Chicago ? In an unusual twist, trading cards that feature scientists instead of athletes were launched Monday at the BIO2006 trade show at McCormick Place.

“Collect ’em now and get an autograph,” said Jack Lavin, director of the Illinois Department of Commerce. “They’ll be worth thousands once they win a Nobel!”

The cards are just one clue to the true nature of biotechnology: it’s the intersection of serious science and unbridled marketing.

In a meeting where up to 20,000 people from around the world are gathering, it seems that everyone has a gimmick to call attention to their message.

Illinois and its card tricks were far from lonely in the BIO2006 marketers’ playground.

Early in the day chief executives from several biotech companies described how their firms use enzymes to turn corn and other plant products into plastics, fuel and fiber.

To illustrate their handiwork, after the executives stopped talking, music cranked up and models strutted back and forth on a runway wearing garments made from corn-based fiber. The models and their clothing were as attractive as anything staged at an upscale fashion show.

Deborah Eppstein, of Q Therapeutics in Salt Lake City, is entertained by Sprockit, a robot that chats with attendees at the Nebraska pavilion during the BIO 2006 international biotechnology conference, Monday, April 10, 2006, at McCormick Place in Chicago. About 18,000 people are scheduled to attend the biotech conference, which runs through Wednesday. It is the industry's largest gathering of researchers, corporations and investors.

But perhaps the most ambitious marketing ploy at McCormick Place is the live cornfield that’s been transplanted into the convention hall. Along with the corn, companies promoting biotech seed brought farmers from around the world who grow biotech crops.

Khosi Rebe, who grows biotech sweet corn as a farmer in South Africa and who is also assistant director of a regional department of agriculture.

Sitting next to a cornfield in a vast convention hall with thousands of people milling about, Rebe expressed some surprise at his situation.

He noted that delegates to the BIO trade show probably already appreciate the value of biotechnology. Ordinary consumers aren’t part of the event.

“There are a lot of people who don’t know much about this technology,” he said. “They could learn a lot if they were here.”