Biotech Timeline

Learn how technology has been used to improve the food we grow or eat. Follow the biotech timeline.

(Source: http://www.whybiotech.com)

10,000 - 9,000 BC

People start planting crops rather than relying on hunting and gathering for food.

6,000 BC

In Mesopotamia, Sumerians use yeast - a type of fungus - to make beer and wine.

5,000 BC

Farming communities in existence.

4,000 BC

Egyptians use yeast to make bread rise.

4,000 BC - 1,600 AD

Early farmers - like those in Egypt and the Americas - saved seeds from plants that produced the best crops and planted them the next year to grow even better crops.

3,000 - 2,000 BC

Peruvians select potatoes (from around 160 wild species) with the lowest levels of poisons and grow them for food.

1700 - 1720

Thomas Fairchild, the forgotten father of the flower garden, creates Europe’s first hybrid plant.

1750 - 1850

European farmers increase cultivation of legumes (to fix nitrogen in the soil) and rotate crops to increase yield.

1866

Austrian monk Gregor Johann Mendel publishes important work on heredity that describes how plant characteristics are passed from generation to generation.

1870 - 1890

Plant researchers crossbreed cotton to develop hundreds of new varieties with superior traits.

1871 - Early 1900s

Researcher Luther Burbank developed the Russet Burbank Potato, and later went on to develop several new hybrid fruits, including plums, berries, prunbes and peaches.

1908

First U.S. hybrid corn produced through self-pollination.

1919

Word ‘biotechnology’ coined by Hungarian immigrant Karl Ereky.

1928

Impact of X-rays and radium on barley mutation described.

1933

Hybrid corn becomes available commercially in the United States, causing corn yields to triple over the past 50 years.

1941

Discovery that chemicals can cause mutations.

1944

Discovery that DNA is genetic molecule - in other words, it is the way genetic information is passed between generations.

1953

Watson and Crick describe the double helix structure of DNA, providing more insight into how DNA carries genetic information.

1950s/1960s

Understanding of the structure of genes, and how they work deepens.

1960s

Work on creating high yield varieties of major grains, especially wheat, corn, millet, and rice massively increase production of these crops in many countries - launching the Green Revolution. The creation of dwarf wheat increases yields by 70%.

1973

Cohen and Boyer successfully splice a gene from one organism and move it into another, launching the modern biotechnology era.

1978

Boyer’s lab created a synthetic version of the human insulin gene.

1982

The first transgenic plant is produced - a tobacco plant resistant to an antibiotic. The breakthrough paved the way for beneficial traits, such as insect resistance, to be transferred to a plant.

1985

Field trials for biotech plants that are resistant to insects, viruses and bacteria are held in the United States.

1990

Genetic modifications used to make chymosin, an enzyme used in making hard cheese.

Late 1980s/Early 1990s

China first to put GM crops on sale, namely VR tobacco and a tomato.

1994

Transgenic FlavrSavr® tomato is approved for sale in U.S. groceries. It was developed to have more flavor and to have a longer shelf-life than conventionally grown tomatoes.

1995-1996

GM soybeans and corn are approved for sale, and GM cotton is commercialized in the United States. GM crops become the most rapidly adopted technology in the history of agriculture.

1996

GM tomato paste approved in the UK, first GM herbicide tolerant soya beans and insect protected maize approved in the E.U. In total, farmers in six countries plant GM crops on 1.7 million hectares.

1999

German and Swiss scientists develop golden rice, fortified with betacarotene, which stimulates production of Vitamin A that can prevent some forms of blindness.

2000

The first entire plant genome is sequenced, Arabidopsis thaliana, which provides researchers with greater insight into the genes that control specific traits in many other agricultural plants.

2001

U.S. and Canadian scientists develop a transgenic tomato that thrives in salty conditions, a discovery with the potential to create tomatoes and other crops that can grow in marginal conditions.

2002

The National Center for Food and Agricultural Policy (NCFAP) study found that six GM crops planted in the United States - soybeans, corn, cotton, papaya, squash and canola- produced an additional 4 billion pounds of food and fiber on the same acreage, improved farm income by $1.5 billion and reduced pesticide use by 46 million pounds.

2003

Farmers in 18 countries plant GM crops on 67.7 million hectares.

2004

Farmers in 17 countries plant GM crops on 81.0 million hectares.

2005

Farmers in 21 countries plant GM crops on 90.0 million hectares.