Innovations

Transferring resistance genes to wheat

Researchers at Washington State University have found a way to control the gene that controls the transfer of genes from other plants to wheat.  Dr. Kulvinder Gill says because wheat is a relatively new plant in the world, its natural resistance is limited.  However, there are more than 300 grasses related to wheat that do carry various resistances.

What Gill calls “the most famous wheat gene” controls the pairing of chromosomes in wheat and will not allow cross-breeding with other ancestors.  Gill and his researchers have found a way to temporarily “silence” the gene to allow for the introduction of chromosomes from related grasses.  They can then remove any unwanted genes from the chromosomes leaving the desired traits and then turn the control gene back on.

Gill stresses they are not genetically modifying the wheat, “because we are using natural processes to transfer genes and the genes are from wheat relatives not from bacteria or insects.  It has to be a wheat relative for this gene to function, that’s the beauty of it.”

Their first effort is to transfer resistance to stripe rust from goatgrass to wheat.  Gill hopes to complete testing within a year.

Gill talks about the process 5:18 mp3

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