NewsRelease

U.S. HOUSE APPROVES $200,000 FOR PLANT BIOTECHNOLOGY RESEARCH AT UNCG

GREENSBORO -- Plant biotechnology research under way at The University of North Carolina at Greensboro received a vote of confidence last week when the U.S. House of Representatives approved a bill containing $200,000 for the further development of so-called "sentinel" plants. The measure will be taken up by the Senate in the fall, as part of an agricultural appropriations bill.

If approved, scientists at UNCG will use the funds to further develop genetically-engineered plants that serve as an early detection system, sending visible signals to farmers when disease or insects threaten. Sentinel plants would allow growers to correct the problem before the disease was visible to the naked eye, thereby eliminating costly crop failures and reducing the use of ecologically damaging chemical pesticides.

Rep. Howard Coble, R-N.C., and Sen. John Edwards are both backing the funding for the three-year project. If approved, it would be a continuation of $198,000 UNCG received last year for the early warning detection program, and would represent the latest in a long list of recent grants from major funding agencies supportive of UNCG's plant biotechnology program. The research is led by Dr. Neal Stewart, head of the Plant Biotechnology Lab.

In 1994, Stewart became one of a handful of scientists who first introduced green fluorescent protein (GFP) from jellyfish into tobacco, which has since become a powerful tool for creating the so-called "sentinel" plants. When tagged to other genes to change plant's performance, the GFPs cause the plant to glow green when exposed to an ultra-violet light source. When fully developed, the technology should provide an easy, inexpensive and instantaneous means to track gene flow in plants, which previously would have been possible only by sampling tissue in a lab.

"The early detection system is probably 15 or 20 years away. We've just begun," Stewart said. "But in time, it could help farmers know when disease or insects problems are beginning."

Early on, Stewart received industry funding to apply the technology to monitor for potential ecological risks of crops genetically engineered for pest- or disease-resistance. Farmers and agri-business have an interest in knowing when such plants cross pollinate with weedy wild relatives, thus creating a "super weed." Canola, for instance, a common transgenic plant, has numerous wild relatives in the mustard family.

Since then, Stewart's work has captured the interest of numerous government agencies, who agree with him that there are many other humanitarian and scientific applications for sentinel plants, both in the laboratory and in the field. With backing from an impressive array of funding sources including NASA, the Department of Defense, EPA, National Science Foundation and others, Stewart and his research team are exploring the use of plants to monitor for bio-terrorist attacks on public water supplies, or the presence of landmines in former war zones. He's also investigating a space crop which could give off early signals of stress or disease to astronauts aboard a space station. Stewart also has a patent pending on a genetically engineered alfalfa to inoculate cattle against e. coli bacteria, and is developing UNCG's first spin-off business, Transgreenix, to market his research.

His work at UNCG will be the subject of a segment on "North Carolina Now," scheduled to air on UNC-TV at 7:30 p.m., Tuesday, July 10. ###
 

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