xxxxx - 24-11-2006 at 14:56
i was wondering if it might be possible to take the nitrogen fixation gene from airplants and put this gene into some type of agricultural crop such
as wheat, corn or rice.
chemoleo - 24-11-2006 at 19:03
Of course it would.
But do realise that this is a whole enzymatic pathway, under subtle metabolic control, that makes this possible, it isn't a single gene!
Would that be your way making the use of nitrogen fertilisers superfluous?
Nice idea, but I am not sure we should release such a plant into earths biodiversity. Lateral gene transfer could wreak serious havoc to indigenous
plant populations, and as a result to the entire flaura and fauna of earth.
Morgan - 26-7-2013 at 05:43
Perhaps a way around the fixation problem.
"His major breakthrough came when he found a specific strain of nitrogen-fixing bacteria in sugar-cane which he discovered could intracellularly
colonise all major crop plants."
http://phys.org/news/2013-07-world-technology-enables-crops-...
Unspar - 5-8-2013 at 11:52
That stuff was damn cool, I'm excited to see how it pans out.
Honestly though, I'm of the mind that anything we could come up with won't be anywhere near as efficient as what goes on naturally. There's a reason
why horizontal gene transfer hasn't already put the genes into the wild population. With all the millions of years those bacteria have been living in
roots you'd expect if they could be transferred (and be more efficiently applied) they would have.
Besides, what's wrong with the system we have now? What would we gain by doing it? It's not like we're starving for nitrogen; that stuff gets pulled
out of the air and into fertilizer by the ton by industrial processes. Biosynthesis tends to be more expensive joule for joule for than chemical
ones, but also more delicate and complex.