Caisson Laboratories is developing a suite of broadly applicable biotechnology tools to redirect the biosynthetic capacity of seeds for the large-scale production of seed-based biofuel feedstocks and other biomaterials for the industrial and pharmaceutical sectors. The resulting technology platform will prevent genetically modified traits from being transferred to other plants through pollen. Two major applications of this technology will be demonstrated by the end of the project:

1. the alteration of plant metabolic pathways to substantially increase the production per acre of fermentable/extractable starch in harvested seeds of grain;
2. transgene biocontainment such that pollen-based gene flow among engineered sorghum plants and neighboring crops or weeds is prevented.

This research is currently funded by the Advance Technology Program of the U.S. Department of Commerce
(http://jazz.nist.gov/atpcf/prjbriefs/prjbrief.cfm?ProjectNumber=00-00-7468).

Caisson scientists are also developing methods to molecularly abort sorghum and corn embryos, early in their development, and to redirect nutrients, normally used for embryo development, toward starch accumulation. The goal is to achieve a 10-20% increase in yield of extractable starch per acre from grains of hybrid sorghum and corn.

The broader impacts of this research are the lessening of the nation's dependence on foreign oil in its production of bioplastics, biofilms and other biomaterials, enhanced agricultural prosperity for marginal farmland, and new and cost-effective methods of producing pharmaceuticals and other industrial chemicals.

This research is currently funded by the National Science Foundation,
(http://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward.do?AwardNumber=0741194).

Caisson Laboratories is developing a corn platform dedicated to the production in greenhouse and open-field conditions of recombinant proteins, antibodies, biocatalysts and other high-value molecules.

Cereal endosperm is the plant part from which the extraction of soluble recombinant molecules is the easiest. In corn, endosperm yield is very high and is particularly suited for the production of high value recombinant molecules. When needed, biocontainment of recombinant proteins is made possible by tighter greenhouse conditions than field production. Further, three to four generations of corn can be annually grown in greenhouse conditions. Finally, the ease to emasculate and crossing maize provide opportunities to assemble in one single tissue (e.g. endosperm of F1 hybrid) two complementary recombinant molecules (such as two antibody chains) originating from two different transgenic lines.

Caisson's two leading scientists, John Carman and Dominique Roche, have extensive experience in researching plant apomixis. A project funded by the Advance Technology program has been recently completed
(http://jazz.nist.gov/atpcf/prjbriefs/prjbrief.cfm?ProjectNumber=00-00-7468).

Gains in crop production of 10 to 50 percent could be achieved if hybrids could "clone themselves" through their own seed, a process that occurs in nature through a rare anomaly known as apomixis (asexual seed formation). Caisson Laboratories is conducting research with the goal of developing tools for conferring apomixis to targeted crops. Caisson's tools consist of methodologies for inducing and stabilizing apomixis by breeding and cloned genes for inducing and stabilizing apomixis by genetic engineering. Population growth, increased energy needs, and an increasing global standard of living are driving the need for increased crop productivity. Adding to this urgency is the projected biomass production demands of the newly emerging bioenergy industry.Corn, rice and wheat are the three most widely grown crops in the world that will benefit the most from the control of asexual reproduction to lower costs of seed production and optimize the effects of hybrid vigor.

When crop plants begin to mature, they progress from a vegetative phase, which lacks flowers, to a reproductive phase wherein flowers form. However, the transition to flowering is unwanted for plants in which vegetative parts are valued, e.g. alfalfa and other forage crops, lignocellulosic biofuels crops, some vegetable crops, and some landscaping plants (vines and ground coverings). Caisson is in the process of licensing recombinant DNA tools that will keep plants vegetative. With this technology, Caisson expects to produce crops and landscaping plants with higher yields of desirable vegetative plant parts.