Other than being an ingredient of the more recherche sorts of salad, herbal tea or wine, dandelions are pretty useless plants. Or, at least, they were. But one species, a Russian variety called Taraxacum kok-saghyz (TKS), may yet make the big time. It produces molecules of rubber in its sap and if two research programmes, onerngoing on in Germany and one in America, come to fruition, it could supplement-or even replace-the traditional rubber tree, Hevea brasiliensis.
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