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Scientists unravel the genetic coding of the pea
February 26, 2008The pea is one of many important crop species that is unsuited to the Agrobacterium-based genetic modification techniques that are commonly used to work with crops. Researchers, reporting in the open access journal Genome Biology have now discovered the first high-throughput forward and reverse genetics tool for the pea (Pisum sativum), could have major benefits for crop breeders around the world..
Researchers from the INRA Plant Genomics Research Unit at Evry, and the INRA Grain Legumes Research Unit at Bretenières, both in France, both in France developed a high-quality genetic reference collection of Pisum sativum mutants within the European Grain Legumes Integrated Project. Abdelhafid Bendahmane and colleagues used plants from an early-flowering garden pea cultivar, Caméor, to create a mutant population, which they then systematically phenotyped for use in both forward and reverse genetics studies.
The team set up a pea TILLING (Targeting Induced Local Lesions IN Genomes) platform with DNA samples from 4,704} plants. The TILLING technique overcomes the pea's natural unsuitability to genetic modification techniques, and provides a powerful tool for investigating the role of essential genes. This new tool has implications for both basic science and for crop improvement. TILLING is an alternative to Agrobacterium-based techniques, and uses EMS (ethane methyl sulfonate) mutagenesis coupled with a gene-specific detection of single-nucleotide mutations. This reverse genetic strategy can be applied to all types of organisms and can be automated for high-throughput approaches. Following this study, the researchers created a database called UTILLdb, which described each mutant plant at different developmental stages, (from seedling through to fruit maturation), and also incorporates digital images of the plants. UTILLdb contains phenotypic as well as sequence information on mutant genes, and can be searched for TILLING alleles of genes of interest, using the 'BLAST' tool, and for plant traits of interest, using keyword searches.
"By opening UTILLdb to the community, we hope to fulfil the expectations of both crop breeders and scientists who are using the pea as their model of study," said research coordinator Abdelhafid Bendahmane.
BioMed Central
"By opening UTILLdb to the community, we hope to fulfil the expectations of both crop breeders and scientists who are using the pea as their model of study," said research coordinator Abdelhafid Bendahmane.
BioMed Central
Genetic Modification Current Events and Genetic Modification News RSSConsumers choose locally grown and environmentally friendly apples
When asked to compare apples to apples, consumers said they would pay more for locally grown apples than genetically modified (GMO) apples.
Delft breakthrough in bioethanol production from agricultural waste
With the introduction of a single bacterial gene into yeast, researchers from Delft University of Technology in the Netherlands achieved three improvements in bioethanol production from agricultural waste material: 'More ethanol, less acetate and elimination of the major by-product glycerol' This week the invention was published in the scientific journal Applied and Environmental Microbiology.
Fate Therapeutics announces creation of small molecule platform for commercial-scale reprogramming
Fate Therapeutics, Inc. announced today the generation of human induced-pluripotent stem cells (iPSCs) using a combination of small molecules that significantly improves the speed and efficiency of reprogramming.
Stem cell success points to way to regenerate parathyroid glands
An early laboratory success is taking University of Michigan researchers a step closer to parathyroid gland transplants that could one day prevent a currently untreatable form of bone loss associated with thyroid surgery.
Anti-biotech groups obstruct forest biotechnology
The potential of forest biotechnology to help address significant social and environmental issues is being "strangled at birth" by the rigid opposition of some groups and regulations that effectively preclude even the testing of genetically modified trees, scientists argue in a new report.
Monash scientists debug superbug
An international team of scientists, led by Monash University researchers, has uncovered the workings of a superbug that kills elderly hospital patients worldwide - a discovery that has the potential to save lives and health care systems billions of dollars each year.
Researchers piggyback to safer reprogrammed stem cells
Austin Smith and his research team at the Centre for Stem Cell Research in Cambridge have just published in the journal Development (http://dev.biologists.org/) a new and safer way of generating pluripotent stem cells - the stem cells that can give rise to every tissue of the body.
Cell transplantation and diabetes: New sites, new devices
Early attempts at islet cell transplantation to treat diabetes date to the nineteenth century, decades before the discovery of insulin in the 1930s.
Modified plants may yield more biofuel
Plants, genetically modified to ease the breaking down of their woody material, could be the key to a cheaper and greener way of making ethanol, according to researchers who add that the approach could also help turn agricultural waste into food for livestock.
Researchers push nature beyond its limits to create higher-density biofuels
For the first time, researchers at the UCLA Henry Samueli School of Engineering and Applied Science have successfully pushed nature beyond its limits by genetically modifying Escherichia coli, a bacterium often associated with food poisoning, to produce unusually long-chain alcohols essential in the creation of biofuels.
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