Authors:

Tina Schroedel

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About Paper:

Climate change necessitates a change in the use of tools and practices used in agriculture. Achieving food security under environmental conditions, such as drought, and reducing carbon emissions are the main goals of today's agriculture. A larger root system in wheat could potentially help with both of these challenges. Previous efforts in the Mohammadi laboratory identified genomic regions responsible for large root systems in an Australian accession 'Penny' via QTL mapping technique (Shaltouki et al., 2024). Two candidate genes, COBRA and auxin-responsive protein (ARP), in this region were used for further studies. A genotype-independent tissue-culture free transformation method, recently developed in the laboratory (Nepal et al., 2025), was used to overexpress these two genes in the wheat genotype 'Apogee'. The purpose of the project is to analyze putatively transformed plants for the overexpression of COBRA and ARP. The T0 generation plants were planted and DNA was extracted from the plants in three groups: wild type (no genetic modification), ARP, and COBRA, a hygromycin PCR was performed, followed by gel electrophoresis to confirm transgene presence. The resulting positive T0 plants were advanced to the T1 generation. After PCR confirmation of T1 plants and harvesting seeds, the T2 generation is getting ready for planting. The T2 generation will be used for plant phenotype and gene expression testing and examining the potential role of overexpression of ARP and COBRA in enhanced root systems. Keywords: Food Security; Climate Change; Wheat; Gene Overexpression

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Purdue University / 2025

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Co-authors:

Tina Schroedel