It's a facultative CAM plant. If this machinery is transfered to crop plants they can easily withstand salt and water stress.
Cam cycle is fitted to drought tolerance and uses photosynthesis in futile paths. This is paid off by slow growth and a complex regulation of carboxylases activation, vacuole carriers and malate PEPCO2ase insensitivity. Photosynthetic efficiency per leaf unit mass is low and multiple cassettes are involved in an hypotetical transfer but this topic is already under scrutiny, as in Dr Xiaohan Yang, a staff scientist in the Biosciences Division at Oak Ridge National Laboratory, which would be the right person to get involved, http://www.scientificamerican.com/article/does-agave-hold-the-secret-to-drought-resistant-farming/
For a general intro one can evaluate https://books.google.it/books?id=rFnoCAAAQBAJ&pg=PA22&lpg=PA22&dq=futile+cam+cycle&source=bl&ots=5qq7qk0_aR&sig=VfnIbgr4BJBcPz-MLpqlFenY1nY&hl=it&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwjzooujiIvMAhVF0RQKHWS1B5wQ6AEIMDAC#v=onepage&q=futile%20cam%20cycle&f=false
Cam cycle is fitted to drought tolerance and uses photosynthesis in futile paths. This is paid off by slow growth and a complex regulation of carboxylases activation, vacuole carriers and malate PEPCO2ase insensitivity. Photosynthetic efficiency per leaf unit mass is low and multiple cassettes are involved in an hypotetical transfer but this topic is already under scrutiny, as in Dr Xiaohan Yang, a staff scientist in the Biosciences Division at Oak Ridge National Laboratory, which would be the right person to get involved, http://www.scientificamerican.com/article/does-agave-hold-the-secret-to-drought-resistant-farming/
For a general intro one can evaluate https://books.google.it/books?id=rFnoCAAAQBAJ&pg=PA22&lpg=PA22&dq=futile+cam+cycle&source=bl&ots=5qq7qk0_aR&sig=VfnIbgr4BJBcPz-MLpqlFenY1nY&hl=it&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwjzooujiIvMAhVF0RQKHWS1B5wQ6AEIMDAC#v=onepage&q=futile%20cam%20cycle&f=false
Respected Guido bongi sir, thank you so much for your valuable answers.
Dear Dr Naido
This idea has been around for many years - see publications by Hans Bohnert.. It sounds logical and if you say it quickly not to difficult! But as professor Bongi says it involves a great deal, with many aspects of the mechanism not understood. These are complex SYSTEMS, with many interactions at all levels of organisation - genes through to complete plant. Mesembyanthemum is what it is because of evolutionary adaption to environment - which is itself complex. Given this poorly understood plant x environment interaction over time it is likely that achieving the goal of introducing an `alien' metabolic system into a current crop without really causing problems is going to take much time and effort. Effort is being put into introducing C4 metabolism into C3 crops to increase photosynthesis, decrease water use and hence increase water use efficiency and, importantly, yield. This effort is a world-wide one involving researchers in Australia, USA, UK etc with funding (partial?) from the Gates Foundation.
Simple ideas may not be quite so simple in practice!
Regards
David Lawlor
Respected David Lawlor sir, you are absolutely right. Everything is possible on paper bt when it comes to field implications it's hard to get those desired traits. Thank you sir
- Badges
- Science topic
- Similar topics
- Agricultural Science
- Agronomy
- Crop Science