Australian scientists produce genetic modified rice

CANBERRA, Sept. 10 (Xinhua) -- A team of Australian scientists on Friday announced that they have genetically modified rice to improve its tolerance to salt, offering hope of increased global production.

And work is already underway to transfer the technology to wheat and barley, other staple foods for billions of people around the world.

The scientists from the Australian Centre for Plant Functional Genomics (ACPFG) at the University of Adelaide worked in collaboration with colleagues based in Cairo of Egypt, Copenhagen of Denmark and Melbourne of Australia.

They used a new technique to trap salt in the root of the rice plant, reducing the amount building up in the shoots and increasing its tolerance to salinity.

Research associate Darren Plett said the breakthrough offered the chance to increase global rice production, especially in areas where salinity was an issue.

"Rice is often grown on land that is prone to high levels of salinity," Dr Plett told Australian Associated Press on Friday.

"Lands that accumulate salt have lower crop yields, which can threaten food supply.

"This has made salinity tolerance an increasingly important factor in the efforts to secure global food production."

Dr Plett said the research team modified a gene to increase the number of salt-transporting proteins in specific cells in the roots of the rice plant.

The modification resulted in salt being trapped in the root, where it is less harmful to the plant and prevented it traveling to the shoot where it does the most damage.

"Our results provide a new approach for genetic modification to increase the tolerance of crops to the toxic sodium ion, which is a major environmental stress," Dr Plett said.

"Successful genetic engineering efforts using this technology should assist in global food production."

Results of the group's work have been published in the online peer-reviewed science journal PLoS ONE.

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