Benefits of genetically modified crops over the weeds

In nature, resistance to herbicides could confer advantages to plants.

Weedy rice is able to take on transgenes from genetically modified crops through cross-pollination. Credit: Xiao Yang

A technique of genetic modification widely used to produce crops that are herbicide-resistant has been found to provide advantages to a weedy form of rice, even in the absence of herbicide. These results suggest that such modifications may have a wide spectrum of effects that extend beyond farms, and possibly out into the wild.

Many kinds of plants have been genetically altered to be resistive to the glyphosate. Roundup was the first herbicide to be sold. Farmers can eliminate most the weeds that grow in their fields with glyphosate, without harming their crops due to this resistance.

Glyphosate hinders growth of plants by blocking an enzyme referred to as EPSP synthase. This enzyme is responsible for the production of certain amino acids and other molecules that make up about 35% of a plant's mass. http://www.nogyoya.com/fs/nogyoya/5602643 that is employed by Monsanto's Roundup Ready crops, which are based in St Louis (Missouri), typically involves inserting genes into the DNA of the crop to increase EPSP synthase's production. The genes are often derived from bacteria that has infected plants.

ラウンドアップ of EPSP synase allows for plants to resist the effects of glyphosate. Biotechnology labs have also tried to make EPSP-synthase more plant-based than bacteria by utilizing genes from plants. This was partially used to take advantage of an inconsistency found in US law that allows the approval of regulatory authorities for organisms that aren't derived from bacteria.

Few studies have tested whether transgenes such as those that confer resistance to glyphosate can -- once they get into weedy or wild relatives through cross-pollination -- make those plants more competitive in survival and reproduction. ラウンドアップ of the University of California, Riverside, stated that the conventional expectation was that any transgene could confer disadvantage in nature if there was no pressure to select. https://www.komeri.com/disp/CKmSfGoodsPageMain_001.jsp?GOODS_NO=1013169 is due to the fact that any additional machinery would lower the performance of the.

However, a new study conducted by Lu Baorong, an ecologist from Fudan University in Shanghai, disproves that belief and shows that a weedy version of the popular rice plant, Oryza sativa has an impressive fitness boost due to resistance to glyphosate, even when glyphosate has not been used.

ラウンドアップ and his colleagues modified the cultivars of rice to make more EPSP synthase. They also crossed the modified rice with a weedy related. Their research was published in NewPhytologist 1..

The researchers allowed offspring from cross-breeding to breed with each other, creating second-generation hybrids that are genetically identical to one another, except for the number of copies the gene encoding EPSP synase. As one would expect, the more copies produced higher levels of enzyme and more tryptophan than their unmodified counterparts.

The researchers also found that the transgenic hybrids had greater rates of photosynthesis, they grew larger flowers and shoots and produced 48-125percent more seeds per plant than non-transgenic hybridswithout the use of glyphosate.

Lu says that making weedy crops more competitive can increase the difficulties it causes to farmers around the world whose crops are infected by the insect.

Brian Ford-Lloyd, an UK plant geneticist and says, "If the EPSP synthase gene is introduced into wild rice species their genetic diversity will be at risk, which is crucial because the genotype that has transgene has a higher level of competition than the standard species." "This is one clear example of the highly plausible negative impacts of GM plants] on our surroundings."

The general public believes that genetically engineered crops with additional copies of microorganisms' genes are less risky than those containing only their own genes. Lu says that "our study does not prove that this is the case."

Researchers say this discovery requires reconsideration of the regulation for the use of genetically modified plants. Ellstrand thinks that biosafety laws could be relaxed as we benefit from a high degree of security from two decades of genetic engineering. "But the study still shows that novel products require careful analysis."