XVI International Botanical Congess

A milk protein, lactoferrin, may fulfill the requirements for developing disease-resistant crops by genetic engineering: effectiveness against a wide variety of infectious agents and safety allowing easy public acceptance. Lactoferrin is an 80-kDa iron-binding glycoprotein consisting of two homologous domains called N-lobe and C-lobe. In this study the genes for human lactoferrin (HLF) and its N-lobe (HLFN) were introduced into rice plants by Agrobacterium-mediated transformation and expressed constitutively under the control of the CaMV 35S promoter. The western blot analysis showed a band at 80 kDa for HLF-rice and at 45 kDa for HLFN-rice. The two transgenic plants grew normally and self-pollinated seeds were obtained. The work is in progress to assess the virus resistance of these transgenic rice plants.