Transgenic plant, defined

The success of any of these approaches depends on having a sufficiently high level of cellulase in the transgenic plant to make hydrolysis effective. Research such as that reported here is required to define which option(s) might prove favorable under specific circumstances. 

The unexpected result of this work is that heat induced increases in the ipt mRNA (Figs. 2 and 3), but did not produce effective alterations in plant development. Preliminary analysis of cytokinin levels indicates that even without heat induction, the transgenic plants contain cytokinin levels 8-fold over that of control plants, while cytokinin levels in heat-induced plants is 60-170-fold over that found in control plants (Morgan, unpubl.). One explanation for these results is that the cytokinin levels after heat shock may be beyond the ability of the plant to respond. The supraoptimal cytokinin levels after hs may negate the developmental effects of cytokinins that were found at control temperatures. Our current work is focusing more closely on defining the optimal response times and processes. 

We are in the process of determining the fatty acid composition and acyl-ACP pools in these transgenic plants. The requirement for KAS III in plant fatty acid biosynthesis can also be investigated by using antisense construct in combination with inducible plant promoters. Information obtained from these transgenic plants will help define the influence of KAS III on regulation of fatty acid biosynthesis in plants. 

Other terms such as genetically modified plants, genetically engineered plants, transgenic plants and transformed plants are often used interchangeably with the term recombinant-DNA plant. For the purposes of this document, the term recombinant-DNA plant will be used specifically as defined in paragraph 4. 

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