近日，美国科研人员报告说，把玉米的基因转移到其他类型的植物中可以增强它们用于生物燃料生产的潜力。
George Chuck及其同事把玉米基因Corngrass1 (Cg1)转移到了包括柳枝稷在内的多种植物，柳枝稷常用于生产生物燃料。
表达Cg1基因的植物的叶子的结构和生物化学特性变得类似于幼态叶，这让它们更容易分解成用于生产生物燃料的单糖，如葡萄糖。这些植物比缺乏Cg1基因的植物长出了更多的枝条并且在茎中储存了至多250%的淀粉，因此增加了可以从中提取的葡萄糖的数量。这些科研人员还能够从这些淀粉中提取葡萄糖而不需要对植物组织进行昂贵且耗费能源的预处理。
Cg1基因完全抑制了柳枝稷的开花，这组作者提出，这具有一些优势：本来可能用于制造花和种子的资源被用于制造额外的淀粉，而且缺乏种子或花粉可以防止Cg1基因意外地转移到原产植物种群中。这组作者提出，含有Cg1的柳枝稷可能成为生物燃料产业的一种改良的原料。他们说，Cg1基因还能够转移到其他物种中，从而改善它们作为生物燃料作物的潜力。
相关英文原文摘要：
Overexpression of the maize Corngrass1 microRNA prevents flowering, improves digestibility, and increases starch content of switchgrass
Biofuels developed from biomass crops have the potential to supply a significant portion of our transportation fuel needs. To achieve this potential, however, it will be necessary to develop improved plant germplasm specifically tailored to serve as energy crops. Liquid transportation fuel can be created from the sugars locked inside plant cell walls. Unfortunately, these sugars are inherently resistant to hydrolytic release because they are contained in polysaccharides embedded in lignin. Overcoming this obstacle is a major objective toward developing sustainable bioenergy crop plants. The maize Corngrass1 (Cg1) gene encodes a microRNA that promotes juvenile cell wall identities and morphology. To test the hypothesis that juvenile biomass has superior qualities as a potential biofuel feedstock, the Cg1 gene was transferred into several other plants, including the bioenergy crop Panicum virgatum (switchgrass). Such plants were found to have up to 250% more starch, resulting in higher glucose release from saccharification assays with or without biomass pretreatment. In addition, a complete inhibition of flowering was observed in both greenhouse and field grown plants. These results point to the potential utility of this approach, both for the domestication of new biofuel crops, and for the limitation of transgene flow into native plant species.
英文原文链接：https://www.biodiscover.com/news/bioindustry/library/1430.html
