Non-GM 'Dual Resistant' Tomato Could Mean No More Pesticides

The result of many years of up-breeding a trait found in a wild Peruvian tomato find “brings us closer and closer to something that can be used commercially to essentially eliminate the need for pesticides in many growing regions”. -Martha Mutschler-Chu

Adapting a novel form of insect resistance discovered in a wild plant native to Peru, Mutschler-Chu, professor of plant breeding and genetics, first isolated the resistance. She found that it was mediated by droplets of sugar esters, called acylsugars, that are produced and exuded from hairs (trichomes) that cover the plants. The acylsugars don’t kill the insects, but deter them from feeding or laying eggs on the plants. The process does not require genetic modification and is completely safe.

After successfully transferring the resistance into new lines and breeding out undesirable traits, her team added a second layer of protection: one or both of two natural genes known to resist the so-called TOSPO viruses, which include tomato spotted wilt virus. -Seed Today

Note that since the trait was found in a tomato plant, it can be transferred into other tomatoes via deliberate breeding efforts and not be GMO. What's nice about this little story is that this tech is to be shared with seed producers, from the sound of it, perhaps any and all seed producers, to transfer the genes into existing tomato cultivars.

These very same trichrome hairs also give 'all' tomato plants carnivorous defensive capabilities, but I see nothing in the new story that indicates if it improves that design.

Botanists have discovered for the first time that the plants are carnivorous predators who kill insects in order to "self-fertilise" themselves. New research shows that they capture and kill small insects with sticky hairs on their stems and then absorb nutrients through their roots when the animals decay and fall to the ground. It is thought that the technique was developed in the wild in order to supplement the nutrients in poor quality soil – but even domestic varieties grown in your vegetable patch retain the ability. -The Telegraph

It does seem to me theres a real decent chance that enhancing the chemical traits of the trichromes, might also enhance the predatory hairs as a side effect. If so that would also mean less fertilizer required.

reply to post by IgnoranceIsntBlisss


did you know that it was protocol in many places to plant cannabis fields around edible plant fields?
thc is a repellant and protects the fields from insects... and the seeds can be boiled to a highly nutritious porridge, so its also edible,, it has saved countless of lives from starvation in india and africa for example...

but this dual resistance sounds very interesting too...

hope it doesnt lead to KILLER TOMATOES

reply to post by solve


That's an aspect of what I like to refer to as 'tactical landscaping'.

For repellant uses marigolds, onions, pyrethimums, and others can be employed. Tobaccos too, but dont plant directly with tomatos / peppers /etc nightshades. Green onions I plant in every pepper (and other) pot I have. They stink up the soil with onion and keep out certain creepy crawlies of the undesirable varieties. Marigolds do the same, eploying different annoying to pest chems, but you have to rip them out at some point I found, growing in 14"dia pots, or they'll dominate by summer.

There's also many trap plants, you can read about in general or you will note on your own doing lots of different things wherever your locale. Two highly effective examples I've noted are basils for stinkbugs and yard long beans for aphids. As much as I like the YLB's, if you sacrifice your concern with eating them you can grow all sorts of phaseolis beans around them and the aphids wont hardly notice them, instead they coat the YLB's. I like to grow basils more for their aromatic properties, especially cinnamon, and the stink bugs spend most of their time there.

Damn, you call it "non-GMO" and nobody gets all revved up to freak out about GMO's, and the thread is more akin to disappointment than rejoice.