Managed Pollinator CAP Coordinated Agricultural Project: RNAi For Treating Honey Bee Diseases

摘要

Many ground-breaking discoveries in science have occurred through serendipity. RNA interference (RNAi), a natural process to turn off gene activity in plants and animals is one of the many serendipitous discoveries that involved a mix of unexpectedness and insight that led to a valuable outcome. Back in the late 1980s, Dr. Rich Jorgenson, a molecular geneticist, and his colleague were trying to create a petunia with intensely purple colored flowers by inserting multiple copies of a purple color-producing gene into petunia plants. Surprisingly, the result turned out to be completely different from their expectation. Instead of achieving darker colored flowers, they got plants with white or patchy blossoms.