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[Jon Moulton]

http://sciencenewsguide.info/2009/06/09/a-...0%94-in-plants/

d'Erfurth I, Jolivet S, Froger N, Catrice O, Novatchkova M, et al. (2009) Turning Meiosis into Mitosis. PLoS Biol 7(6): e1000124. doi:10.1371/journal.pbio.1000124
http://www.plosbiology.org/article/info%3A...al.pbio.1000124

Brainstorming...

If knockdown of OSD1 is sufficient to cause the meiosis-to-mitosis conversion, then treatment of germline cells with antisense oligos might provide a method for making single-generation clones. If viable seeds are produced from treated germline cells, the clones can be sold -- but without the oligo treatment, they will only reproduce sexually. This could be a great commercial advantage.

Here is a potential tool for this process: Morpholino oligos can transiently knock down genes in plants.

Okuda S, Tsutsui H, Shiina K, Sprunck S, Takeuchi H, Yui R, Kasahara RD, Hamamura Y, Mizukami A, Susaki D, Kawano N, Sakakibara T, Namiki S, Itoh K, Otsuka K, Matsuzaki M, Nozaki H, Kuroiwa T, Nakano A, Kanaoka MM, Dresselhaus T, Sasaki N, Higashiyama T. Defensin-like polypeptide LUREs are pollen tube attractants secreted from synergid cells. Nature. 2009 Mar 19;458(7236):357-61.
http://www.ncbi.nlm....pubmed/19295610