The Red Canary

The Story of the First Genetically Engineered Animal

Nonfiction, Science & Nature, Science, Biological Sciences, Genetics, Zoology, Nature, Animals
Cover of the book The Red Canary by Tim Birkhead, Bloomsbury Publishing
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Author: Tim Birkhead ISBN: 9781620406496
Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing Publication: July 18, 2014
Imprint: Bloomsbury USA Language: English
Author: Tim Birkhead
ISBN: 9781620406496
Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing
Publication: July 18, 2014
Imprint: Bloomsbury USA
Language: English

Winner of the Consul Cremer Prize, The Red Canary follows the compelling quest to turn the green canary red.

The creation of Dolly the sheep in the 1990s was for many people the start of a new era: the age of genetically modified animals. However, the idea was not new, for in the 1920s an amateur scientist, Hans Duncker, decided to genetically engineer a red canary.

Favored originally for their voice, by the middle of the nineteenth century canaries had become so popular that millions were exported from Europe to the United States to satisfy demand. During the 1870s, English canary breeders caused a scandal by feeding their birds red peppers to turn them orange. In the 1930s, Duncker's genetics efforts caught the attention of the Nazi regime who saw him as a champion of their eugenic policies, even though his ingenious experiments were not successful.

Nonetheless, Duncker's work paved the way thirty years later for an Englishman, Anthony Gill, and an American, Charles Bennett, to succeed, after recognizing that the red canary would need to be a product of both nature and nurture. In Tim Birkhead's masterful hands, this highly original narrative reveals how the obsession of bird keepers turned the wild canary from green to red, and in the process, heralded exciting but controversial developments in genetic manipulation.

View on Amazon View on AbeBooks View on Kobo View on B.Depository View on eBay View on Walmart

Winner of the Consul Cremer Prize, The Red Canary follows the compelling quest to turn the green canary red.

The creation of Dolly the sheep in the 1990s was for many people the start of a new era: the age of genetically modified animals. However, the idea was not new, for in the 1920s an amateur scientist, Hans Duncker, decided to genetically engineer a red canary.

Favored originally for their voice, by the middle of the nineteenth century canaries had become so popular that millions were exported from Europe to the United States to satisfy demand. During the 1870s, English canary breeders caused a scandal by feeding their birds red peppers to turn them orange. In the 1930s, Duncker's genetics efforts caught the attention of the Nazi regime who saw him as a champion of their eugenic policies, even though his ingenious experiments were not successful.

Nonetheless, Duncker's work paved the way thirty years later for an Englishman, Anthony Gill, and an American, Charles Bennett, to succeed, after recognizing that the red canary would need to be a product of both nature and nurture. In Tim Birkhead's masterful hands, this highly original narrative reveals how the obsession of bird keepers turned the wild canary from green to red, and in the process, heralded exciting but controversial developments in genetic manipulation.

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