Work

Synthetic glycolate metabolism pathways stimulate crop growth and productivity in the field

Year: 2019

Type: article

Abstract: Fixing photosynthetic inefficiencies In some of our most useful crops (such as rice and wheat), photosynthesis produces toxic by-products that reduce its efficiency. Photorespiration deals with these by-products, converting them into metabolically useful components, but at the cost of energy lost. South et al. constructed a metabolic pathway in transgenic tobacco plants that more efficiently recaptures the unproductive by-products of photosynthesis with less energy lost (see the Perspective by Eisenhut and Weber). In field trials, these transgenic tobacco plants were ∼40% more productive than wild-type tobacco plants. Science , this issue p. eaat9077 ; see also p. 32

Source: Science

DOI: 10.1126/science.aat9077

Authors: Paul F. South, Amanda P. Cavanagh, Helen W. Liu, Donald R. Ort

Institutions: Agricultural Research Service, United States Department of Agriculture, University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, Carl R. Woese Institute for Genomic Biology

Language: English

Topic: Photosynthetic Processes and Mechanisms

Subfield: Molecular Biology

Field: Biochemistry, Genetics and Molecular Biology

Domain: Life Sciences

SDG: Zero hunger

Open Access status: hybrid

Funders: Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, Department for International Development