科研人員報(bào)告說,，把玉米的基因轉(zhuǎn)移到其他類型的植物中可以增強(qiáng)它們用于生物燃料生產(chǎn)的潛力,。
George Chuck及其同事把玉米基因Corngrass1 (Cg1)轉(zhuǎn)移到了包括柳枝稷在內(nèi)的多種植物，柳枝稷常用于生產(chǎn)生物燃料,。
表達(dá)Cg1基因的植物的葉子的結(jié)構(gòu)和生物化學(xué)特性變得類似于幼態(tài)葉,，這讓它們更容易分解成用于生產(chǎn)生物燃料的單糖,，如葡萄糖。這些在植物比缺乏Cg1基因的植物長出了更多的枝條并且在莖中儲(chǔ)存了至多250%的淀粉,，因此增加了可以從中提取的葡萄糖的數(shù)量,。這些科研人員還能夠從這些淀粉中提取葡萄糖而不需要對(duì)植物組織進(jìn)行昂貴且耗費(fèi)能源的預(yù)處理。
Cg1 基因完全抑制了柳枝稷的開花,，這組作者提出這具有一些優(yōu)勢：本來可能用于制造花和種子的資源被用于制造額外的淀粉,，而且缺乏種子或花粉可以防止Cg1 基因意外地轉(zhuǎn)移到原產(chǎn)植物種群中。這組作者提出,，含有Cg1 的柳枝稷可能成為生物燃料產(chǎn)業(yè)的一種改良的原料,。這組作者說，Cg1基因還能夠轉(zhuǎn)移到其他物種中,，從而改善它們作為生物燃料作物的潛力,。（生物谷 Bioon.com）
doi:10.1073/pnas.1113971108
PMC:
PMID:
Overexpression of the maize Corngrass1 microRNA prevents flowering, improves digestibility, and increases starch content of switchgrass
George S. Chuck, Christian Tobias, Lan Sun, Florian Kraemer, Chenlin Li, Dean Dibble, Rohit Arora, Jennifer N. Bragg, John P. Vogel, Seema Singh, Blake A. Simmons, Markus Pauly, and Sarah Hake
Biofuels developed from biomass crops have the potential to supply a significant portion of our transportation fuel needs. To achieve this potential, however, it will be necessary to develop improved plant germplasm specifically tailored to serve as energy crops. Liquid transportation fuel can be created from the sugars locked inside plant cell walls. Unfortunately, these sugars are inherently resistant to hydrolytic release because they are contained in polysaccharides embedded in lignin. Overcoming this obstacle is a major objective toward developing sustainable bioenergy crop plants. The maize Corngrass1 (Cg1) gene encodes a microRNA that promotes juvenile cell wall identities and morphology. To test the hypothesis that juvenile biomass has superior qualities as a potential biofuel feedstock, the Cg1 gene was transferred into several other plants, including the bioenergy crop Panicum virgatum (switchgrass). Such plants were found to have up to 250% more starch, resulting in higher glucose release from saccharification assays with or without biomass pretreatment. In addition, a complete inhibition of flowering was observed in both greenhouse and field grown plants. These results point to the potential utility of this approach, both for the domestication of new biofuel crops, and for the limitation of transgene flow into native plant species.
