Genes: it's all in the family

摘要

Mitchell, a laboratory-gencrated petunia, is showing University of Guelph researchers that plants don't need all their genes to thrive. Prof. Judy Strommer, Horticultural Science and Molecular Biology and Genetics, and molecular geneticist Elizabeth Foster-Atkinson have been studying petunia Mitchell for years. What makes Mitchell unique is that it doesn't express a gene that's responsible for detoxifying plants, yet it's just as healthy as plants that do express the gene.