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Gene Flow in Plants and Micro-organisms
Programme background
How genes move in the environment.
The Gene Flow programme investigated the biological events that control and influence how new genetic material is inserted into the genomes of plants and microorganisms, and the consequences of such gene flow.
It tackled the following topics.
- Ways to integrate DNA into genomes more precisely, so as better-understand how integrated DNA interacts with existing DNA. For example, how is the integrated DNA inherited? How does it affect the way existing genes operate? What implications, if any, might it have for food safety?
- Ways of comparing changes in how genes operate when new varieties are created through traditional selective breeding techniques and genetic modification.
- New ways of ensuring that an inserted gene operates only in the organisms it was originally introduced into. For example, developing ways of preventing the inserted gene working in other plants and microbes.
- The developmental biology of pollen and seed formation.
- Examining how much and how often DNA moves between different crop varieties and their relatives during evolution and domestication, including what makes plants competitive in natural habitats.
- Extrapolating what might happen at a larger scales from laboratory studies. For example, how do introduced traits behave in successive generations? What effect (if any) do organisms with these introduced traits have on other species they interact with (for example, their predators and parasites)?
- What gives microbial populations genetic variability, and how fast and how often the genetics of microbial populations vary, including populations in gastrointestinal tracts and soil. The research emphasized gene flow to organisms that are important to medicine/health and the environment.