The GMO Tree You Never Heard About - Dr. Chris Dardick, USDA/ARS

Talking Biotech with Dr. Kevin Folta

We regularly discuss a small suite of commercial crops that have been genetically enhanced with transgenes. However, one additional genotype was transformed long ago, and approved for use in the USA, Canada and EU-- but nobody talks about it much. It is the plum resistant to plum pox virus (PPV), a devastating virus of stonefruits. While rare in the USA, it is endemic throughout the rest of the northern hempisphere, and certainly could become a problem. Dr. Chris Dardick of the USDA-ARS in Kearneysville, WV talks about the plum, its history and current application. The resistant plum was developed by the USDA-ARS in the 1990s, using a similar approach to the successful papaya ringspot virus resistant papaya. The work is a foundational success of biotechnolgy, and an available strategy in the event the virus ever emerges. .