Improvement of forage quality by downregulation of maize O-methyltransferase.(Genomics, Molecular Genetics & Biotechnology)

Crop Science, November, 2003 by Gallo-Meagher, Maria; Hall, Mary Beth; He, Xu; Smith, Rex L.

Lignin is a complex, aromatic polymer that limits plant cell wall degradation by ruminants and reduces the nutritional value of forages. Genetic engineering, using an antisense strategy, offers the potential to modulate enzymes in the lignin biosynthetic pathway as a way to reduce lignin, thereby improving forage quality and animal performance. We investigated the effectiveness of expressing antisense sorghum O-methyltransferase gene (omt) to downregulate maize OMT and reduce lignin. Constructs contained a sorghum omt coding region in the antisense orientation driven by the maize ubiquitin-1 (Ubi) promoter (with the first intron and exon) along with bar, that confers glufosinate herbicide resistance, driven by the CaMV 35S promoter. Twenty-eight [T.sub.0] plants regenerated from...

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