Environment
Domesticated Trees May Save Forests
by Clifton Coles
Trees grown specifically for use as plywood or furniture may be the crop
of the future.
Domesticated trees--the forestry
equivalent of crops like corn and soybeans--could be bred and grown for specific
characteristics, reducing the need to log in wilderness areas, say researchers at Purdue
University.
Identifying gene function is the first step in eventually developing
trees with ideal characteristics, such as insect resistance, improved wood properties, or
delayed flower production. The task then is to produce multiple trees with those traits.
Richard Meilan, professor of molecular physiology at Purdue, and his
colleagues used two related techniques known as gene trapping and enhancer
trapping to identify genes. These techniques identify genes based on their activity
patterns.
Once a gene that controls a desired trait is identified, scientists can
manipulate the gene's activity, Meilan says. They can produce a tree that flowers at a
different time than other trees of the same species, for example. They could also transfer
genes such as those for insect resistance into trees that don't ordinarily have them.
The current goal is to identify genes responsible for root development.
Currently, managers rely on conventional breeding to produce trees--mating male and female
trees, sowing their seeds, and planting the seedlings. But there are no guarantees that
the next generation of trees will exhibit the desired traits.
"With houseplants, you can take a cutting, put it in water, and it
will root," says Meilan. "You can't do that with most trees. We'd like to find
the genes that cause root initiation so we can develop trees we could propagate just like
houseplants."
The next step will involve taking genes through the gene enhancer and
trapping methods, transferring these genes to trees that lack the desired trait, and
determining whether the trees acquire the trait.
Meilan sees tree domestication as a partial solution to myriad problems
that forestry faces, including human population growth, loss of agricultural land,
encroachment on wildlife areas, and increased consumption of natural resources.
Source: Purdue University News Service, West Lafayette, Indiana 47907.
Web site www.uns.purdue.edu.
