Dr Ho said trials showed that enzymes used to help control the spread of pollen from the test crops could be even more harmful than the crops themselves. The enzymes were used in the government trials near Edinburgh to make the rape pollen sterile and prevent cross-fertilisation with nearby fields. They all deny causing damage by uprooting plants during a demonstration against trials of GM oil seed rape at Boghall Farm, Midlothian, on March 28 last year. Dr Ho pinpointed two enzymes, Barnase and Recombinase, which she said had been shown to have a toxic effect on the kidneys of rats. The enzymes are used to make the pollen sterile and to prevent cross-pollination but this poison can be spread between species.
Bees pick up the pollen and from there it gets into the food chain.
These new experiments on rats have shown these enzymes damage animal cells. It messes up the genome and the consequences of this would be that it would kill, or render abnormal, plant or animal cells. The trial, before Sheriff Elizabeth Jarvie at Edinburgh Sheriff Court, continues.