Phylos Bioscience sparks outrage after announcing their beginning their own breeding

[dank.frank]

I'd try to discuss this, but I've gotten enough spiteful, bitter, evil spirited - albeit, interesting - PM's for one week already.

However, I'll say, I was curious to know more about the "blueberry" line I've been growing for so long, given it's not entirely known what it is. I was planning on asking how to send in a safe sample, one that could not be "kept", before all this noise developed.

I suppose it is a moot point now.



dank.Frank

 

[Sam_Skunkman]

x

 

[shaggyballs]

Well thank you again Sam for taking the time to respond to some of my questions.
As you stated I am well over my head on this topic, no doubt.

I do suspect this is all readily doable with today's technology even if it may not have been done before.
Maybe if I took the time to spend the three years at a Tertiary education institution and obtain a degree in Molecular Genetics I could fully understand the potential of the DNA in question.

 

[CrushnYuba]

I'm not sure if i understand why all these people are attacking sam. Maybe i missed it. And I'm not sure what attacking his old seeds has to do with anything.
He encouraged people to send samples to a company that lied? What makes everyone think that he knew their true intentions the whole time. And what exactly is everyone afraid of.
Yes phylos did not make their true intentions clear. But i don't think that their sex and gene testing was for stealing anything. I would think it's just as a source of revenue before they get their real program going. It would have been way easier and cheaper to just have a few guys travel recreational States buying a gram of each variaty to get a dead dna sample instead of a huge charade if they just wanted to steal our strains via Jurassic park methods.

I'm personally not very afraid of my strains being Jurassic parked. I'm afraid of being obsolete

 

[Weird]

I was under the impression he encourage people to use them as if they had a seal of approval

 

[GatorGumbo]

To be honest your questions or whom evers questions show they have little understanding of the issues involved.
No one can take extracted DNA and regenerate a plant identical to the plant the DNA was removed from. We are far from that.
-SamS

You are mistaken on that point. As I linked the evidence of, it has been done. With tissue that is both deceased, preserved frozen, and was almost 32,000 years old. They created complete living specimens from the DNA and tissue. That was in 2012, the first time it was ever done was in 2007 (IIRC).

 

[Sam_Skunkman]

x

 

[Londinium]

Phylos Lied and disrespected the Whole Underground Canna Movement in one go! Really Slimey and Seedy they turned out to be. I really could slap Mowgli(If I was a violent man)after watching his Deluded,Rude "Sales Pitch". The Galaxy was backward and confusing at best IMHO. Mostly loads of the same PolyFuck cuts with different names cluttering up the place-I was hoping to see how Landraces ,IBL's,Hemps and old Hybrids related to each other as were many others I am sure, but It never worked very well for that and was too hard to use....what the hell is "Berry" anyway,someone please explain?
But...they Don't have anything that enables re-creation of your plants,unless you sent live seed or leaves/stems to them. They Really don't. I'm sure they will find a way to earn out of the Data though! They apparently seem to be working with a few breeders in the US.....whats the story there? Anyone?
So,Well done if you warned everyone not to trust them...and you were Right in the end...I was wrong....But I'm all out of Medal's Sorry
PS. Y'all don't have to trust Sam-or anyone else for that matter....But Sam is a Mod at IC-whether you like it or not and has been a member forever. This Threads about how un-trustworthy Phylos are-suddenly becoming breeders though Isn't it? Not the "Blame Sam for Everything(again)" thread...
There are plenty of opinions I disagree and agree with that IC members(and the canna community in general) have. But I don't feel the need to attack anyone that I Don't Actually Know,repeatedly - I just agree to disagree generally,after a while of dispute,or you just ruin it for everyone in the end.
Luck'n'Lite All
Except for Phylos who Really do Suck Massively!

 

[Sam_Skunkman]

Ax

 

[shaggyballs]

I was under the impression he encourage people to use them as if they had a seal of approval

I got that impression also.

Sam did you not encourage members to participate with your seal of approval.

 

[HazeOil]

...

 

[CrushnYuba]

I was under the impression he encourage people to use them as if they had a seal of approval

I caught that but is there evidence that he knew their intentions?
Maybe he did, i don't know. But i would think that unless sam is an employee, their intentions would not be revealed to him. It obviously was something that was kept quiet. Who knows. Maybe he does work for them.

Just because he encouraged people to send in samples doesn't mean anything. It's not the mafia. He didn't vouch for a snitch. He was excited about it. I was excited about it! We thought phylos was going to help us breed new amazing plants and uncover so much mystery. I also told people about phylos. I never met anyone from their company but still.

 

[Switcher56]

I ran out.... time for another bucket

 

[oldchuck]

Can you spare some, Switcher?

 

[Mr. Greengenes]

Where'd all this bashing of Sam come from? As far as I can tell, Sam is one of a handful of people in the world with the dedication and perseverance it takes to accomplish the decades of work necessary to breed plants. It seems to me that people, even smart ones, that haven't spent the last 30-40 years breeding cannabis seem to have a hard time understanding how important Sams work is. That very small handful of folks who have spent years breeding cannabis will have a much gentler and more respectful opinion of Sams work. That's what I think.

Uhh, any more news on the phylos issue?

 

[igrowone]

i'm not much into the big grow side of things, so might be undereducated on it
but did phylos get anything that couldn't be had by spending a few bucks at some dispensaries?

 

[CrushnYuba]

i'm not much into the big grow side of things, so might be undereducated on it
but did phylos get anything that couldn't be had by spending a few bucks at some dispensaries?

That's what i said a few posts back! They could have gone around buying grams and seeds for dna. Why the charade if their intentions were to Jurassic park our plants.

 

[igrowone]

That's what i said a few posts back! They could have gone around buying grams and seeds for dna. Why the charade if their intentions were to Jurassic park our plants.

the only motivation i could see is getting it for free would be better than paying
if you're really short on capital makes a little sense
though i guess some heirloom genetics could be hard to get

 

[Maggotbrain]

As you said:
"Can Phylos currently do this? I heartily doubt it. I doubt that it's actually easy at all for anyone to do at this time. That said, it's certainly on the horizon for cannabis sooner or later. There's no harm in pushing the science or being industrious, but breaking good faith agreements with your contributors to do so is not fair. People contributed their hard work and heirlooms with a stipulation, and they were betrayed because Phylos wants more. I can excuse some people for being weary as fuck of them now, people who don't care what Phylos will give to them because they don't want more, they just want to do their own thing and be content with knowledge."

It has not been done with Cannabis is clearly what I meant, maybe just maybe DNA companies need to be able to re-assemble a full Cannabis genome before they can attempt to map all the genes completely neither of which has been done 8 years after the first DNA sequencing of Cannabis. I agree that Phylos should of been completly open about future plans if they had them when they started, but it is too late for that now they have made guarantees and broken them no one trusts them, that is their problem they created on purpose or by default by not being more open to all their clients paid or free.

-SamS

As I understand they did not use a DNA sequence to regenerate the 32,000 year old plants. Every article I have read, even the wikipedia page that GatorGumbo cites, says they used "placental tissue" from seeds still in the fruit. They couldn't get the mature seeds to sprout because the squirrel that had collected to seeds rendered them unable to grow in it's burrow. Still a great thing to sprout 32,000 year old seeds but definitely not reconstituted from raw DNA.

I sent a sample to Phylos from seed collected 40 years ago. I hoped to find out where they came from. They asked for stem pieces that you had to wash in alcohol, not seeds. I was disappointed in the results. They weren't able to link it to any other cultivar and the they said the genetics were pretty much equal parts skunk, berry, landrace and hemp with a little cbd. I suspect that having a way to realistically link genetics is a long way off if it will ever be possible. Before the international commercial marijuana trade escalated in the 60's, there were thousands of small isolated farming families in places like Colombia, Mexico and Thailand that had their own cultivars that they had had refined over generations. And as we well know, farmers jealously guard their unique and special strains. There were probably hundreds of unique varieties that can be called Colombian that were wiped out due to prohibition. Much like Thai stick being a marketing gimmick to sell a number of different varieties over the years, the Colombian Gold of 1970 may have been completely different from what someone in 1980 called Colombian Gold. Now all we have is a handful of known Colombian cultivars. I admire the idea of genetically tracing how cannabis has evolved and seeing what varieties are linked by genetics, but I think that it will be very difficult get a complete picture given all that has been lost to history. I don't feel cheated by Phylos. They did what they said they would do for me. They tested my plant and gave me the results with the understanding that they would use the genetic information for their purposes. They just couldn't tell me what I want to know because my variety may be one that was lost years ago. I have many more cultivars I would like to know the origins of, but right now Phylos seems like a waste of money for me.

 

[CrushnYuba]

I mean.. A company that size with investment capital like that.. They can't afford to spend a few bucks a gram?
Are those few airlooms really that unique? Of its not being grown for consumption, it's probably available in seed for us amature breeders.