2019
Establishment of Waterhemp Tissue Culture Lines for Herbicide Resistance Research
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Contributor/Checkoff:
North Dakota Soybean Council
Category:
Sustainable Production
Keywords:
Field management Nutrient managementSoil healthTillageYield trials
Parent Project:
This is the first year of this project.
Lead Principal Investigator:
Michael Christoffers, North Dakota State University
Co-Principal Investigators:
Project Code:
QSSB
Contributing Organization (Checkoff):
North Dakota Soybean Council
$5,476
Institution Funded:
North Dakota State University
$5,476
Brief Project Summary:

The ability of scientists to make edits for herbicide resistance in weed genomes is becoming feasible. Gene editing could one day be introduced into weed populations to facilitate increased weed control, including the reversion of resistant weeds back to susceptibility. This project seeks to continue research using existing cultured waterhemp cells to produce cells capable of accepting the chemical components necessary for future gene editing research. These cells will also be tested to see if new cultures can be derived from single protoplast cells. Because current gene editing technology is imperfect, establishing cultures from single edited cells is necessary to produce genetically uniform and homogeneous cell cultures.

Key Benefactors:
farmers, scientists, breeders, pathologists

Information And Results
Project Deliverables

Final Project Results

Update:

View uploaded report Word file

Research Conducted:
Callus tissue cultures are clumps of cells grown under laboratory conditions. Callus cultures can be used for biological research such as the study of herbicide resistance. Four waterhemp seed samples were used to study and determine conditions for laboratory germination and establishment of callus cultures from seedling stems, and cultures were successfully produced from all four waterhemp seed samples. However, genetic testing was used to determine that one waterhemp seed sample also contained Powell amaranth, and this sample was not used in later experiments.

The remaining three waterhemp samples were used to establish and study the growth rate of additional callus cultures. Growth rates were highly variable, and no significant differences among cultures established from the different waterhemp seed samples were observed.

Why the research is important to ND soybean growers:
Most current herbicide-resistant weed research is limited to the study of resistant weeds that have already developed. New genetic technologies such as gene editing have potential to allow researchers to produce new resistant weeds for study in the laboratory, even before these variants are discovered in the field. Related technologies that use gene editing, such as gene drives, also hold promise for improving the control of herbicide-resistant weeds. Plants grown in tissue culture can remain as callus without capacity to propagate outside the laboratory, yet still allow researchers to investigate how new genetic technologies can be used to study and combat herbicide resistance.

Final findings of the research:
This project established conditions for successful generation of waterhemp callus tissue cultures. Several cultures for use in future research investigating herbicide resistance and emerging genetic technologies for weed control were also produced. The successful generation of calli from all tested samples indicates that establishment of callus cultures is likely not limited to only certain waterhemp seed sources.

Benefits/Recommendations to North Dakota soybean farmers and industry:
Waterhemp plant material in the form of callus tissue cultures are now available for further study investigating herbicide resistance. The conditions for establishment of additional waterhemp callus cultures in the future have also been established. These cultures will allow researchers to study new weed variants without risk of escape into North Dakota fields.

The United Soybean Research Retention policy will display final reports with the project once completed but working files will be purged after three years. And financial information after seven years. All pertinent information is in the final report or if you want more information, please contact the project lead at your state soybean organization or principal investigator listed on the project.