Gene controlling flowering boosts energy production from sorghum

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http://agrilife.org/today/2011/09/27/sorghum-flowering-gene/

Gene controlling flowering boosts energy production from sorghum

Texas AgriLife Research discovery announced in National Academy of Science journal

September 27, 2011 By: Kathleen Phillips

COLLEGE STATION – A sorghum hybrid that does not flower and accumulates as much as three times the amount of stem and leaf matter may help the bioenergy industry, according to a study appearing today in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

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“For energy crops, we want to prevent plants from flowering so they accumulate as much biomass as possible for bioenergy/biofuels production,” said Dr. John Mullet, AgriLife Research biochemist.

Sorghum is a grass, native to Africa, that provides an indispensable food source for more than 300 million people in countries where food supplies are insecure, according to the paper’s authors. They noted that though primarily grown for its grain and forage, high biomass sorghum is also an excellent drought-tolerant energy crop for sustainable production of lignocellulosic-based biofuels.

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Mullet explained that breeders “can now use molecular markers to assist in the design of sorghum hybrids that flower at optimal times accelerating the process of breeding high-yielding grain, sweet and energy sorghum hybrids.”

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