I don’t know about you but I don’t like it when people try to produce scientific studies based on false results. Especially when they are authored by scientists themselves. Agence France-Presse (AFP) reports that a new study published in the scientific journal PLOS ONE states that evidence has been uncovered revealing a number of toxicants in 13 different types of rat food from five continents. Researchers also detected residue of 262 pesticides, four heavy metals, and 22 genetically modified organisms.

Sounds ominous, doesn’t it? I mean with the potential of these additives potentially being the reason for spontaneous diseases in lab rats could mean that pesticides voluntarily or involuntarily placed in regular food (like GMOs) could poison us, right? Not exactly. Scientists who read the manuscript are already questioning its authenticity. One scientist has stated that pesticide levels in the food were very low and not toxic, while another said that the paper was speculative at best.

As it turns out, the person who headed the research is none other than Gilles-Eric Seralini of the University of Caen in Normandy. Seralini was able to get a study published alleging rats he and his team of analysts used for experiments for their research were fed Monsanto manufactured GMO corn for two years. Doing so, they claimed, resulted in cancerous tumors in rodents. The journal later retracted the manuscript in 2013 due to questions about the methodology used by scientists to reach their conclusions.

The Genetic Literacy Project did some looking into Serafini and he has ties to anti-GMO, organic and environmentalist groups in which they are funding his research as well. The article about him reveals who paid for his PLOS ONE manuscript:

Funding for this study and much of Séralini’s previous research comes directly from one of the US organic industry’s leading figures Anthony Rodale–chairman emeritus of Rodale’s Organic and founder of the Rodale Institute, a 501c3 that bills itself as “advocating for policies that support farmers, and educating consumers about how going organic is the healthiest option for people and the planet.” Rodale works closely with former Patrick Holden, former director of the UK Soil Association, which calls itself a “charity campaigning for planet-friendly organic practices” and “healthy, humane and sustainable food, farming and land use.”.

They two provide money via a U.S. NGO known as the Sustainable Food Alliance (SFA) to overseas organic and anti-GMO groups, including scientists such as Séralini, without having to make the grants public. About US$2 million appears to have gone from this NGO to research for “herbicide” and “toxic evaluations” between 2011-2013. Seralini’s research group acknowledged support from SFA in the PLOS ONE article. Séralini has previously received funding from Greenpeace, which financed a 2007 study that claimed that GM corn caused health problems in rats. The study was reviewed by the European Food Safety Authority, which concluded that all of the statistical anomalies cited by the study group were attributable to “normal biological variation.”

The interesting thing about this latest study by Seralini is that it targets pesticides rather than GMO’s. Pesticides can be inserted into GMO as a defense against insects but his last study singled out biotechnological food. None the less, this looks like a half-hearted attempt to try to demonize pesticides in hopes of potentially replicating the efforts of scientists connected with the IUCN environmentalist group who attempted to publish a study based on questionable findings in a peer review journal. This done in hopes of generating enough controversy for green groups to lobby the the European Union in order to permanently ban neonicotinoid pesticides. Fortunately, the plot was discovered before the study could be submitted.

The shrewdness of environmentalists is such that they will identify and support the research of scientists ideologically in line with them and then do what is necessary so the study gets published and its results replicated in other studies. With scientists already questioning the results of Seralini’s research hopefully another of his manuscripts will be retracted. However, it won’t stop environmentalists from trying again since they see failures as temporary set backs.