Avesthagen develops male sterile technology for hybrid seed
Published on Wed, Sep 19, 2007 at 11:59 | Source : Moneycontrol.com
Updated at Wed, Sep 19, 2007 at 12:39
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Avesthagen develops male sterile technology for hybrid seed
Avesthagen receives heads up on a patent for developing technology that will revolutionize the agriculture industry. Develops male sterile technology for hybrid seed development
Avestha Gengraine Technologies Pvt. Ltd. (Avesthagen), one of India's leading biotechnology companies based in Bangalore, today announced that the Australian Patent Office has granted a patent to the company on "A process for generating cytoplasmic male sterile line in rice and other crops by RNA editing'. This patent will revolutionize the agricultural industry and bring succor to the sector.
This invention promises to open up opportunities in developing hybrids in crops where conventional male sterility is not available or feasible. This technology would allow hybrid seed programs to be developed without narrowing the diversity of germplasm. Avesthagen assists farmers by creating innovative solutions that will benefit their production.
Avesthagen has provided a crucial breakthrough with this program for the agricultural industry, since it opens up many crops for hybrid seed production. Moreover, it can be transferred to any other crop within a short time span, as the technology is not crop specific.
Dr. Villoo Morawala Patell, Vice Chairman & Managing Director, Avesthagen said, "We are absolutely delighted to receive this news".
This patent follows close on the heels of the previous patent approval received by Avesthagen in South Africa and Australia entitled 'A process for generating genetically modified pearl millet through Agrobacterium and biolistic transformation' and various other Indian Patents. Over the years Avesthagen has made numerous inventions and now it has a significant portfolio of 137 patent applications of which 61 relate to Agri-Biotech domain.
Dr Patell further added that, "At Avesthagen, this patent positioning gives us substantial freedom to operate in the agricultural domain. We constantly aim to produce breakthrough solutions that are of benefit to our end users and this reiterates our commitment to research in the agri-biotech sector'.
In the words of Dr Patell, 'this was an idea in 1994 that I came up with, based on the knowledge and possibilities that emerged from my Ph.D. and I applied it to the needs of Indian agriculture for generating new male sterility lines. The project outline was first drawn up for ICRISAT for pigeonpea but was considered too out of the box. It was again expanded for rice for funding from IFCPAR (Indo-French Centre for the Promotion of Advanced Research) and finally got funded in 1998. This project was developed in collaboration with Prof. Jean-Michel Grienenberger, IBMP (Institute of Plant Molecular Biology, Strasbourg, France) and with the support of Prof. Udayakumar, University of Agriculture Sciences, Bangalore. The project, entitled "RNA Editing as a tool to generate male sterile lines in rice" was initially funded by IFCPAR for one year.. Avesthagen has taken it forward and has supported and developed the technology for the last eight years.
I am extremely grateful to collaborators and colleagues at IFCPAR, IBMP, and UAS for their initial support. Today, it is indeed gratifying to see the efforts finally having borne fruit".
Sourced From: LINOpinion - The Lintas Public Relations Division
