Rick Green

U.S. Rep. Elizabeth Esty, D-5th District, joined 11 of her colleagues in Congress Tuesday to ask the National Institutes of Health to examine whether "home-brewed heroin" is now a threat because of recent "scientific breakthroughs."

According to Esty's office, Stanford University researchers recently announced the creation of a strain of yeast that can convert sugar into hydrocodone, an active ingredient in Vicodin.

In a letter to the NIH, Esty and the other members of Congress wrote that "we must not be caught unprepared for the possibility of a new homemade source of opiates. We urge the NIH and its partners to examine this technology and...