11/23/05 Apomixis, part two

A project that could revolutionize agriculture. I'm Bill Scott and more about apomixis on Today's Idaho Ag News. Gemini Life Sciences of Madison County has a two million-dollar National Institute of Standards and Technology grant to continue work through September 2007 on apomixis, a naturally occurring process where a plant produces a genetic clone of itself. Gemini president Ross Farmer says they're trying to apply this to sorghum. FARMER "Coming up with a sorghum plant that is essentially all the seed it produces is apomectic seed." Farmer says they're still a couple of years away from attaining that but there's a dual track that they're working on, the breeding process is one, and genetics is the other. FARMER "Apomixis will allow even in the breeding process the process time to be shorted up by about 60 percent." At Utah State University there's been extensive research looking for a gene that was believed to make a plant apomectic. FARMER "The important thing to understand is this isn't some new construct, some new science out of the lab. Its science understanding what nature is already doing." Farmer says they're getting help from researchers at Texas A&M and the Idaho National Lab. The bottom line says Farmer is that apomixis could dramatically increase crop yields and that could have a huge impact on agricultural products that could in turn help make this country less dependent on costly foreign oil. Today's Idaho Ag News Bill Scott