Performance Story: Selection for NIF gene delivery into mitochondrial genomes
Dr. François Eudes, Lethbridge Research Centre, Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada,
This project gave rise to the development of technology that will find applications in wheat crop improvement. This one-year bridging project aimed at the development of better selection procedures for genetic engineering of triticale and wheat microspore mitochondria with the long-term objective of the introduction of the N2 biological fixation pathway into mitochondria of crops. The selection procedures were improved by modification of the cell and tissue culture protocols and by the construction of novel, better selectable marker genes for mitochondria transformation using short peptide nanocarrier mediated delivery. The first and most direct application of the developed technology will be in the generation of triticale and wheat plants with a novel trait of biological nitrogen fixation. This research into triticale/wheat that can fix its own N2 would enhance the sustainability of system management practices in agriculture by reducing the amount of N fertilizer that would be needed to apply, saving both money and the environment. N fertilization is the most significant variable input cost of wheat production. The farm savings over a single crop season would exceed the research and development cost. Other benefits of N2 fixing crops, such as an increase in the productivity fostering new value chains creations, e.g. bioenergy and biomaterial value chains, and reduced feed cost for hog and beef industries, are also highly valuable for farmers in the Canadian prairies agriculture.
This developed technology for stable transformation of the mitochondrial crop genomes will also be used to generate wheat varieties with other beneficial traits, such as improved nutritional characteristics, production of bioproducts, cytoplasmic male sterility, pest resistance, etc., which will advance the Canadian prairies agriculture. This technology development will find applications in Canadian agriculture as a tool for the generation of wheat crop varieties with novel or improved traits.