Engineering chloroplasts: an alternative site for foreign genes, proteins, reactions and products.
Plant genetic engineering via the nucleus is a mature technology that has been used very productively for research and commercial biotechnology. By contrast, the ability to introduce foreign genes at specific locations on a chloroplast's chromosome has been acquired relatively recently. Certain limitations of nuclear genome transformation methods might be overcome by the site-specific introduction of genes into plastid chromosomes. In addition, plastids, mitochondria and other subcellular organelles might provide more favorable environments than the nuclear-cytoplasmic compartment for certain biochemical reactions and for accumulating large amounts of some gene and enzyme products.
Bogorad
L
L
Department of Molecular and Cellular Biology, Harvard University, 16 Divinity Ave, Cambridge, MA 02138, USA. bogorad@biosun.harvard.edu
D002245:Carbon Dioxide / Q000378:metabolism; D002736:Chloroplasts / Q000235:genetics* / Q000378:metabolism; D005544:Forecasting; D005818:Genetic Engineering / Q000379:methods*; D018740:Genetic Heterogeneity; D005821:Genetic Techniques; D009584:Nitrogen / Q000378:metabolism; D009876:Operon; D030821:Plants, Genetically Modified; D018087:Plastids / Q000235:genetics; D011994:Recombinant Proteins / Q000235:genetics* / Q000378:metabolism
D011994:Recombinant Proteins; D002245:Carbon Dioxide; D009584:Nitrogen