Paul C. C. Fengof Washington State University, and colleagues, show that “Glyphosate inhibits rust diseases in glyphosate-resistant (GR) wheat and soybean.” Their work appears in the latest issue of the Proceedings in the National Academy of Sciences online.

Glyphosate is a herbicide used to control weeds in glyphosate-resistant crops. Researchers have found that it can also provide both preventive and curative activities against Puccinia striiformis f. sp. tritici and Puccinia triticina, which cause stripe and leaf rusts, respectively, in wheat. Moreover, glyphosate applied to GR crops also suppressed Asian soybean rust in GR soybeans.

Researchers believe that GR crops engineered with a glyphosate-insensitive, instead of glyphosate-deactivating gene, can allow for better rust control, since glyphosate is not destroyed and can be allowed to act on other invading pathogens.

PNAS subscribers can read the complete article at http://www.pnas.org/cgi/content/full/102/48/17290

Source: CropBiotech Update