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Plants with genetically encoded autoluminescence
Tatiana Mitiouchkina1,2, Alexander S Mishin1,2, Louisa Gonzalez Somermeyer3
1Planta LLC, Moscow, Russia.
Abstract:
Autoluminescent plants engineered to express a bacterial bioluminescence gene cluster in plastids have not been widely adopted because of low light output. We engineered tobacco plants with a fungal bioluminescence system that converts caffeic acid (present in all plants) into luciferin and report self-sustained luminescence that is visible to the naked eye. Our findings could underpin development of a suite of imaging tools for plants.
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