The idea that we might be affected by the ingestion of GMO dna is loose conjecture. All food contains dna, and the difference between regular dna and modified dna would not be detectable until it was incorporated into an organism and expressed. The likelihood of that happening is remote. Incorporating exogenous dna into a target is difficult, not an everyday occurrence.

> Horizontal gene transfer through natural transformation of members of the microbiota of the lower gastrointestinal tract (GIT) of mammals has not yet been described. Insufficient DNA sequence similarity for homologous recombination to occur has been identified as the major barrier to interspecies transfer of chromosomal DNA in bacteria. In this study we determined if regions of high DNA similarity between the genomes of the indigenous bacteria in the GIT of rats and feed introduced DNA could lead to homologous recombination and acquisition of antibiotic resistance genes.

> The analyses showed that extensive ingestion of DNA (100 μg plasmid) per day did not lead to increased proportions of kanamycin resistant bacteria, nor did it produce detectable transformants among the aerobic microbiota examined for 6 rats (detection limit < 1 transformant per 1,1 × 108 cultured bacteria). The key methodological challenges to HGT detection in animal feedings trials are identified and discussed. This study is consistent with other studies suggesting natural transformation is not detectable in the GIT of mammals.

Nordgård, L., Brusetti, L., Raddadi, N., Traavik, T., Averhoff, B., & Nielsen, K. M. (2012). An investigation of horizontal transfer of feed introduced DNA to the aerobic microbiota of the gastrointestinal tract of rats. BMC research notes, 5(1), 170.

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