If you've been consuming red wine, believing it to be a safe source of antioxidants, I suspect you'll be concerned about this new report outlining some of the dubious "advances" in growing techniques that have yielded genetically modified (GM) grapes.

Although 25 varieties of GM grapes were produced in the United States between 1999-2005, the commercial release of many are expected soon. At the same time, researchers in Italy, Germany and Australia, other prime wine-making countries, are gearing up their own GM grapes.

In the meantime, scientists have found the DNA taken from a GM grape remained intact for more than a year, even after the process of wine fermentation, carrying with it all the risks of horizontal gene transfer and recombination, along with creating modified viruses and bacteria that create disease.

Moreover, one particular variety of GM grape -- altered to resist insects by producing hydrogen cyanide -- could be especially harmful to humans.

Some safer, non-GM sources of antioxidants:

• Grape pomace
  
• Blueberries
  
• Green tea
  
• Chocolate