Doing a research: developing a drought tolerant rice line

Rice is one of the most important cereal crops since it is staple food for more than half of population in the world and plant model for genetic and molecular studies. Drought is the most important limiting factor for crop production and it is becoming an increasingly severe problem in many regions of the world. That is one of the main problems of rice cultivation and production, especially during periods of low rainfall which affect the growth rate and the amount of yield. How do the scientists solve this problem? Absolutely, there are several approaches, but the one I would like to introduce is developing a drought tolerant rice line by genetic modification.

To develop this drought tolerant rice line, the first thing plant physiologists have to do is brainstorming the ideas about how to create it by reviewing the literature involving in drought responses and drought responsive genes.

After gathering the ideas, the next step is organizing them. The plant physiologists decide what gene should be modified so that plant can tolerate to the water stress and which method should be applied, set the hypothesis and design the experiment.

Then, they draft the experiment; isolate and modify the gene of interest and insert it into rice genome.

In reviewing step, the scientists test osmotic tolerance of the transformed rice. The rice is treated with drought stress. Then, its survival rate and other physiological, biochemical and molecular characteristics are monitored.

Next, they revise the drought resistant rice line. If the rice line shows any undesired trait, they will make some modification of a gene construction inserted into the plant genome, for example, changing or modifying the promoter of gene.

Finally, the result of the experiment is published and the drought tolerant rice line is submitted to Rice Department.