Why I’m Quitting GMO Research

I’m exhausted by the overwhelming negative responses the topic evokes in so many people. A few weeks ago, like thousands of other scientists around the globe have done before, I stood up in front of a public audience and “defended” my Ph.D. thesis to a jury of senior scientists. My time in GMO research creating virus-resistant plants has meant dealing with the overwhelming negative responses the topic evokes in so many people. These range from daily conversations halting into awkward silence when the subject of my work crops up, to hateful Twitter trolls, and even the occasional fear that public protesters might destroy our research. Little wonder then, that having finished my Ph.D., I’m part excited and part relieved to move to a new lab and work on more fundamental questions in plant biology: how plants are able to control the levels at which their genes are active. My first experience of the intensity of anti-GMO belief occurred during a public panel discussion about patenting crops and GMOs organized by my colleagues. The panel was interrupted by a protester shouting about how GM food was responsible for their American friends’ child’s autism. As the panelists tried to explain, there is no causal link between autism and GMOs (or vaccines for that matter), and GMOs have repeatedly been found to be perfectly safe for human consumption. But the protester readily dismissed these arguments in favor for what can only be described as a fervently held conspiracist belief. It really showed how futile researchers’ attempts at science communication can be.