Poster: Late and Moved Abstracts

Abs # 937: Agrobacterium-Mediated Transformation of Oryza sativa ssp. Japonica cv. Nipponabare Using a bas1 Construct to Produce Dwarf Rice

Presenter:	Neill, Alissa , anei2432@mail.uri.edu
Authors	Neill, Alissa  (A)   Budziszek, Michael  (A)   Longo, Chip  (A)   Duong, Huetran  (A)   Dyer, Megan  (A)   Lebeau, Bryan  (A)   MacKinnon,  Lindsay  (A)   Thompson,  Lindsay  (A)   West,  Jeff  (A)   Neff, Michael  (B)   Luo, Hong  (A)   Chandlee, Joel  (A)   Kausch, Albert  (A)
Affiliations:	(A): University of Rhode Island (B): Washington University

Rice has been estimated to feed half of the world’s population, despite decreased yields due to lodging. Although the Green Revolution offered an increase in yield by introducing dwarf plants through hybridization, the physiology of rice restricted it from such modifications. New genes, however, can be introduced into rice that will produce desired phenotypes such as drought and stress tolerance, insect and pest resistance, and a phenotype that will produce dwarf rice plants. Through Agrobacterium-mediated transformation using a mutated bas1 construct behind a ubiquitin rice promoter, shorter internodes and increased root mass result, resulting in dwarf rice plants. This method has been tested in Arabidopsis and tobacco and has proved to be successful. In this experiment, we have introduced the bas1 gene, as well as the selectable marker gene bar, on two separate Ti plasmids. The embryogenic rice callus was infected and putative transformants were molecularly analyzed by PCR, Southern Blots. The transformants will be screened to ensure that brassinosteroid function is competitively inhibited in the plant, creating a new rice variety that will confer dwarf traits with improved yields and drought tolerance. This project was the result of a two-semester project-based course offered at the University of Rhode Island in Modern Techniques of Plant Biotechnology.