Little Rock, Arkansas
May 7, 2009
Arkansas - home of thousands of
backyard gardens, farmer’s markets, and a summer festival that
pays annual homage to the tomato - also is home to a team of
scientists based at the University
of Arkansas at Little Rock (UALR) that is developing a
tomato plant hearty enough to grow in space and surviving
down-to-earth droughts and disease.
More than providing fresh produce for astronauts on extended
missions to Mars, the research has important implications for
developing crops resistant to drought and other stresses while
improving the nutritional value of food.
Dr. Mariya Khodakovskaya, assistant professor of applied
science, and Dr. Stephen Grace, associate professor of biology,
at UALR and researchers at Arkansas State University and
University of Central Arkansas are preparing to patent their new
and effective ways to increase production of antioxidants in
plants and make them more tolerant to stresses such as drought
and disease.
“We are working now on tomatoes, but we are identifying
mechanisms and genes that are responsible for other traits and
can be used for other crops more important in countries that
have droughts,” Khodakovskaya said. “It has implications for
earth agriculture as well as space agriculture, which is why the
project has been funded for three years by Arkansas Space Grant
Consortium.”
The scientists believe future investments will promote
collaborative partnerships between UALR and private and public
institutions throughout Arkansas that will make UALR more
competitive in attracting research dollars to further expand
undergraduate and graduate studies in biology, chemistry,
environmental sciences, and related disciplines.
A year when she was affiliated with North Carolina State
University, Khodakovskaya placed her experiment growing cherry
tomatoes aboard the International Space Station.
“It was the first transgenic tomato tested in space conditions,”
she said.
Her transgenic tomato plants show dramatic increases in drought
tolerance, vegetative biomass and fruit lycopene concentration.
Studies in Arkansas and worldwide have shown that antioxidants
such as lycopene are important in the prevention of cancer and
many other chronic diseases. These established tomato plants are
an excellent model for identification of novel means to enhance
production of lycopene and other antioxidants in plants.
Grace, who earned his Ph.D. at Duke University, has focused his
research on diverse aspects of plant biology, including
biochemical analysis of secondary metabolic pathways to
environmental signaling mechanisms and the physiology of stress
on plants.
He and Khodakovskaya’s cross-linked research projects are
supported by grants from the P3 Research Center of Arkansas NSF
EPSCoR Program - the Experimental Program to Stimulate
Competitive Research - and the Arkansas Space Grant Consortium.
Dr. Khodakovskaya will identify key genes and gene networks
involved in stress tolerance and activation of antioxidant
production in tomato plants. Her team will also create new
reproducible biological source of antioxidants by establishment
of highly productive tomato “hairy roots” cultures.
Dr. Grace works on the biochemistry of flavonoids, another
important group of plant phytochemicals that act as health
promoting antioxidants. Flavonoids have shown promise in
protection against coronary heart disease, neuron damage,
certain cancers, and other age-related diseases.
“For this reason, there is great interest in developing crops
with optimized levels and composition of these high value
natural products,” Grace said. “Our group studies the light
regulation of flavonoid synthesis in tomato in order to develop
strategies to increase flavonoid levels for improved nutritional
content.”
Other scientists working on the project are Dr. Nawab Ali,
research associate professor in UALR’s Graduate Institute of
Technology; Dr. Fabricio Medina-Bolivar of Arkansas State
University; and Dr. J.D. Swanson of the University of Central
Arkansas. Undergraduate and graduate students at each
institution are involved in research projects directed at
enhancing nutritional and pharmaceutical value of crops by
genetic approaches.
“As soon as we develop a new tomato with drought tolerance and
more antioxidants, we will test how it grows in space
conditions,” Khodakovskaya said. |
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