Desperate times call for desperate measures. During the Second World War, following Japan's lightning speed conquest of Asia, the Allied nations found their main sources of natural rubber suddenly out of bounds. Numerous at finding a viable alternative were then swiftly instigated, including the use of Taraxacum kok-saghyz (TKS), otherwise known as the Russian Dandelion. The Soviet Union had been exploring the possibilities of alternative rubber sources since the 1920s, and in 1931 a botanist identified TKS in the mountain plateaus of Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan. In 1942, under the United States' Emergency Rubber Project, TKS seeds were imported from Russia and grown in 28 different states. Experimental tyres produced from Russian Dandelion sourced rubber were manufactured and tested, and the results from the TKS rubber were said to be equal to Hevea (Hevea brasiliensis, the Brazilian rubber tree) and superior to guayule and synthetic GRS rubber.
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