{"id":5950,"date":"2023-07-05T18:38:00","date_gmt":"2023-07-05T18:38:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/new.www.purdue.edu\/newsroom\/?p=5950"},"modified":"2024-07-17T18:43:50","modified_gmt":"2024-07-17T18:43:50","slug":"biotechnology-offers-holistic-approach-to-restoration-of-at-risk-forest-tree-species","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.purdue.edu\/newsroom\/2023\/Q3\/biotechnology-offers-holistic-approach-to-restoration-of-at-risk-forest-tree-species","title":{"rendered":"Biotechnology offers holistic approach to restoration of at-risk forest tree species"},"content":{"rendered":"

WEST LAFAYETTE, Ind. —<\/p> \n

Many at-risk forest tree species will probably need biotechnology along with traditional tree-breeding approaches to survive, according to insights published in the July issue of the journal New Forests.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

Purdue University\u2019s Douglass Jacobs<\/a> and Kasten Dumroese<\/a> of the U.S. Forest Service led a team of 19 co-authors, including scientists, land managers and regulators, in presenting their findings on biotechnological risk assessment and forest tree restoration. Their New Forests paper<\/a>, published in a special issue on threatened tree species<\/a>, presents key outcomes of a 2021 virtual international conference on the issues.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Among their conclusions: Society drives policy. If genetic engineering is the only way to save some species, its use will require public acceptance.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cBiotechnology is a diverse toolkit comprising different technologies that can be used to impart pest resistance \u2013 it could be bugs or pathogens \u2013 in our threatened forest trees,\u201d said Jacobs, the Fred M. van Eck Professor of Forest Biology. But many people mistakenly equate biotechnology with genetic engineering. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cTraditional tree breeding, whether you\u2019re breeding different species or different varieties within species, has been going on for thousands of years. And the regulations on planting trees that have been traditionally bred are wide open,\u201d he said. \u201cGenetic engineering, on the other hand, is highly regulated, but all biotechnology is certainly not genetic engineering.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"
Douglass Jacobs, the Fred M. van Eck Professor of Forest Biology at Purdue University, inspects a stand of butternut at the John S. Wright Forestry Center. (Purdue Agricultural Communications photo\/Tom Campbell)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Scientists often use genomics, for example, which involves working with the complete set of an organism\u2019s genetic material, to learn more about what causes disease. Genomics also can help identify the genes responsible for useful traits such as pest resistance.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Blight began afflicting the American chestnut in the 1900s, killing billions of trees. Despite being the target of decades-long tree-breeding efforts, the chestnut\u2019s prospects remain in doubt. The list of at-risk species also includes ash, butternut, and bristlecone pine among other members of the five-needle white pine family.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI feel a sense of urgency. We can\u2019t take a hundred years like we\u2019ve taken with chestnut to turn the page,\u201d said Dumroese, a research plant physiologist at the Forest Service\u2019s Rocky Mountain Research Station in Idaho.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThe species are becoming ecologically extinct,\u201d Dumroese said. \u201cThey\u2019re not able to provide their historic level of ecosystem function because often they don\u2019t grow to maturity. And that\u2019s happening at a faster and faster pace. Look at how rapidly we\u2019ve lost ash trees from our forests and urban landscapes because of the introduced insect pest emerald ash borer.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The western white pine is an example of how the Forest Service has, starting in the 1960s, effectively used traditional tree breeding to cope with white pine blister rust. The white pine population remains below its pre-blister-rust levels, however, and may never become fully restored.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"
Kasten Dumroese, a research plant physiologist at the Forest Service\u2019s Rocky Mountain Research Station in Idaho, stands in a crop of western white pine seedlings. These seedlings, the result of traditional tree breeding for enhanced resistance to white pine blister rust, are growing at the University of Idaho\u2019s Pitkin Forest Nursery. (Photo by USDA Forest Service\/Anthony Vaudo)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

\u201cBut we see a lot more western white pine on the landscape and being planted on the landscape every year because of those efforts,\u201d Dumroese said. \u201cThat process only took a couple of decades where we come from a big problem to making improvements. We need that pace for all of the species that we\u2019re calling at risk.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Back in Indiana, the Hardwood Tree Improvement & Regeneration Center<\/a>, a joint effort between Purdue and the Forest Service, for years has maintained a breeding program for pest resistance. Almost all of the center\u2019s efforts to date have focused on traditional tree breeding and genomics.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThe chance to work with chestnut and help reintroduce it back to the landscape was a big reason I took the Purdue job in the first place back in December of 2001,\u201d Jacobs said. \u201cWatching species disappear from the landscape provides me personally with a lot of motivation to contribute whatever I can toward helping to save some of these at-risk species.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In the last 10 years, Jacobs has seen striking advancements in novel biotechnologies that use genomics and genetic engineering.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"
Among the at-risk native forest tree species in North America are the white ash (left), American chestnut (center) and butternut (right). (Photos provided by Douglass Jacobs)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

\u201cFor some species, traditional tree breeding doesn\u2019t appear to be a viable long-term option to get disease-resistant trees. In those cases, it\u2019s probably going to have to be genetic engineering if we want to save the species,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

That applies even to a species like the blight-afflicted American chestnut, the target of a breeding program for 50 years. \u201cIntroducing enough chestnut and ash trees to bring us back to the pre-disturbance level is likely not possible in anyone\u2019s lifetime, but you have to start somewhere,\u201d Dumroese noted.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The participants of the 2021 conference came to a consensus on the applicability of biotechnology toward reintroducing some threatened forest tree species. They came from academia, the Forest Service, and organizations such as the American Chestnut Foundation and the Nature Conservancy.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cSocietal perception and policy remain the weakest links,\u201d Jacobs said. \u201cThere\u2019s been this consistent one-way flow of information from scientists to the public with the idea of, \u2018Hey, we\u2019re scientists, trust us.\u2019 Or \u2018We\u2019re the government, trust us.\u2019 But you need a much more interactive dialogue to be successful in changing public opinion.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Support for the conference and related work was provided by the\u00a0U.S. Department of Agriculture<\/a>\u00a0Forest Service<\/a>\u00a0and\u00a0National Institute of Food and Agriculture<\/a>.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n

\n
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\n Writer:<\/strong>\u00a0Steve Koppes
Media contacts:<\/strong>\u00a0Maureen Manier,\u00a0mmanier@purdue.edu<\/a>; Lisa Bryant,\u00a0lisa.bryant@usda.gov<\/a>
Sources:<\/strong>\u00a0Douglass Jacobs,\u00a0djacobs@purdue.edu<\/a>; Kasten Dumroese,\u00a0kasten.dumroese@usda.gov<\/a>
Agricultural Communications:<\/strong>\u00a0765-494-8415;
Maureen Manier, Department Head,\u00a0mmanier@purdue.edu<\/a>
Agriculture News Page<\/a> <\/p>\n <\/div>\n <\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

WEST LAFAYETTE, Ind. — Many at-risk forest tree species will probably need biotechnology along with traditional tree-breeding approaches to survive, according to insights published in the July issue of the journal New Forests. Purdue University\u2019s Douglass Jacobs and Kasten Dumroese of the U.S. Forest<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":5954,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[],"department":[6],"source":[29],"purdue_today_topic":[66],"coauthors":[53],"class_list":["post-5950","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-research-excellence","department-agriculture","source-purdue-news","purdue_today_topic-research"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.purdue.edu\/newsroom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5950","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.purdue.edu\/newsroom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.purdue.edu\/newsroom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.purdue.edu\/newsroom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.purdue.edu\/newsroom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5950"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.purdue.edu\/newsroom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5950\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":5955,"href":"https:\/\/www.purdue.edu\/newsroom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5950\/revisions\/5955"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.purdue.edu\/newsroom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/5954"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.purdue.edu\/newsroom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5950"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.purdue.edu\/newsroom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5950"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.purdue.edu\/newsroom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5950"},{"taxonomy":"department","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.purdue.edu\/newsroom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/department?post=5950"},{"taxonomy":"source","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.purdue.edu\/newsroom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/source?post=5950"},{"taxonomy":"purdue_today_topic","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.purdue.edu\/newsroom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/purdue_today_topic?post=5950"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.purdue.edu\/newsroom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/coauthors?post=5950"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}