05 May 2011IOWA STATE (US) - Placing a newly discovered gene into soybean plants increases the amount of protein in the soybean seeds by 30 to 60 percent.
The results were a pleasant surprise to the researchers as the function of the gene, which is found only in Arabidopsis plants, was previously unclear because its sequence is very dissimilar from all other plant genes. Arabidopsis is a small, flowering plant in the mustard family that is often used in scientific research.
“Most genes contain clues in their DNA sequence as to their biological function,” says Eve Wurtele, professor of genetics, development and cell biology at Iowa State University. “But this one has no sequence features that gave us any hint of what it’s doing.”
http://greenbio.checkbiotech.org/news/gene_pumps_protein_soybeans
