Professional Documents
Culture Documents
Like the glowing forests from the film Avatar, glow-in-the-dark plants are coming to your home.
Growing a glowing tree may take a while, but you can order glow-in-the-dark seeds for Arabidopsis,
a small flowering plant in the mustard family, right now.
According to the Kickstarter campaign that launched the company last year, Glowingplant.com
planned to start shipping the seeds next week. But the company says it has postponed the release
until the fall not due to production glitches or a failure to shine, but because it has raised more
money than it expected.
We asked our backers a few months ago whether they wanted us to ship on time or to use the rest of
the funds to improve the luminosity, said Anthony Evans, CEO of the synthetic biology startup that
has created the bioluminescent flora. The overwhelming advice was to improve.
To create a bioluminescent plant, scientists synthetically crossbred Arabidopsis and the glowing
marine bacteriumVibrio fischeri. Simply insertingthe bacteriumsDNA into the plant wouldnt work
the genes required modifications to work correctly in the plant so the team used the synthetic
approach.
First, they assembled the genes virtually, using software called a genetic compiler, which lets
scientists assemble DNA for new life forms on their computers. Then they sent the gene specs to
DNA-assembling companies, which built the actual DNA.
To import the freshly built genes into Arabidopsis, the team used a bacterium --Agrobacterium
tumefaciens. In nature,A. tumefaciensisa pathogen thatinserts its genes into plant cells, causing
tumorous growths. But its neutralized version can deliver the synthesized DNA into the host plant
without hurting it.
The team inserted the genes into the leaves and assessed how well the plant adjusted and how much
light it produced. Thanks to that extra funding, theyre now experimenting with a gamut of slightly
varied DNA sequences to achieve the best glow.
We plan to test about 1,500 sequences, Evans said.
modification wont give it any better weed power compared to, say, canola thats genetically modified
to resist herbicide.
Evans predicts the glowing plant will make the concept of synthetic biology exciting and relatable to
people. The reason people have such mistrust in biotechnology is that they dont understand it, he
said. We believe that we can change the resistance to biotechnology by creating something tangible,
something people can understand.
So will we live to see Pandoras forest-like trees that will replacestreet lamps,cut down on electricity
usage and CO2 emissions?
Its gonna take a lot of work to get to that level, Taylor says. Its biology, so things can pop up that we
dont fully understand. But he adds, We have some ideas how to get there.
http://www.foxnews.com/science/2014/03/27/glow-in-dark-plants-go-on-sale.html