Agnet July 26/05
Weed
discovery brings calls for GM ban
Brazil GMO
soy sales start slowly; royalties cited
SA will not
be left behind: McEwen
Coalition of
groups takes aim at Sacramento, Calif., public TV show
Blackberry
fungus enters United States
Tomato
chlorosis virus, tomato - Philippines (Mindanao)
Going green?
Put fruit in your tank, says Cyprus
Weed, pest
plan 'could save millions'
Grape
growers pay to fight pest
System uses
polarized light pulses to reveal crop health
Ethylene-mediated
cross-talk between calcium-dependent protein kinase and MAPK signaling controls
stress responses in plants
how to subscribe
Weed
discovery brings calls for GM ban
July 26, 2005
The Guardian/BBC
Former UK environment minister Michael Meacher was cited as saying yesterday
that Britain cannot afford to take the risk of spreading genetically modified
genes to wild plants and should ban GM crops that have wild relatives in the
countryside, adding, "I remember being reassured on this issue when I was
minister. Now we discover that charlock, a distant relative of GM oil seed rape,
has acquired resistance to herbicide. It means we just cannot afford to take the
risk that GM crops will not cross-contaminate wild plants in unpre dictable and
unforeseeable ways. If weeds are able to tolerate broad spectrum herbicides as a
result of cross-pollination it means we get into uncharted territory."
Scientists however, were cited by the BBC as urging caution over a study which
may have found a so-called "superweed" growing at a site where GM
crops had been trialled.
The charlock, a relative of oilseed rape, failed to shrivel up when daubed with
the herbicide used to manage a biotech crop grown in the same field.
The creation of wild plants that pick up the traits of engineered crops has long
been feared by anti-GM groups.
But researchers said their work showed the chances of such transfer were slim.
What is more, they argued, the study reinforced the view that the environmental
impact was negligible.
Dr Les Firbank, who led the consortium of scientists on the recent UK Farm-Scale
Evaluations (FSEs) of genetically modified plants, was quoted as saying,
"Herbicide-tolerant weeds tend to under-perform compared with wild type, so
unless all its competitors have been sprayed out with the same herbicide, it
won't thrive. There's lots of evidence for that."
The stories explain that the study was conducted by Centre for Ecology and
Hydrology (CEH) researchers, looking for any evidence that a genetic trait in an
oilseed rape, engineered to be resistant to a particular herbicide called
Liberty, would pass to near-relatives growing wild in the field or at the
margin.
The CEH team collected more than 95,000 seeds of wild relatives in and around
the FSE trial sites and grew them up in greenhouses. These plants were then
sprayed with Liberty (a glufosinate ammonium) to see if they had acquired
herbicide tolerance - through their parents being pollinated by the GM rape.
The scientists found just two plants, of Brassica rapa or turnip rape, that
showed resistance to the treatment; a rate of 0.000021.
But Brassica rapa is a very close relative of farmed oilseed rape and the
discovery of some gene flow is not a huge surprise, say the scientists.
The CEH team also toured fields, daubing Liberty on the tissues of weeds and
looking for the expected signs of die-back.
The researchers found just one weed - what they believe was a charlock ( Sinapis
Arvensis ) - which showed no reaction to the application.
DNA analysis on a leaf sample confirmed the gene trait from the engineered
oilseed rape was present, but when the researchers returned the following year
to the same field they could find no herbicide tolerance in seedlings of the
charlocks growing there.
Meacher was further cited as saying he had been to Canada to see the plight of
farmers who had encountered superweeds and that they had been forced to spray
them with heavy duty chemicals, adding, "In a small island like Britain
where we have many comparatively small fields and many related species of
plants, it is unrealistic to think we could have adequate separation distances
between GM crops and conventional crops or their wild relatives."
Brian Johnson, an ecological geneticist, head of the biotechnology group at
English Nature, was cited as empathizing yesterday that the charlock was not a
superweed and did not appear to be fertile, but it was possible the GM genes
could be carried to other plants in the pollen.
Brazil
GMO soy sales start slowly; royalties cited
July 26, 2005
Reuters
Roberto Samora
SAO PAULO - Industry sources were cited as saying on Monday that sales of
genetically modified (GMO) soybean seeds for next harvest, which were legalized
earlier this year in Brazil, are very slow, and that farmers' financial
difficulties and royalties charged by U.S. biotech giant Monsanto Co. are seen
as the main reasons for the slowness.
Ivo Carraro, executive director of the Central Cooperative of Agricultural
Research (Coodetec, Brazil's biggest producer of GM seeds), was quoted as
saying, "The market isn't moving. GM sales are sluggish and things are
generally quiet because farmers don't have cash," and that Coodetec has
sold less than 10 percent of its seeds, compared with 90 percent at the same
time last year.
The story says that Coodetec, one of Monsanto's partners in Brazil, produced
around 2.5 million 40-kg bags of GM seeds for next year's harvest.
Brazil will have some 3 million bags of GM soybean seeds for the 2005/06
(Oct/Sept) crop, which would cover 2.2 million hectares, or a little less than
10 percent of the soybean planted area in 2004/05.
SA
will not be left behind: McEwen
July 26, 2005
Ezigrain Journalist
http://www.ezigrain.com.au/
South Australia’s Agriculture Minister Rory McEwen was cited as saying the
Waite cluster's research reputation is not at risk and that SA's "hasten
slowly" approach to genetically modified crops is a "very sound
response" adding, "Australia is not getting left behind. The last
thing we want to do is put at risk proven farming practices for the sake of
rushing.”
Mr McEwen was further cited as saying there is no commercial pressure to take
any GM crops to the market and scientific, social and ethical issues surrounding
GM had not been resolved and that other outstanding issues were liability and
responsibility for biotechnology data and its introduction into agriculture,
adding, "We must keep the leading edge with science but we must not let
present practices be put at risk. There's no point in producing anything if the
markets don't want it. Let's make sure the markets are ready."
Coalition
of groups takes aim at Sacramento, Calif., public TV show
July 26, 2005
The Sacramento Bee, Calif.
Jim Wasserman
Source: Knight Ridder/Tribune Business News
A 40-member coalition of food safety groups, environmentalists and anti-biotech
organizations is, according to this story, demanding that a Sacramento public
television station withdraw its national weekly TV series on American food
production scheduled to debut in September.
The groups claim that sponsorship of "America's Heartland" by
agricultural biotechnology giant Monsanto Co., the American Farm Bureau
Federation and other national farm organizations will present viewers
"biased" programming favoring genetically engineered crops and other
conventional farming methods.
The story explains that the campaign against KVIE and American Public Television
represents a new front in a global fight between groups favoring organic
agriculture and companies modifying crops by moving genes between different
plant species. At least one national group of food producers and restaurateurs
said it typifies attacks from groups funded "by a relative handful of
deep-pocketed philanthropies."
Blackberry
fungus enters United States
July 26, 2005
The Associated Press
Rukmini Callimachi
PORTLAND, Ore. -- A deadly fungus used to control the spread of unwanted
varieties of blackberries overseas has, according to this story, landed in the
United States, infecting the capital of America's blackberry industry.
Officials with the Oregon Department of Agriculture were cited as saying the
rust fungus was first spotted this spring on the southern Oregon Coast, and has
spread to seven counties.
The story adds that the fungus has been reported in virtually all of the fields
of the commercially grown evergreen blackberry, the No. 2 blackberry crop in
Oregon, accounting for roughly 9 percent of the state's $30 million blackberry
industry.
Tomato
chlorosis virus, tomato - Philippines (Mindanao)
July 25, 2005
A ProMED-mail post
http://www.promedmail.org
ProMED-mail is a program of the International Society for Infectious Diseases
http://www.isid.org
Sponsored in part by Elsevier, publisher of Principles and Practice of
Infectious Diseases Online, 6th edition
http://tinyurl.com/7sfzw
Date: 24 Jul 2005
From: ProMED-mail
Source: Minda News, Mindanao, 21 Jul 2005 [edited]
http://www.mindanews.com/2005/07/20nws-kamatis.html
Destructive virus threatens tomato industry
Mindanao's tomato industry is reportedly being threatened by the continuing
spread of a plant virus that has been destroying tomato farms in several parts
of the island, a government horticultural scientist said.
Dr. Agapito Cabalquinto, a horticulturist of the state-owned University of
Southern Mindanao, said tomato production in several parts of northern and
central Mindanao has declined over the last 2 years due to infection by Tomato
leaf curl virus (ToLCV). According to Cabalquinto, this is a big problem because
ToLCV is systemic in infected tomato plants and once virus symptoms appear,
there is no other choice but to destroy them.
Cabalquinto said the ToLCV infection, which reportedly first emerged in several
tomato farms in the country more than 2 years ago, is expressed mainly by
curling of tomato leaves. He said plants which were hit by the virus no longer
have the capacity to bear fruits. On average, this virus could wipe out at least
20 to 30 percent of tomato plants per hectare he said.
Diseased plants were recorded on tomato farms hit by ToLCV in Claveria town in
Misamis Oriental in Northern Mindanao. According to the Department of
Agriculture, Northern Mindanao is the 2nd major producer of tomato in the
country, accounting for 13.80 percent of the country's average annual production
of over 150 000 metric tons. The area also comprises 9.44 percent of the more
than 16 000 hectares of tomato farms in the country.
But Cabalquinto said some farmers based in the province, especially those from
Polomolok and Tampakan towns, have also complained about ToLCV.
A tomato producer from Tampakan said the tomatoes they planted recently using
certified seeds have showed signs of the virus. "This shows that the virus
has been spreading mainly through the seeds that had been infected," he
said.
Cabalquinto said there is ongoing research about measures to control spread
using ToLCV-resistant tomato cultivars. The Agricultural Biotechnology
Support Project II, an initiative of Cornell University in the United States,
has been developing a multiple virus-resistant tomato for the Philippines and
Indonesia.
The project aims to combine near-market transgenic technologies for Cucumber
mosaic cucomovirus with conventional resistance against ToLCV to produce
commercial tomato varieties with multiple virus resistance within 5 to 7 years.
According to Cabalquinto, the project seeks to assist Indonesian and Philippine
organizations in gaining regulatory approval, licensing the needed intellectual
property, testing the efficacy of resistance against local virus strains,
incorporating the transgenic resistance into local varieties, and combining that
with resistance to the other viruses to generate commercial
multiple-virus-resistant tomato seeds.
ToLCV-resistant lines of tomato against ToLCV have reportedly been developed and
initial efficacy trials of these resistant lines in Taiwan, Southern India, and
Thailand have showed promising results.
[Byline: Allen V. Esrabillo ]
[ToLCV is a chlosterovirus that is mostly restricted to greenhouse tomato
production. The virus is vectored by 4 whitefly species: the sweet potato,
silverleaf, cotton and greenhouse species. Under Florida conditions, disease
onset appears to occur during the short day-length period of late
December-February. No fruit abnormalities have been observed but fruit size and
number appear to be reduced by virus infection.
Disease management involves planting virus-free tomato transplants in a
whitefly-free production site. Measures to restrict whiteflies include use of
tight screens in greenhouse facilities to prevent entry of whiteflies from the
field; this can dramatically reduce virus incidence but will seriously limit
cooling capabilities, unless houses are structurally redesigned. Judicious
vector control using legally available insecticides will slow disease onset and
reduce disease severity. Although ToLCV can cause severe crop losses in fresh
market and glasshouse-produced tomatoes, damage is generally minor. It also
infects several other food crops monitored by ProMED-Plant such as lettuce (_Lactuca
sativa_) and potato (_Solanum tuberosum_).
Link:
http://edis.ifas.ufl.edu/PG059 - Mod.DH]
Going
green? Put fruit in your tank, says Cyprus
July 26, 2005
Reuters
Michele Kambas
ICOSIA - Commerce Ministry is, according to this story, poised to announce a
pilot project by the end of this year for the introduction of liquid biofuels,
based on Cyprus's abundance of fruits, grapes and potatoes, for motors in an
attempt to cut down on pollution-spewing fossil fuels.
Georgios Roditis from the Applied Energy Center of the Ministry of Commerce,
Industry and Tourism, was cited as saying the initial target is for one percent
of the island's annual fuel consumption on road transport to be from renewable
energy resources, adding, "Biofuels have been used in places like the
United States for years, but it is innovative for Cyprus, even Europe."
The island has an obligation to introduce renewable energy resources as a
European Union member. It already widely uses solar power from its advantage of
almost uninterrupted sunshine throughout the year, but most of its other energy
sources are fossil fuels.
Weed,
pest plan 'could save millions'
July 26, 2005
Sydney Morning Herald
http://www.smh.com.au/news/National/Weed-pest-plan-could-save-millions/2005/07/26/1122143839283.html
The Australian Biosecurity Group (ABG), convened by the premier national
invasive species research bodies, the Invasive Animals Cooperative Research
Centre and the Cooperative Research Centre for Australian Weed Management, and
WWF Australia, was cited as outlining a 10-point plan in a new report to stop
the spread of weeds and pests could prevent the devastation of native species
and save millions in eradication costs, and that failure to stop weeds and
pests, such as the cane toad, European carp, foxes and the water weed species
was already costing the nation $4.7 billion a year.
The story says that the ABG's plan calls for development of high-level federal,
state and territory government institutions that enable a national response to
the growing invasive species threat as well as a national education, training
and action program to enable more community involvement in early warning
surveillance and control.
Invasive Animals CRC chief executive Dr Tony Peacock was cited as saying the ABG
would present the plan to all governments to work towards options for a new
national invasive species system by October.
Grape
growers pay to fight pest
July 26, 2005
Knight-Ridder Tribune
Jim Wasserman, The Sacramento Bee, Calif.
The California Department of Food and Agriculture was cited as announcing Monday
that a majority of California's wine grape growers have voted to continue paying
assessments through March 2011 to find a cure or treatment for a deadly
grapevine pest.
The story explains that of more than 4,000 growers voting, 89 percent favored a
new round of assessments that have raised a total of $17.8 million for research
into Pierce's disease over the past four years.
This year, growers are being assessed $2 for each $1,000 in grapes sold for
crushing to pay for the research program. The assessment varies each year from
$1 to $3 per $1,000 of grapes sold.
System
uses polarized light pulses to reveal crop health
July 26, 2005
IFT Daily Newsletter
http://www.ift.org/cms/
By firing rapid pulses of polarized light at corn, spinach and other crops,
researchers have uncovered a picture of plant health that is invisible to the
naked eye. Using a portable light source and detector technology, the
researchers can differentiate minute differences in leaf colors - indicators of
over- or under-fertilization, crop-nutrient levels and perhaps even disease.
The researchers hope their tractor-mountable N-Checker (for
"nitrogen-checker") apparatus will help farmers determine in real time
how much fertilizer to apply. By preventing waste, the system could decrease the
cost of crop production and dramatically cut the nitrogen-laden runoff
responsible for algal blooms and other damage to wetlands and waterways.
Steve Finkelman, Paul Nordine and their colleagues at Containerless Research,
Inc. of Evanston, Ill., Louise Egerton-Warburton and partners at the Chicago
Botanic Garden, and graduate student Tim Smith of the University of Illinois,
Urbana-Champaign, will present their new technology July 19 at the InfoAg 2005
Conference in Springfield, Ill.
"With our technology, we are able to easily see what is hidden from
conventional instruments," says Finkelman. "The system eliminates
interference from light reflected at a leaf's surface and allows us to see light
re-emitting from within."
Depending on the plant, leaves reflect, transmit and absorb varying amounts of
light. Polarized light that enters a leaf's interior can lose its polarity and
be re-emitted as "depolarized" light. The depolarized light reveals
nitrogen content and other properties the proprietary sensors in the N-Checker
can detect.
Changes in nitrogen levels change the way light interacts with the molecules in
the leaf, characteristically affecting the spectrum of light that re-emits from
the plant. Chlorophyll molecules, in particular, contain nitrogen atoms that
play a critical role in photosynthesis.
The researchers have experimented with two versions of their apparatus. The
original version channels broad-spectrum light from a xenon flashlamp through a
series of calcite crystals to illuminate each corn, sugar beet, cotton or other
broad-leaf crop with a tiny, transient spot of polarized light. Moving from leaf
to leaf, that system can measure nitrogen levels in 60 plants per minute.
Instead of a broad-spectrum lamp as its source, the N-Checker uses two red-light
sources that cut down on sensor and polarizer costs and increase the system
speed. The red region of the electromagnetic spectrum is important because it
reveals not just total chlorophyll content, but also relative amounts of the
various types of chlorophyll molecules.
"Other devices use both red and infrared wavelengths," says Finkelman.
"Those devices tend to be imprecise because they measure bulk chlorophyll
content, which can result from a number of factors." By using two specific,
visible, red wavelengths, the N-Checker can differentiate among the several
types of chlorophyll molecules and therefore reveal nitrogen-dependent plant
health information.
The N-Checker can take 1000 measurements per second--at least every 10th of an
inch--while moving at roughly 5 miles an hour. At that speed, a farmer could
survey and fertilize tens of acres in a day, or hundreds of acres per day with a
multi-sensor system.
This research was supported by NSF Grant #DMI-0319826
SBIR Phase I: Polarization Sensing of Stress Levels in Vegetation
http://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward.do?AwardNumber=0319826
Ethylene-mediated
cross-talk between calcium-dependent protein kinase and MAPK signaling controls
stress responses in plants
July 26, 2005
Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences
Vol. 102, No. 30
Andrea A. Ludwig , Hiromasa Saitoh , Georg Felix ¶, Gerald Freymark , Otto
Miersch ||, Claus Wasternack ||, Thomas Boller ¶, Jonathan D. G. Jones and Tina
Romeis , The Sainsbury Laboratory, John Innes Centre, Colney Lane, Norwich NR4
7UH, United Kingdom; Department of Plant Microbe Interactions, Max Planck
Institute for Plant Breeding Research, Carl-von-Linné Weg 10, 50829 Cologne,
Germany; ¶Botanical Institute, University of Basel, Hebelstrasse 1, CH-4056
Basel, Switzerland; and ||Leibniz Institute of Plant Biochemistry, Weinberg 3,
06120 Halle, Germany
Edited by Frederick M. Ausubel, Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA
Plants are constantly exposed to environmental changes and need to integrate
multiple external stress cues. Calcium-dependent protein kinases (CDPKs) are
implicated as major primary Ca2+ sensors in plants. CDPK activation, like
activation of mitogen-activated protein kinases (MAPKs), is triggered by biotic
and abiotic stresses, although distinct stimulus-specific stress responses are
induced. To investigate whether CDPKs are part of an underlying mechanism to
guarantee response specificity, we identified CDPK-controlled signaling
pathways. A truncated form of Nicotiana tabacum CDPK2 lacking its regulatory
autoinhibitor and calcium-binding domains was ectopically expressed in Nicotiana
benthamiana. Infiltrated leaves responded to an abiotic stress stimulus with the
activation of biotic stress reactions. These responses included synthesis of
reactive oxygen species, defense gene induction, and SGT1-dependent cell death.
Furthermore, N-terminal CDPK2 signaling triggered enhanced levels of the
phytohormones jasmonic acid, 12-oxo-phytodienoic acid, and ethylene but not
salicylic acid. These responses, commonly only observed after challenge with a
strong biotic stimulus, were prevented when the CDPK's intrinsic autoinhibitory
peptide was coexpressed. Remarkably, elevated CDPK signaling compromised
stress-induced MAPK activation, and this inhibition required ethylene synthesis
and perception. These data indicate that CDPK and MAPK pathways do not function
independently and that a concerted activation of both pathways controls response
specificity to biotic and abiotic stress.
This paper was submitted directly (Track II) to the PNAS office.
Freely available online through the PNAS open access option.
Abbreviations: CDPK, calcium-dependent protein kinase; NtCDPK, Nicotiana tabacum
CDPK; MAPK, mitogen-activated protein kinase; SA, salicylic acid; SIPK,
SA-induced protein kinase; WIPK, wound-induced protein kinase; OPDA,
12-oxo-phytodienoic acid; JA, jasmonic acid; ACC,
1-aminocyclopropane-1-carboxylate; PR, pathogenesis-related; HR, hypersensitive
reaction; HA, hemagglutinin; AVG, aminoethoxyvinylglycine; ACS, ACC synthase; J,
junction domain; C, C-terminal calmodulin-like domain; K, protein kinase domain;
V, variable domain.
Present address: Centre of Molecular Plant Biology, Eberhard-Karls University of
Tübingen, Auf der Morgenstelle 5, 72076 Tübingen, Germany.
To whom correspondence should be sent at the present address: Department of
Plant Biochemistry, Institute for Biology, Free University of Berlin, Königin-Luise-Strasse
12-16, 14195 Berlin, Germany. E-mail: romeis@zedat.fu-berlin.de.
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