Abstract
Cellulosic ethanol provides an alternative energy to avoid environmental issues. Microorganisms have been well engineered for the efficient production of cellulosic ethanol. In contrast, breeding of plants as the materials for cellulosic ethanol production has less attention. Since a great amount of rice straw is produced every year in the world, it could be a good idea if this agricultural waste was applied to the materials for the ethanol production.
We generated transgenic rice plants which overexpressed a cellulase gene and acquired an enhanced cellulase activity. The transgenic plants showed various physiological and morphological abnormalities, such as split of leaf blade, necrotic cell death and low fertility. Importantly, we detected an enhanced saccharification ability in the overexpressing plants. Thus, we successfully generated a rice plant with an enhanced saccharification ability suitable for cellulosic ethanol production. We have been studying effectiveness of an inducible promoter to avoid the growth defects caused by the overexpression of the cellulase.
