Highlights 2004-2005

• TBGRC research identifies two classes of genes that cause early flowering in the field. Suppression of a natural flowering repressor, and genes that cause a reduction in gibberellic acid signaling, caused flowering during the second growing season in the field. This may present new means for accelerating breeding, or imparting floral sterility to meet regulatory requirements.
  

• TBGRC staff and collaborators produced the first genome-scale gene chip for poplar and used it to identify thousands of genes that are differentially expressed during tree development. Based on the newly completed poplar genome sequence, the chip contains three probes for more than 56,000 putative genes, allowing nearly any gene to be monitored for the first time. It will enable many new genetic avenues for modification of economically important traits.
  

• Director Strauss was awarded an Aldo Leopold Fellowship. This prestigious award, intended for mid-career environmental scientists, supports two weeks of training in methods for communication with news media, policy makers, and the public. It will promote Strauss’ efforts in crop and forest biotechnology outreach. See http://www.leopoldleadership.org/
  

• The TBGRC Director and collaborators at other universities published articles on more effective regulation of GMO crops in the leading journal Nature Biotechnology. Based on scientific considerations and experience, these articles proposed more fine-grained regulatory classes, including exemptions from regulation, for some products. http://wwwdata.forestry.oregonstate.edu/tgbb/publications/
  

• TBGRC Director assumes leadership of University-wide biotechnology outreach program. This program, which began work in November 2004, seeks to provide accurate information to the public, educators, and decision makers on products of recombinant DNA-based agricultural and forest breeding. http://wwwdata.forestry.oregonstate.edu/orb/
  

• The TBGRC laboratory and several major collaborators were awarded a competitive grant of nearly $1.5 million over three years from the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) to study genes for modification of gibberellic acid (GA) signaling in poplar. These studies will continue our efforts to understand how GA genes can be used to modify tree form, stature, productivity, chemistry, and flowering.
  

• The U.S. DOE awarded nearly $1.5 million over three years for a collaborative project between the biotechnology company Ceres and the TBGRC laboratory. We will study how the company’s many novel genes affect growth, architecture, chemistry, and stress tolerance in transgenic poplars.
  

• The Consortium for Plant Biotechnology awarded the TBGRC laboratory $80,000 over two years to extend studies of activation tagging in poplar. The work will investigate methods for more efficient transformation needed for activation tagging in the sequenced Nisqually clone, and may support establishment of a large field trial.
  

• The Consortium for Plant Biotechnology and Arborgen awarded the TBGRC laboratory $70,632 over two years to study how RNAi applied to the GA2-oxidase gene family in poplar affects tree stature, flowering, and wood structure. This collaborative project with Prof. Victor Busov of Michigan Technological University could lead to new methods for increasing tree height, fiber length, and accelerating the onset of reproduction for faster breeding.