This mRNA then travels to the special machinery inside the cell, called a ribosome, and there the message is translated. The translation of mRNA leads to the synthesis of a protein. Genetic engineering allows one to actually change the sequence of the DNA to allow a human gene, for example, to be expressed by bacterial enzymes and ribosomes. Then this human gene will be expressed in a bacterium, and a human protein can be made in this way. The bacterium usually used for introduction of foreign genes is a very special laboratory strain of Escherchia coli, or E coli.
Genetic engineering is wonderful and powerful.
But, there is great potential for misuse. Genetic engineering can be used to modernize existing biological weapons and to develop genetically altered pathogens, resistant to antibiotics and vaccines. Genetic engineering can produce new kind of weapons based on chemical substances produced naturally by the human body. They could damage the nervous system, the heart, and produce death. For example, peptides are strings of amino acids which perform various functions in our bodies.