Biotech Potato Beats Late Blight

In a three-year GM research trial, scientists from The Sainsbury Laboratory (TSL) have successfully boosted the resistance of potatoes to late blight without the use of fungicides. Late blight, caused by the fungus Phytophthora infestans, remains as the most serious disease of potato to this day.

In the most recent field trials conducted in 2012, the potatoes experienced ideal conditions for late blight. The scientists did not inoculate any plants, but waited for races circulating in the UK to blow in. By early August, non-transgenic plants were 100% infected while all GM plants remained fully resistant until end of the experiment. The GM tubers also yielded more than the non-GM tubers. The introduced gene came from a South American wild relative of potato, and it triggers the plant's natural defense mechanisms by enabling it to recognize the pathogen.

"Breeding from wild relatives is laborious and slow and by the time a gene is successfully introduced into a cultivated variety, the late blight pathogen may already have evolved the ability to overcome it," said TSL Professor Jonathan Jones. He adds that GM technology, together with the insights into both the pathogen and its host, will help them tip the evolutionary balance in favor of potatoes and against late blight.

For more details about this research, read the Q&A with Professor Jones about the field trials of late blight resistant potatoes available at http://www.tsl.ac.uk/gmspuds.html.