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A new source of maize hybrid vigor
Date:6/28/2012

URBANA -- Steve Moose, an associate professor of maize functional genomics at the University of Illinois and his graduate student Wes Barber think they may have discovered a new source of heterosis, or hybrid vigor, in maize. They have been looking at small RNAs (sRNAs), a class of double-stranded RNA molecules that are 20 to 25 nucleotides in length.

"Hybrid vigor" refers to the increased vigor or general health, resistance to disease, and other superior qualities arising from the crossbreeding of genetically different plants. "We've always known that there's a genetic basis for this heterosis," said Moose. "Charles Darwin noticed it and commented that corn was particularly dramatic."

Scientists have been debating the sources of hybrid vigor since the early 1900s when Mendel's laws were rediscovered. Many of them disagreed with the model that prevailed from the 1920s to the 1950s, which linked heterosis to a single gene or to the interaction of several genes. "It seemed that the whole genome was involved," said Moose.

The discovery of DNA in 1953 eventually caused a paradigm shift in the way people looked at hybrid vigor but, Moose said, there was no unifying theory. Even as new genetic technologies were developed, the genes did not seem to explain everything.

"We thought that maybe it's the rest of the genome, the remaining 85 percent of the corn genome, that's important," said Moose.

sRNAs were originally found in 1998 in roundworms. Researchers studying virus resistance in plants then began to notice them and observed that the way that they function is very different from the functioning of protein-coding genes.

"Every time we have a breakthrough in our knowledge of genetics, people have looked to see if that breakthrough brings any insight into the mystery of the hybrid vigor," said Moose. "That's what we've done with the small RNAs."

"When you think about what small RNAs do, they participate i
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Contact: Susan Jongeneel
sjongene@illinois.edu
University of Illinois College of Agricultural, Consumer and Environmental Sciences
Source:Eurekalert

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