Scientists Model Photosynthesis to Find Room for Improvement

University of Illinois scientists used a digital model to simulate how adding genes from cyanobacteria might improve photosynthesis inplants. Cyanobacteria, which are photosynthetic algae, contains small structures called carboxysomes that concentrate carbon dioxide in the area where photosynthesis occurs. The research team led by Prof. Stephen Long found  that adding a gene for bicarbonate transporter that carries the carbon dioxide across the carboxysome membrane leads to improvement in photosynthesis by 6%. The model also showed that when about 8 components of the carboxysome system is added to plant,s photosynthesis could be improved by up to 60 percent.

Modeling photosynthesis in crop plants has proven to be an efficient way to identify which genetic manipulations would be most fruitful. It prevents a lot of wasted time and money spent trying things in the laboratory that could just lead to failure.

Read more details athttp://news.illinois.edu/news/14/0303photosynthesisStephenLong_JustinMcGrath.html