New York, Dec 27: Rudolph the red-nosed reindeer might emerge from the Christmas eve tale into reality someday, thanks to genetic engineering and fluorescent proteins from coral reefs, scientists report.

It would take about 250,000 dollars for a 60 per cent chance of finding the genes in the reindeer, given two years of dedicated effort, marine molecular biologist Mikhail Matz of the Whitney Laboratory of the University of Miami in St. Augustine, Fla., told United Press International. From there you might take another 10 years to breed. Of course, there will be lots of problems with animal protection people.
Matz and colleagues discovered a red fluorescent protein while in Moscow in 1999 from sea corals collected from private aquaria. Experts think these glowing biochemicals, in their natural state, cultivate the proper light ambience for photosynthetic algae living inside the blind corals, which generate more than 90 percent of the energy balance of their hosts.
When asked the light-hearted question about using the protein to create reindeer with glowing noses, Matz said the easiest way to make a Rudolph would be to simply paint the nose. If you want to do it fancily, you could paint the nose with some virus that infects the genes in the nose with the protein.
Such viral paint is just a fancy way of painting, however, and will not be transmitted to offspring, Matz cautioned. To create herds of red-nosed reindeer, scientists would have to rewrite their genetic codes. Would-be Rudolph-makers would have to find genes specific to reindeer nose cells to keep the gene for the red glow confined there.


Bureau Report