Agriculture Reference
In-Depth Information
variation at the grain fi lling stage thus, it indicates that changes
in weather/climate conditions especially temperature stress
infl uence rice formation and its quality as evident by isform
expression (Wei et al. 2009). Although several japonica and
some indica varieties of rice have already been transformed,
there is signifi cant scope for improvement in the technology
of transformation of economically important indica varieties.
Successful transformation of rice employing agrobacterium and
recent advances in direct gene transfer by biolistics, evidenced
by transfer of multiple genes, have removed some of the serious
impediments in the area of gene engineering. The transfer
of genes for nutritionally important biosynthetic pathway
has provided many opportunities for performing metabolic
engineering. Other useful genes for resistance against pests,
diseases and abiotic stresses have also been transferred to
rice. But the limited knowledge about important target genes
require rapid progress in the fi eld of functional genomics.
The transgenic rice system can be applied to isolate new
genes, promoters, and enhancers and their functions could be
unraveled. The combination of novel regulatory systems for
targeted expression and useful new genes should pave the way
for improvement of rice.
