why agrobacterium tumefaciens is called genetic engineer for plants ?
why agrobacterium tumefaciens is called genetic engineer for plants ?
Agrobacterium tumefaciens is a gram negative soil bacteria. It has the unique property of infecting the dicot plants and causing crown gall disease through transfer of its Ti plasmid into plant genome.Ti plasmid (tumour-inducing plasmid) carries gene for pathogenecity in T-DNA region. This property of Agrobacterium tumefaciens is utilised to engineer plant genome for required traits . This is why Agrobacterium tumefaciens is called genetic engineer for plants. Ti plasmid can be modified into a cloning vector by removing the genes responsible for pathogenicity and inserting desired genes such as disease resistance. Then this modified Agrobacterium tumefaciens is allowed to infect plant to introduce desired gene in the plant.
Agrobacterium tumefaciens is a gram negative soil bacteria. It has the unique property of infecting the dicot plants and causing crown gall disease through transfer of its Ti plasmid into plant genome.Ti plasmid (tumour-inducing plasmid) carries gene for pathogenecity in T-DNA region. This property of Agrobacterium tumefaciens is utilised to engineer plant genome for required traits . This is why Agrobacterium tumefaciens is called genetic engineer for plants. Ti plasmid can be modified into a cloning vector by removing the genes responsible for pathogenicity and inserting desired genes such as disease resistance. Then this modified Agrobacterium tumefaciens is allowed to infect plant to introduce desired gene in the plant.
