Abstract:
Biotechnology is a set of tools that uses a whole or part of the organism, or substances from them to make or modify a product, improve plants, animal breeds or microbes, for specific uses. Modern biotechnology comprises genomics (molecular characterization of all species); transformation (introduction of single genes conferring potentially useful traits into plant, livestock, fish, and tree species; Molecular breeding (identification and evaluation of desirable traits in breeding programs with the use of marker assisted selection); and Vaccine technology (use of modern immunology to develop recombinant DNA vaccines for improving control of lethal diseases) (FAO, 2004) among other disciplines.