Current and Future Innovations in Soybean (Glycine max L. Merr.) Oil Composition

抄録

Biotechnology often is regarded strictly sa transgenic research. In practice, it involves a team effort among plant breeders, genomicists, and molecular geneticists. Genetic improvement of soybean (Glycine max) began over 5000 years ago when wild soybeans (Glycine soja) were introduced into China. These ancestors of cultivated soybean exhibit a wide range of genetic diversity for traits that range from seed size and color to genes that govern oil composition. However, the ’gene pool’ for US varieties comes from less than 12 of the 18000 types of Glycine max. Thus, the genetic base for modern soybeans is rather narrow. For example, wild soybeans contain desaturase genes (FAD3) are not present in domesticated soybean that sontribute to elevated polyunsaturates in Glycine max. How can we extract and utilize untapped genetic diversity in soybean or any other crop? The answer is through biotechnology. Soybean breeders have an arsenal of natural gene mutations (resessive alleles) that influence fatty acid composition. Modern genetic technology helps identify the gene, gene product and the exact nature of the mutation in each allele. Transgenic research provides ’proof of concept’ and also may be used to create genetic diversity for novel traits. Gene markers, maps and micro-array technology help to locate selected genes in segregating populations. These tools accelerate breeding progress and enable variety development in a socially acceptable manner. These concepts are applied to the development of agronomic soybeans with lower-palmitic acid, higher oleic acid and lower-linolenic acid concentration. In the near future, the means to create natural mutations that fine-fune regulation of metabolic enzyme activities for specific traits will be in hand. Such technical advances may lesson social concern for biotechnology, through more effective use of natural genetic diversity to achieve goals now thought possible only by application of transgenes in commercial food/feed products.