James and the Giant Corn Genetics: Studying the Source Code of Nature

November 10, 2009

Genetically Engineered Crops: Soybean

Soybean field. Photo: Big Grey Mare, Flickr (click photo to view photostream)

Soybean field. Photo: Big Grey Mare, Flickr (click photo to view photostream)

Scientific Name: Glycine max

Genetically Engineered Traits: Herbicide Resistance

Details of Genetic Engineering:

The genetic engineering of soybeans is pretty similar to that of Canola. Roundup Ready soybeans (produced by Monsanto) have been on the market for some time. The soybeans, which allowed farmers to spray an herbicide that kills all the plants in the field besides the soybeans themselves, have been a huge hit with market shares >90%. The benefit here is that being able to use herbicide resistant soybeans has been linked to increased use of no-till farming.* Bayer CropScience recently received regulatory approval for LibertyLink soybeans, their own herbicide + resistance system. Having another system is good for two reasons:

  1. Competition brings down prices for farmers
  2. Being able to rotate between two different herbicides prolongs the usefulness of both. Even if weeds develop some resistance to glyphosate (the active ingredient Roundup Ready crops are resistant to) the weeds are killed next year when the farmer sprays Glufosinate (the active ingredient that Liberty Link crops are resistant to).

About Soybeans: (more…)

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