What is the Agricultural Research Service (ARS) doing about plum pox?
ARS has an active research program to develop a better understanding of the virus and how mechanisms of resistance may work in trees. The primary goal of the research program is to produce PPV-resistant trees. Because developing a PPV-resistant plum tree is not a simple or quick project, ARS has not waited until plum pox has a major presence in the U.S. to begin research. Rather, ARS has taken the proactive step of developing a PPV-resistant tree and doing the testing required to allow genetically engineered trees to become available, before plum pox precipitates a crisis in this country. (Link: Researchers involved in developing and testing HoneySweet) How was the PPV-resistant plum developed? ARS researchers have developed a PPV-resistant tree through genetic engineering. The gene for the PPV coat protein was separated from the PPV and inserted into a piece of carrier DNA. This new piece of DNA was inserted into a bacterium Agrobacterium tumefaciens that was used to infect cells extr
