Weeding Out The Risk Of Super Pest Plants
Pastor Dale Morgan
Weeding Out The Risk Of Super Pest Plants*
by Staff Writers
Canberra, Australia (SPX) Mar 12, 2007
More accurate assessments of the environmental risks associated with the
release of super disease-resistant plants are now possible following
CSIRO's development of a new framework that identifies potential weed
pests. SIRO Plant Industry scientist, Dr Bob Godfree, says knowing the
risks is crucial to ensuring both natural and agricultural environments
are protected against the threat of plants which could become invasive.
"The new framework is a very exciting development," Dr Godfree says. "It
will allow us to capture information that has been difficult to obtain
previously and it has major positive implications for both the
agricultural and natural resource management industries."
He says disease is sometimes the major natural factor keeping certain
plants from eventually dominating a particular environment.
"If that limiting factor is removed, plants bred for agricultural
purposes can very quickly spread and reduce biological diversity in the
natural environments of an area. It is therefore really important that
such plants undergo trials to determine if they pose a threat."
The conceptual framework developed by Dr Godfree provides an accurate
picture of the risk presented by a particular plant to a particular
environment.
"Plants will respond differently given different environmental
conditions and we have found we can identify environments where
disease-resistant plants have a better chance of over-running local
plant populations."
The framework has been used to assess the 'weediness' of white clover
resistant to the disease Clover Yellow Vein Potyvirus in a variety of
environments and accurately predicted where the plants would most
successfully establish.
"From this information we are able to formulate strategies to manage the
release of plants and prevent them from becoming invasive pests in
natural environments," Dr Godfree says.
His findings were published recently in the respected science journal,
Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. The research was
supported by Dairy Australia.
Robert C. Godfree*,, Peter H. Thrall, and Andrew G. Young. Enemy release
after introduction of disease-resistant genotypes into plant-pathogen
systems. Published online before print February 13, 2007,
10.1073/pnas.0608356104 PNAS | February 20, 2007 | vol. 104 | no. 8 |
2756-2760
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