Research Project Aims to Enhance Anti-Cancer Potential of Soyfoods
Soybean Insect Research Information Center Set For Major Revitalization
Consortium Seeks To Improve Genetic Engineering of Soybeans
Global Economy May Dictate Changes In Soybean Research and Development
The NSRL Bulletin is published three times a year by the National Soybean Research Laboratory at the University of Illinois, 170 National Soybean Research Center, 1101 W. Peabody Drive, Urbana, IL 61801; telephone (217)244-1706; e-mail nsrl@uiuc.edu; FAX (217)244-1707. James Sinclair, director; Robert J. Wynstra, editor; David Riecks, photographer; Lynn Hawkinson Smith, graphic designer.
Unless otherwise stated, articles may be reproduced or quoted if credit is given to the NSRL Bulletin. The National Soybean Research Laboratory at the University of Illinois is an affirmative action and equal opportunity institution.
Presented by
College of Agriculture University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign National Soybean Research Laboratory 170 National Soybean Research Center 1101 West Peabody Drive Urbana, IL 61801-4723
Research Project Aims to Enhance Anti-Cancer
Potential of Soyfoods
A number of scientific studies have pointed to isoflavones, protease inhibitors, and some antioxidants found in the soybean as possibly preventing the development of cancer or even reducing the growth of tumors. In recent years, this work has sparked widespread interest in increasing the amount of soyfoods in the average diet.
But, in work underway at the University of Illinois, researchers in the Department of Crop Sciences and the Institute for Environmental Studies are taking this approach a step further with a project aimed at enhancing the anti-cancer potential of soyfoods.
"It appears that advances in medical treatment and environmental controls have done little to reduce the cancer rate in the U.S.," says Michael Plewa, professor of genetics and interim director of the Institute for Environmental Studies. "We believe, however, that agriculture has an active role to play in reducing the incidence of cancer through the indentification and development of anticancer agents from agronomic crops such as the soybean."
By applying innovative biotechnology techniques, Plewa and his research team plan to systematically screen soyfoods and soybean processing products for their ability to prevent or repair DNA and chromosome damage in mammal cells after exposure to chemical carcinogens.
"These in vitro studies will allow us to prioritize soybean processing products and soyfoods according to their chemoprotective abilities," Plewa says. "This approach can quickly identify soy products that contain chemoprotective agents and help determine if these agents can suppress the actions of carcinogens in animals."
Assays in laboratory mice will be used to confirm whether the chemoprotectant soybean products identified in cell culture studies are effective in whole animals. The most promising products then can be ranked in order based on their potency.
"The in vitro cellular studies provide a reasonable, albeit imperfect, prediction of antimutagenic activity in animals, including humans," Plewa says. "Animals studies, however, will be required to verify the chemoprotective activity of soybean products shown positive by the screening process."
Plewa's research team, which includes A. Lane Rayburn, associate professor of cytogenetics, and Bettina M. Francis, associate professor of environmental toxicology, recently received support for this project from the Illinois Council on Food and Agricultural Research (C-FAR). Other funds are being provided by the Institute for Environmental Studies and the Department of Crops Sciences in the College of Agricultural, Consumer, and Environmental Sciences.
Additional support for the project will be provided by USDA\ARS scientists Mark Berhow and Steven Vaughan of the National Center for Agricultural Utilization Research in Peoria, Illinois. This critical collaboration will allow use of the Center's sophisticated laboratory equipment for chromatography and soybean fractionation.
Plans also call for the direct involvement of industry in this research. Commercial soybean processing companies from across the state have been contacted to cooperate on the project and to supply samples of their products for testing. Archer Daniels Midland Company and Lucas Meyer, Inc. already have provided letters of support and other companies are expected to join the effort as the project moves forward.
Such cooperation is especially important because this research is directly aimed at producing practical outcomes of benefit to the entire soybean industry. Promising anti-cancer products probably could be recovered during normal processing, thereby allowing for the production of large quantities of anticarcinogens without the need for industry to develop new processing plants.
"This is an idea whose time has come," Plewa says.
"The potential exists from this research to open up a whole
new niche market, which will result in a greater demand for
soybean products. In the future, certain types of soybeans even
could be grown for their pharmaceutical value."
Soybean Insect Research Information Center Set
For Major Revitalization
The Soybean Insect Research Information Center (SIRIC) was established by the Illinois Natural History Survey and the Illinois Agricultural Experiment Station in 1969 as a comprehensive collection of world literature on insects and other arthropods associated with soybeans. The collection and its equipment was moved into new facilities at the National Soybean Research Laboratory in 1993.
SIRIC today consists of about 24,000 references, more than 5,000 of which deal directly with soybean entomology. A bibliographic database from the collection was computerized in 1972, making it one of the first agricultural databases to enter the computer age.
And, according to Edward Armbrust, director of the Center of Economic Entomology in the Illinois Natural History Survey, the collection, which has suffered for several years from funding problems and the loss of its curator, currently is poised for a major revitalization.
"Through the cooperation of the Illinois Natural History Survey and the Office of Research in the College of Agricultural, Consumer, and Environmental Sciences, work is underway to bring this invaluable collection up-to-date," Armbrust says. "These changes mean that we can take full advantage of the Internet and the World Wide Web to make the bibliographic database and the collection of reprints readily available to producers, agribusinesses, and researchers."
In the period before its decline, SIRIC served as much more than just a database. Under the direction of its founder and curator, Jenny Kogan, the center published six bibliographies and a directory of soybean entomology workers. SIRIC was represented at numerous regional and national meetings, as well as the International Grain Legume Symposium and three different meetings of the World Soybean Research Conference.
In addition, SIRIC provided services, such as bibliographic searches, copies of papers and bibliographies, and referrals, to numerous individual researchers, soybean producers, and institutions in the United States and more than 50 other countries. In 1988, more than 5,000 entries from the collection were published in an award-winning, two-volume world bibliography of soybean entomology.
"With the revitalization of SIRIC, this trove of information one again can be made available to the agricultural and research communities," Armbrust says.
He notes that the information in SIRIC would be especially important in cases where exotic species enter the U.S. and cause major problems requiring extraordinarily expensive corrective actions.
"This database in tandem with the Survey's International Soybean Arthropod Collection can provide information essential for researchers to identify and control newly introduced insect pests," Armbrust says. "Such information conservatively could save two to five years in the research time necessary to evaluate the problem and implement corrective measures."
Compared to the savings for U.S. producers in the event of a crisis, the cost of upgrading and operating SIRIC represents an extremely inexpensive insurance policy.
"The cost for this database represents less that one
one-thousandth of the annual value of the Illinois soybean crop
and an even smaller fraction of the cost of the U.S. crop,"
Armbrust says. "Clearly the investment in this database is
infinitesimal compared to its value as a research tool in the
case of a major pest outbreak."
Consortium Seeks To Improve Genetic Engineering
of Soybeans
As modification of crop plants by genetic transformation becomes increasingly common, researchers have begun working on ways to modify traits such as oil and protein composition, herbicide or pesticide resistance, digestibility, and disease resistance. Some recent research even has focused on developing novel compounds such as pharmaceuticals from crop plants.
Some of these transformations may allow one crop species to displace another as a preferred industrial product. Other modifications could enhance the economy of production for a crop or create entirely new markets for that crop.
Genetic transformation of the soybean, however, is much more difficult than transformation of many other plant species. Genetic engineering by recombinant DNA methods requires a highly specialized staff and significant effort over a long period of time. Most importantly, these difficulties act as a major barrier to many aspects of soybean research and development.
"While it is now possible to regenerate plants from soybean tissue cultures, the efficiency is generally low and the time required is long," says Jack Widholm, professor of plant physiology in the Department of Crop Sciences at the University of Illinois. "If transformation and plant regeneration methods were more straightforward and efficient, soybean improvement would be greatly expedited."
Although there are various methods for transforming and regenerating soybean plants from tissue cultures, none of them to date has proven to be entirely satisfactory. Most successful transformations have been accomplished using three different systems: Agrobacterium tumefaciens-mediated transformation of seedling cotyledons, particle bombardment of shoot meristems, and particle bombardment of embryogenic suspension cultures.
"Despite some successes, each of these systems has serious drawbacks in terms of time, efficiency, and labor," Widholm says. "Quite clearly, major improvements are needed to make soybean transformation more accessible to researchers in both the public and private sectors."
To overcome this problem, Widholm has joined with University of Illinois researchers Andrew Bent, Stephen Farrand, and Lila Vodkin and scientists from four other universities to obtain funding from the North Central Soybean Research Progam for a collaborative program. Researchers from nine different laboratories located at the University of Illinois, Iowa State University, the University of Minnesota, the University of Nebraska, and South Dakota State University will pursue five focused objectives.
"The objectives were chosen based on their strong potential to overcome the transformation and regeneration bottlenecks that make it extremely difficult to genetically engineer soybeans," Widholm says. "If this approach results in more efficient and reproducible systems, then the improvements possible from genetic engineering could be much more easily applied to soybeans." He notes that some duplication of effort is planned to take advantage of the different capabilities of the laboratories and to examine different genotypes. The aim is for the various research groups to regularly communicate so that successes in one laboratory can be utilized by all the collaborating partners.
"One major focus will be on enhancing the Agrobacterium tumefaciens transformation systems," Widholm says. "This bacterium serves as a natural genetic engineer capable of placing genes into plants. Optimization of its interaction with the soybean should greatly enhance gene transfer systems."
The group also will work on improving the plant regeneration efficiency of the embryonic suspension culture transformation system and the cotyledonary node transformation system. Researchers further will utilize other organogenic tissue culture regeneration systems for transformations. The goal is to optimize all these systems and make them more efficient and reproducible.
Another important aspect of this program will center on developing the Agrobacterium tumefaciens vacuum infiltration system with intact plants to eliminate the need for plant regeneration. This natural genetic engineer will be used with whole plants to determine if transformed seeds can be directly obtained, as has been accomplished with another plant species.
"The potential results from this effort hold real
promise, especially since competing crops today can be engineered
more easily than the soybean." Widholm says. "The
soybean could be altered through genetic engineering to change
the oil and protein content, to incorporate resistance to
diseases, insects, nematodes, and herbicides, and even to make
plastics or other chemical feedstocks."
Global Economy May Dictate Changes In Soybean
Research and Development
During the past half century, soybeans have become the world's leading source of high protein meal and edible oil. This surge in importance for the soybean as an international commodity largely has resulted from the comprehensive research and development efforts undertaken by the U.S. public and private sectors.
According to Harold Kauffman, professor in the Department of Crop Sciences at the University of Illinois, the challenge in the global economy of the 21st Century will be to develop a research and development system that can maintain and even increase the market share for soy products and the U.S. soybean industry.
"The global economy, which has resulted from rapid changes in information technology, geopolitical structures, and liberalization of economic policy, dictates that individual commodities must have a global research and development program that can effectively compete in established markets and take advantage of the new emerging markets," he says.
Kauffman, who served for nearly a decade as director of the International Soybean Program (INTSOY) at the University of Illinois, presented his views on the opportunities for global leadership in soybean research and development as part of a seminar presentation sponsored by the National Soybean Research Laboratory.
While serving with INTSOY, Kauffman helped launch a research and development program aimed at developing low-cost processing methods and new soy products that can improve human nutrition and expand the use of soybean around the world. During his long international career, he has traveled to more than 60 countries in every part of the world.
Prior to returning to the University of Illinois in 1995, he spent three years in India as coordinator of the Plant Genetics Resource Project for Winrock International. As part of this project, he supervised activities related to construction of a modern germ plasm bank with facilities to hold one million accessions of plant seeds.
According to Kauffman, the major growth in soybean exports into the 21st Century likely will come from new emerging economic powers in Asia, such as China and India, and from other emerging countries in the Middle East and Central Europe. With the success of the "Green Revolution" in agriculture and new economic liberalization, these countries are on a fast path toward economic development. Rapid economic growth, coupled with large populations, means that major markets are opening up for new food and consumer products.
"To compete effectively in these emerging markets, a new research and development paradigm is needed for commodities such as soybeans," Kauffman says. "These countries have many diverse ethnic, religious, and economic groups, all of which are accustomed to unique products and services."
He points to the global-oriented research and development programs evolved by the International Research Centers for commodities such as rice, wheat, and corn as possible models for the soybean industry. The Consultative Group for Agricultural Research (CGIR), which is a consortium of 50 donor countries, development banks, and foundations, has been funding these global programs for more than 25 years in countries throughout Africa, Asia, the Middle East, and South America.
Annual funding for global rice research through this system exceeds $25 million and involves more than 100 countries. Wheat is funded at the level of about $14 million per year, potatoes at $9 million, and corn at $6.5 million. These CGIR funds all are supplemented by the National Agricultural Research System and, more recently, by private sector investment.
In addition, the Rockefeller Foundation has funded the Rice Biotechnology Network, which demonstrates the power of global networks in high-tech areas such as molecular genetics. Seventy institutions from more than 30 countries are participating in this worldwide effort.
"A new vision for soybean research and development programs in the global economy of the 21st Century must take note of these developments and link current domestic research programs with the expanding efforts being conducted in numerous countries around the world," Kauffman says. "Tapping the talent and resources in these countries is essential if the use of soy products is to continue to expand on a global scale."
According to Kauffman, the National Soybean Research Laboratory could play a key role by tapping into the strategic alliances that the International Soybean Program at the University of Illinois has established during the last 20 years. Another key source of access is the network of regional marketing offices established by the American Soybean Association (ASA).
"Working in close consort with the ASA offices will better involve them in research and provide a feed-back mechanism to the U.S. research and farm communities," he says. "Through these activities, individual markets could be more clearly identified, products parameters could be more precisely characterized, and research could better be directed toward making these products."
Kauffman points out that many of these product parameters, such as protein and oil content, can be changed through genetic manipulation. But, this effort requires open access to germ plasm collections around the world. Because China is the center of diversity for the soybean and has the largest germ plasm collection, increased collaboration with Chinese institutions and scientists is essential.
"Although the U.S. is the world leader in biotechnology, countries rich in germ plasm and low in labor costs have a competitive advantage in developing certain techniques," he says. "Countries such as Thailand, China, and India are developing active biotechnology programs that can contribute to improving the competitiveness of soybeans."
Many countries have tried to adopt U.S. production practices and processing technologies for their own soybean industries. Only Brazil and Argentina, which have climates, soils, and economies that are very similar to the U.S., have become major players on the global market. Tropical and subtropical countries of South America, Asia, and Africa have found that soybean production is not competitive with other crops.
"In my opinion, the fear that other countries will steal
U.S. soybean technologies are not valid," Kauffman says.
"In fact, the new global economic realities indicate that
the development of a global network of all soybean producing
countries would greatly improve the competitiveness of soybeans
against major commodities such as canola or rapeseed, palm oil,
sunflowers, peanuts, and cottonseed."
Since its inception, the National Soybean Research Laboratory has strived to serve the U.S. soybean industry by promoting effective communications through a wide variety of means. An important aspect of the NSRL program has aimed at fostering interdisciplinary and interinstitutional programs of national interest.
One good example of this effort is the way that the NSRL responded to reports of soybean rust in the state of Hawaii. With support from the United Soybean Board (USB), the NSRL moved quickly to meet this potential threat by bringing together nine leading soybean specialists from six states for a three-day workshop to ascertain the state of knowledge about the disease and the fungi that causes it.
The group further was charged with the task of recommending short- and long-term research needs in anticipation of the fungi and the disease possibly becoming a threat to production in the continental U.S. An executive summary of the group's conclusions and recommendations was immediately provided to soybean growers' organizations across the country and was posted on the StratSoy electronic information system.
No one should underestimate the potential for an exotic crop disease to enter the continental U.S. and cause major problems. One need look no farther for proof than the recent identification of Karnal bunt disease on wheat in the southwestern states and the resulting serious economic disruptions.
Since the soybean rust workshop, the scientists involved have kept a watchful eye for new developments and proposed a number of research efforts aimed at insuring the safety of the continental U.S. crop. In addition, the NSRL recently published the full proceedings of the workshop as the first of its planned series of soybean publications.
Copies of Proceedings of Soybean Rust Workshop, 9-11 August
1995, edited by J.B. Sinclair and G.L Hartman, are available
at $4 each to cover the costs of postage and handling. Orders,
along with a check or money order made payable to the University
of Illinois, should be sent to: Publication Sales, OAF, UIUC, 69
Mumford Hall, 1301 W. Gregory Drive, Urbana, IL 61801.
James B. Sinclair
Interim Director
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