Team:Lethbridge/Description
Description
We have two main goals for our project that we would like to address at the same time. The first goal is to combat potato pathogens. in order to achieve this goal we will make the potato express AMPs that are effective against fusarium, a fungus causing dry rot in potatoes on the field and during storage. We want to express AMPs within the potato plant to provide biological control of Fusarium. We also want to engineer E. coli to produce the desired AMPs instead and apply them to the plants/tubers. The application of AMPs via E. coli would have a similar effect, but have the advantage that the potatoes are not GMOs. Having an effective detection mechanism would also help greatly with the topical application approach.
Our second goal is to enhance nutrition and do so proactively. To do this, expressing AMPs in foods that are regularly consumed would have beneficial health effects. Having potatoes with beneficial AMPs would serve to protect the population and enhance their health. Additionally, we want to address human health and the negative perception of GM food. We want to produce AMPs that also enhance the potato's nutritional value and health effects. AMPs useful against Fusarium may also have effects against human pathogens, making their ingestion beneficial. One example is the bovine AMP BMAP-18, which has antimicrobial effects against Trypanosoma, the cause of sleeping sickness. By creating GMOs with beneficial effects for consumers, we hope to alleviate the stigma of GM food and increase its public acceptance.
Another one of our goals is getting input from farmers and the agricultural community around Lethbridge on their perspective on GMOs. To achieve this goal, we plan on sending out a survey asking thoughts on GMOs and a second survey that does not contain words like GMO or genetically engineered. By doing the survey, we hope to get a better understanding of stigmas surrounding GMOs. In addition to this, we would like to see if the health benefits and decrease in crop loss that would result from our project would be supported. Conducting more interviews as well as information from our survey will help us with our project and determine its feasibility.
Design
The Problem
Fusarium graminearum is a fungal pathogen that can infect potatoes and their seeds, leading to dry rot and decreasing the shelf life of potatoes.The average shelf life of potatoes lasts up to 2-3 months. Potatoes that express antifungal antimicrobial peptides (AMPs) would be better protected against Fusarium graminearum infections. The potato also offers an affordable and easily distributable vessel for AMPs with pharmaceutical properties, particularly to developing nations where access to health care is limited. There is potential for taking a proactive approach in combating diseases by expressing AMPs that provide health benefits in edible potatoes. Some AMPs have already been successfully expressed in potatoes. This is particularly important as the goal of our project is to express AMPs in potatoes for a variety of purposes. For our project, we will be focusing on two main issues in relation to agriculture and human health. Firstly, Fusarium is commonly found in most of the commercially sold potato seeds, with its dry rot killing potato sprouts and tubers in crops worldwide. The expression of AMPs that are effective against Fusarium in potatoes would allow a biological control within the potato plant itself. A topical application of AMPs to combat against Fusarium, would allow a common effect without the addition of genetic modifications to the potatoes. An effective detection system would greatly improve the impact of a topical approach. In many cases, disease treatments are done retroactively. Instead of preventing a disease prior to it being an issue, the disease is only treated when it has already become a big problem. Often, in many places, especially in the developing countries, healthcare access is often limited and unfordable. By expressing AMPs that have known health benefits in food that is consumed regularly, a proactive approach can be taken. The chosen AMPs will help to increase immunity to potential health threats. Therefore, diseases are less likely to occur. This would also benefit healthcare systems, which would be less likely to be overwhelmed when outbreaks occur.
Fusarium dry rot (Rosemary Loria, Department of Plant Pathology, Cornell University)
Current solutions used in combatting dry rot (Wharton et al., 2007).
Seed treatments are primarily used to combat the dry rot infection with active ingredients such as fludioxinil. The table below from Wharton et al. 2007 summarizes a variety of different registered seed application products:
Lauria, R. (1993). VEGETABLE CROPS. Retrieved October 28, 2020, from http://vegetablemdonline.ppath.cornell.edu/factsheets/Potato_Fusarium.htm