Plantibodies
Block That Sperm! (The Atlantic Magazine, March, 2015)
Antibodies from plants: By inserting human genes into plants, scientists have been able to create disease-fighting proteins called “plantibodies,” which work just like the antibodies that the human immune system makes to ward off infections. Harvesting such proteins from plants—many plantibody researchers work with tobacco—is far cheaper than growing them in human cell cultures.(The world […]
Plantibodies Could Pave the Road to Wellness (Newsweek, Dec. 15, 2014)
One day, women everywhere may dissolve a postage-stamp sized piece of translucent film in their vaginas. It might look like a Listerine strip. It might be coated with compounds capable of making sperm wriggle in place, keeping them from inseminating a woman’s egg. It might also halt the HIV and herpes viruses found in semen […]