New Grower AN on the future.....Cheap weed and CRISPR

Corgy

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Newsletter from Big Nike received today.... Brave New world..... :

Decades ago—like in the ’80s—weed wasn’t always easy to find.

Sure, if you grew it or had the right connections, you could enjoy year-round buds. But most smokers found themselves with an empty sack and a bowl full of resin a helluva lot more often than they wanted.

I’m not saying smokers rarely had weed. In fact, more often than not they were flush. However, they wanted a plump satchel all the time—365 days a year.

But that wasn’t a reality for most people.

Every so often they’d be forced to endure periods when product was scarce—like during the “dry” summers, when none of their connects could get their hands on anything.

And even if they could hunt down a bag, it was typically harsh, seedy, stemmy, low THC schwag weed. Ugh!

A lot of people even had to smoke this crap year round because it was all they could get. Good weed rarely crossed their paths. So it was shit weed most of the year, peppered with periods of desperately trying to get their hands on something…anything…no matter how bad it was.

In Colorado the price has dropped to $1400 to $1600 per pound.

This is for marijuana that’s better than what once sold for two to three times as much on the black market.

And profits have only begun to dwindle.

Big Marijuana will have the ability to streamline their operations, pay workers crap money to manage the grows, and purchase equipment and supplies for as little as possible because they can buy in bulk.

And since growing outdoors cuts the cost of production to a fraction of what it is indoors, commercial production will move to greenhouses, utilizing light deprivation and light supplementation to grow the product.
And, with CRISPR (clustered regularly interspaced short palindromic repeats) technology, Big Marijuana will be able to produce GMO marijuana, modified to thrive specifically where it’s grown outdoors.

The majority of production will move to Third World countries, where both land and labor are cheap. When the marijuana is grown, the cannabinoids and terpenes will be extracted and shipped to the United States in 55-gallon drums.

This means Big Marijuana will be able to hawk their product for much less than everybody else.
Within a few years, the average price for a pound of weed may sink to $500 or $600, which means growing marijuana will no longer be profitable for 99% of the growers in our community.

Growers will be left with little option but to sell their product to the big boys for a fraction of what they’re able to sell it for now. And they’ll be fighting over pennies. It’s already started. But just wait a few years. You ain’t seen nothing yet. It’s about to get bloody.

Because of all this, my advice to most—not all, but most—commercial growers is…

Right now—before the bubble bursts—grow as much weed as you can and make as much money as you can.

It’s better to walk away with something than nothing, right?

But, if you play your cards right, you could thrive in the weed industry for years to come.

To find out how, keep an eye on your email inbox for What Big Marijuana Doesn’t Want You to Know—And How to Kick Ass in the New Cannabis Economy which I’ll soon be sending you.

http://www.getsynbio.com/high-science-joint-projects-budding-synbio-cannabis-firms/


High Science? Joint venture budding between Synbio and Cannabis firms
In The News— 01 May 2014


Written by Ron Kanter

One of the United States’ largest cannabis agriculture firms is looking to synthetic biology as they rapidly expand throughout the American West. A subsidiary of real estate giant Home Treasure Finders Inc. (HMTF), HMTF Cannabis Holdings has publicly announced its expansive land accusations in states with reformed marijuana cultivation laws while planning to take advantage of a discipline at the pinnacle of agricultural sciences to better its product; synthetic biology.

HMTF Cannabis Holdings has announced a strategic partnership with Rosewind Cannabis Genetics Corporation for a variety of abilities that synbio specialists can afford the marijuana agriculture firm. In a recent press release from the subsidiary, the joint effort between HMTF Cannabis and the Rosewind Corporation will be “to research Cannabis genetics using the tools of synthetic biology with a goal to perfect and commercialize various high value technologies.” In other words, the partnership is being devised to ensure the easy development of more effective (potent) strains of marijuana and deliver these products in a cost effective manner to the smoking public.

The press release detailing the cooperative effort also discloses how the Rosewind Corporation will provide the most practiced services that synthetic biology offers to the agricultural industry. Stated in the announcement: “This [agreement] will benefit the tenants which occupy HMTF Cannabis Holdings Inc. grow facilities by enabling them to enforce proprietary ownership and reliably identify various strains of cannabis.” With the inclusion of advanced measures to eliminate the reproductive capacity of their seeds, the Synthetic Biologists at Rosewind will be able to ensure that HMTF Cannabis’ most valuable intellectual property remains a trade secret. One can only assume that as both the Synthetic Biology and commercial marijuana industries grow this will become a common and necessary practice to survive in a field as competitive as designer cannabis.

Of course, the news of a cannabis cultivator and synthetic biology genetics firm collaboration will be sure to put smiles on the faces of marijuana company executives as well as lazy college students and music festival goers everywhere. Although the recreational applications may prove profitable, one must consider the impact that this partnership will have on the medicinal side of the cannabis industry.

With researchers continuously discovering uses of marijuana as a potent remedy for dozens of needs of the ailing public the ability for scientists to isolate key traits of the mysterious plant’s pharmaceutical properties can prove extremely beneficial. Scientists honing in on cannabis based health solutions obtaining through Synthetic Biology the ability to avoid decreases in functionality as well as a more diverse range of administration routes the possibilities for the controversial drug’s medical applications grow to new bounds.

Perhaps, the most valuable genes in marijuana plants with regards to health and wellness can be extracted from the cannabis genome and inserted into entirely different substances contained in traditional medication mediums such as inhalers or pills or into radically different platforms such as fruits or vegetables.

The union of synthetic biology and marijuana agriculture will be sure to benefit all parties partial to one of America’s most vital cash-crops, from the producers to the recreational users and ideally those for whom it is medically necessary. With the increases in IP security and quality as well as the potential for increased medical applications inspired by HMTF Cannabis Holdings and Rosewind Cannabis Genetics Corporation strategic partnership, it is certain that this collaboration will at no time soon go up in smoke.


https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/CRISPR..... Excerpts....


Diagram of the CRISPR prokaryotic antiviral defense mechanism.[1]
Clustered regularly interspaced short palindromic repeats (CRISPR, pronounced crisper[2]) are segments of prokaryotic DNA containing short, repetitive base sequences. Each repetition is followed by short segments of spacer DNA from previous exposures to foreign DNA (e.g., a virus or plasmid).[3] Small clusters of cas (CRISPR-associated system) genes are located next to CRISPR sequences.

The CRISPR/Cas system is a prokaryotic immune system that confers resistance to foreign genetic elements such as those present within plasmids and phages[4][5][6] that provides a form of acquired immunity. RNA harboring the spacer sequence helps Cas proteins recognize and cut exogenous DNA. Other RNA-guided Cas proteins cut foreign RNA.[7] CRISPRs are found in approximately 40% of sequenced bacterial genomes and 90% of sequenced archaea.[8][note 1]

A simple version of the CRISPR/Cas system, CRISPR/Cas9, has been modified to edit genomes. By delivering the Cas9 nuclease complexed with a synthetic guide RNA (gRNA) into a cell, the cell's genome can be cut at a desired location, allowing existing genes to be removed and/or new ones added.[9][10][11] The Cas9-gRNA complex corresponds with the CAS III crRNA complex in the above diagram.

CRISPR/Cas genome editing techniques have many potential applications, including medicine and crop seed enhancement. The use of CRISPR/Cas9-gRNA complex for genome editing[12][13] was the AAAS's choice for breakthrough of the year in 2015.[14]Bioethical concerns have been raised about the prospect of using CRISPR for germline editing.[15]


Cascade (CRISPR-associated complex for antiviral defense)

Structure of crRNA-guided E. coli Cascade complex (Cas, blue) bound to single-stranded DNA (orange).
 
I've heard about crispr from "In a nutshell" channel on youtube. Fascinating stuff. But I'm pretty sure weed is not going to be a major priority for a few reasons:
1. The big pharma money will buy out every worthy researcher in this field.
2. Weed is still illegal on federal level and I'm pretty sure obtaining a license to modify cannabis seeds with intention to provide them to commercial growers requires some form of licence from government.
3. Trials. Shitload of time and money (which currently no single commercial grow op got as far as I believe) Modifying DNA might've gotten cheaper, but trials didn't.
4. Monsanto. Weed money is nothing compared to corn money. If something getting "Crispred" it's corn and other profitable legal plants.

Even if I'm totally wrong and the technology will get advanced fast and we'll be able to grow apple trees with 99% THC buds for apples, costs per pound of weed will not be my main concern. If we add transportation automation to collapse of farming economy, whole world will suffer from an economic depression no man has seen before. Add human genetic modifications to that, a drop of true AI and we're totally out of our league of understanding what the fuck to do.

My point is: we're gonna be totally fucked or (less likely) blessed long before a pound will cost $500.
 
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