Jean Vitule, a fish expert from the University of Paraná who was not involved in the study, agrees: “I am really worried, because the arrival of the GM fish in this river basin is a shot in the dark,” he told Mongabay by email. This adds up to a worrying situation, he said: “The risk of these exotic fish leading to the extermination of native fish is real and will get worse, unless the authorities take action to stop their escape.” In one of them, the Queiroga creek, “they reproduce every month of the year,” Magalhães said. Moreover, although it’s widely believed that GloFish (which include other fish species engineered for fluorescence) are infertile, the study found that these fish were reproducing in two creeks. Magalhães said this means the creeks have become susceptible to invasion by alien species. And in the creeks where they occur, there are no predators to keep their numbers in check, he added. These fish feed on the insects and zooplankton that native fish also eat, putting them in direct competition, he said. This study, Magalhães said, is the first to explore life-history strategies of genetically modified zebrafish ( Danio rerio) in the wild. Image by Ccm272 via Wikimedia Commons ( CC BY-SA 4.0). ” A Galactic Purple Shark, one of several strains of genetically modified rainbow shark ( Epalzeorhynchos frenatum). “Apart from many species of non-native fish, we now have non-native hybrid fish and, worst of all, non-native genetically modified fish, like the transgenic zebra fish.
Some of the native fish could be driven into extinction by these GloFish and other introduced species, he said. “I am very concerned because these non-native fish can have serious ecological impacts, such as competing over food and predating native fish,” André Magalhāes, a biologist at the Federal University of São João del-Rei in Minas Gerais state and lead author of a recently published study, told Mongabay in an email. The basin covers 55,500 square kilometres (21,400 square miles) across the states of São Paulo, Minas Gerais and Rio de Janeiro, and is considered the Brazilian watershed that has been the most heavily impacted by human activity. One of Brazil’s most threatened biomes, the Atlantic Forest, now faces a new hazard: genetically modified zebrafish that glow in the dark.ĭespite these so-called GloFish being officially banned in the country, researchers caught specimens in all five sampled headwater creeks in the southeastearn Paraíba do Sul River Basin. But a U.S biologist whose own research showed that GloFish fail to compete reproductively against wild-type zebrafish says this new paper is “almost a study about nothing” and was published only because it was “sensational.”.Brazilian biologists have called for measures to prevent these fish from escaping fish farms and entering into local bodies of water, where they compete with native species for food.GloFish, which are genetically engineered for fluorescence, are advertised for sale online in Brazil, even though they’ve been banned there since 2017.A recent study shows that genetically modified zebrafish, known as GloFish, have been found and are breeding in creeks in Brazil’s Atlantic Forest.
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