Engineered edible cottonseed could end up feeding millions of people

LUBBOCK, Texas (AP) — “The Fabric of Our Lives” may soon feed millions.

A Texas researcher has found a way to reduce toxin in cottonseed that until now could only be eaten by cattle. The bovines’ multiple stomachs gradually digested the poisonous substance called gossypol.

The new seeds can be eaten by pigs, chickens, fish and humans and could show up in protein bars, shakes, breads, cookies and other foods within about 10 years. The amount of cotton already grown worldwide contains enough protein to feed 500 million people per year, experts said.

“There are a lot of poor people that cannot afford diets that contain a reasonable amount of protein,” said Keerti Rathore, the Texas A&M University researcher who made the breakthrough. “It will be nice to be able to utilize this source.”

Gossypol drops blood potassium to dangerous levels in humans and can harm the heart and liver in people and animals. Chickens eating only cottonseed die within a week.

Researchers have worked for decades to neutralize the substance and achieved partial success in the 1950s when scientists produced a gossypol-free plant by shutting off the gene that produces the toxin throughout the plant. But without gossypol, insects and diseases ravaged the cotton.

Rathore found a way to shut off gossypol production in only the seeds, leaving stems, leaves, flowers and tissue protected.

Cotton raised in field trials earlier this year at A&M had both stable growth and safe levels of gossypol in the seeds. More tests involving a variety of cotton strains lie ahead as well as regulatory hurdles, but researchers are optimistic about the technique’s potential.

“We’re trying to proceed cautiously, but we’re optimistic,” said Jodi Scheffler, a research geneticist in the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Crop Genetics and Production Research Unit. “So, so far, so good.”

Rathore said there could be less resistance to eating the genetically-altered cottonseed because his technique involves shutting down a chemical process within the seed, not adding something to it.

The method also has potential with crops such as the Indian pea, a legume that grows in Asia and Africa. Farmers grow the pea as an emergency crop because it’s high in protein and hardy in drought, but it contains a neurotoxin that paralyzes the lower body when eaten in large amounts.

Rathore’s cottonseed meets World Health Organization and U.S. Food and Drug Administration standards for food consumption, but he needs approval from the USDA, FDA and possibly other agencies to make it commercially available.

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