Some cut flowers and potted plants are better than others at fending off the aging process, known as senescence. To help tomorrow's blooms stay fresh longer, Agricultural Research Service (ARS) plant physiologist Cai-Zhong Jiang is investigating the gene-controlled mechanisms of plants' aging. Such probing may eventually reveal how to modify flowers' aging-linked genes, or the proteins that are products of those genes.
Jiang is with the ARS Crops Pathology and Genetics Research Unit at Davis, Calif.
One approach, known as "virus-induced gene silencing" or VIGS, is allowing Jiang and colleagues to determine the function of genes in aging plants. In the laboratory, the scientists work with a naturally occurring microbe known as the tobacco rattle virus, modifying it by inserting plant genes of interest into it. In any given experiment, some flowering plants will not be exposed to the virus, while others will be exposed to either the unmodified or the modified virus.
Exposure triggers the plants' natural defense mechanism, including attempts to quash, or silence, the virus. When that happens, the genes that were inserted into the modified virus are also silenced. By comparing all of the plants, the researchers may be able to determine the newly-silenced genes' functions.
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