Purpose

To use defense peptides against a serious soybean disease, Phytophthora sojae, in Missouri, Illinois and Northcentral US The blight causes seedling and root rot that between 1989 and 1991, reduced Northcentral soybean production by millions of bushels and caused economic losses of more than $187 million (estimated).

Diesease resistant genes, bred into new soybean varieties, are effetive from 5 to 7 yrs. Then, as the diesease changes, new alternative forms of resistance are needed.

Objectives

To use recent advancements in combinatorial biochemistry, plant transformation technology, and molecular biology to allow more sophisticated screening for diverse phages of the disease and then construct delivery systems to deploy disruptive defense peptides within and around root systems.

Impact

1. Creation of value-added soybeans with a unique disease-resistance format.
2. Create a system for delivering disease defence peptides that are effective against other production-limiting pathogens (like soybean cyst nematode).
3. Protection of value-added soybean lines against pathogens that can limit production.
4. Reduction of production and environmental costs associated with protective seed treatments and replanting after crop failure from disease.