Project Number: 1275-21220-186-00
Project Type: Appropriated

Start Date: Apr 17, 2003
End Date: Apr 16, 2008

Objective:
Provide a national quarantine program as required by federal law for the acquisition, testing, therapeutic treatment, and distribution of prohibited foreign plant genera entering the US. Protect US agriculture from the introduction of exotic plant pathogens while expediting the introduction of new germplasm. Reduce the quarantine period and increase the efficiency/capacity of the program. Develop or adapt rapid and sensitive diagnostic techniques for quarantine pathogens. Develop or improve in vitro procedures for enhancing germplasm survival and the therapeutic elimination of pathogens. Characterize and report new pathogens from quarantined germplasm. Maintain electronic records on accessions.

Approach:
Establish foreign germplasm under quarantine conditions using a variety of propagative materials and horticultural techniques. Test accessions for pathogens using protocols approved by APHIS. Tests may include graft or mechanical inoculations to woody or herbaceous indicator hosts, serological assays, electron microscopic observations, and molecular assays such as nucleic acid hybridizations and polymerase chain reaction. Whenever possible, eliminate pathogens by applying therapeutic treatments such as thermotherapy, chemotherapy, and meristem tip culture on infected accessions. Distribute accessions released from quarantine to designated recipients. Conduct research to develop or adapt new extractions methods and molecular assays as alternatives or supplements to current testing protocols. Conduct research to identify new protocols for in vitro testing of accessions and pathogen elimination from infected accessions, thereby reducing the quarantine period and/or improving program efficiency. Enhance accession data tracking and sharing with improved software applications and GRIN interfaces.

Project Team

Kinard, Gary Li, Ruhui Li, Ruhui Mock, Raymond Hurtt, Suzanne Hammerschlag, Freddi

Project Annual Reports

FY 2003