MODIFICATION OF LIGNIN SYNTHESIS IN PLANTS

摘要

The synthesis of lignin by plants is controlled by transformation of the pla nt genome with a recombinant gene construct which contains the gene specifying an enzyme critical to the synthesis of a lignin precursor, which gene may be in antisense orien- tation so that it is transcribed to mRNA having a sequence complementary to the equivalent mRNA transcribed from the endoge- nous gene thus leading to suppression of lignin synthesis. If the recombinan t gene has the lignin enzyme gene in normal, or "sense" orientation, increased production of the enzyme may occur when the insert is the full length DNA but suppression may occur if only a partial sequence is employed.