The State - News from Jan. 20, 1986

The Foundation on Economic Trends, a Washington organization that opposes genetic engineering, has filed a lawsuit in U.S. District Court in Washington to stop a test spraying of the world’s first genetically engineered bacteria into the atmosphere over California farmland. The suit alleges that the mutant bacteria, designed to inhibit formation of frost on crops, could endanger public health and the environment. The Environmental Protection Agency has granted a test permit for use of the bacteria, made by Advanced Genetic Sciences Inc. of Oakland and commercially known as Frostban. It was to have been sprayed on a strawberry patch near Castroville.