00:00 Wide
– traffic on major road
Busy
traffic shot, cars and lorrys
Bus
moves through shot
c.u.
Bus exhaust pipe
Pan
across field of Oilseed Rape
c.u.
Oilseed Rape flower head
Tilt
up to show wide expanse of Oilseed Rape crop
Wide
– University of Durham sign
Wide
– Professor Lindsey and Dr Jen Topping, Senior Researcher, in
greenhouse
c.u.
Arabidopsis thaliana plant and flower
Guide Voice: We’ve become increasingly
dependent on motorised transport to move ourselves and our goods
around – but these vehicles need fuel and concerns about
diminishing mineral resources and increased global warming have
turned our attention to alternative fuel sources. Crop plants, such
as oil seed rape, offer the potential for industrial-scale
renewable energy supplies – vegetable oils can be converted
to bio-diesel and starches to bio-ethanol, a petrol substitute. But
these aren’t, currently, cheaper options. Land
availability and crop yields mean that the race is on to find a way
to make bio-fuels more cost effective. Researchers at the
University of Durham, led by Professor Keith Lindsey, believe they
have the solution to maximising the potential of this renewable
energy source.
00:44 SOT: Professor Keith Lindsey, School of
Biological & Environmental Sciences, University of Durham
– “Our research is really focused on
understanding how genes regulate plant development and we’ve
been working with a model organism which is related to some crops,
like brassica crops, but is a very useful experimental system to
understand how genes regulate development. And this has led us to
identify genes that control the pathway of accumulation of starches
and oils so in a sense we’ve been trying to understand
molecular switches that will switch on production of starches and
oils.”
01:28 c.u.
Arabidopsis thaliana flower
head
Focus
pull on above
c.u.
young plants in trays
Wide
– Prof. Lindsey & Dr Topping with plants
c.u.
finger pointing at plants
Extreme
c.u. mutated plant
Slide
– cross section of plant stem. Oil and starch not
evident
Slide
– as above but cells full of oils and starch
Pull
back from plant to show Dr Topping at microscope
c.u.
eyes at microscope
c.u.
manipulation of plant under microscope
Wide
– Dr Topping and microscope
Extreme
c.u. – gathering pollen under microscope
Dr
Topping and microscope
Guide Voice: They’re working with
Arabidopsis thaliana, commonly known as Thale Cress, the first
plant to have its genome comprehensively sequenced. It’s a
close relative of the plant group known as brassicas, which
includes oil seed rape and the research of Professor Lindsey and
his team could be directly applicable to a wide range of important
crop plants.
They’ve taken a genetic approach, finding mutations within
Arabidopsis which are able to massively over-produce starch and
oils in tissues that don’t normally accumulate such high
levels. Starches and oils usually accumulate mostly in the seed;
now they’ve found genes which, if “turned on” in
tissues like leaves and stems, promote massive accumulation of
starch and oil. These molecular switches activate the whole bio
synthetic pathway, allowing the production of raw materials for
energy in other areas of plant tissue.
The beauty of this research is that it isn’t only
applicable to bio-fuels – if the team can consistently
identify these molecular switches it could have huge impact on
agriculture, particularly in countries where good agricultural land
is sparse.
02:33 SOT: Professor Keith Lindsey –
“This is particularly important at the moment with global
warming, where the amount of land available for growing crops is
going to decline and, on top of that, you’ve got an
increasing population around the world. So there’s the food
angle but also these products like oils and starches are
potentially valuable raw materials for bio fuels and with the
decline in the availability in fossil fuels and so the increase in
price, plus the concerns about carbon dioxide released into the air
through burning of fossil fuels there’s a lot of political
pressure to try and find renewable sources of energy and these
crops that produce starches and oils represent new sources of
renewable energy.”
03:22 Wide
– researcher marking Petri dishes
c.u
of above
Wide,
researcher and Bunsen burner
Wide,
researcher and centrifuge
c.u.
centrifuge – sample placed inside
c.u.
starting machine
Centrifuge
spinning
Wide
– vehicles on road
Cars
and lorry on road
Wide
– field of Oilseed Rape
c.u.
Oilseed
Rape
Guide Voice: The production of energy from
specially grown crops is also 'carbon neutral' – the energy
producing elements are made in the plant from carbon dioxide taken
up from the air. Any CO2 that is released back into the
atmosphere is only replacing that taken out to make the oils and
starches in the first place so there is no contribution to global
warming.
This is a long term project. Selective breeding programmes take
time and this is, currently, laboratory based research - but the
team are actively seeking strategic alliances with plant breeders
to allow them to transfer the information they’ve gathered
into actual crops. Bio-fuels are likely to become an important part
of our future. A renewable energy source that is carbon neutral is
simply too important to ignore in this day and age, as is research
that could boost crop yields both for energy and to meet our
increasing food needs.
04:12 SOT: Professor Keith Lindsey -
“I would like to see that the basic work that
we’re doing - the laboratory based work - has some general
applicability. If it can in any way help problems associated with
feeding increasing populations around the world or having some
impact on climate change through the use of renewable energy then
I’d be very happy.”
04:38 End
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