April 26, 2005

Photos and Graphics Click for larger images

WESLACO - Using advanced laboratory techniques, Dr. Javier Gonzales-Ramos has moved genetic material from milk and spinach to citrus. His goal is to provide oranges and grapefruit with resistance to citrus canker, a devastating and emerging bacterial disease that causes damage to citrus trees worldwide.

The ability to move genetic material, or DNA, between different plant species is revolutionizing both agriculture and medicine. In agriculture, it means the potential to produce new and improved plant varieties more precisely, rapidly and efficiently than conventional breeding methods.

Studies by the National Science Foundation, however, show that this new science of molecular genetics and genomic biology is being taught in schools in affluent neighborhoods of the country, but not to minority students in urban and rural school districts.

Gonzalez-Ramos, who is doing post doctoral research at the Texas A&M University System Agricultural Research and Extension Center at Weslaco, wants to help change that. As part of a fellowship program of the National Science Foundation, he is coordinating a workshop in Weslaco this summer for high school and junior college faculty. The goal of this workshop is to get these faculty members, and eventually their students, up to speed on biotechnology.

"This is a free, three-day workshop that is presented by the prestigious Dolan DNA Learning Center at the Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory in New York and funded by a grant from the National Science Foundation," Gonzalez-Ramos said. "It is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to learn this fascinating science from some of the country's top genetics experts."

The workshop, titled "Plant Molecular Genetics and Genomics," will be held June 15-17. Up to 25 teachers will be accepted. Attendees are required to have some computer skills and a basic understanding of molecular genetics.

Gonzales-Ramos said that to date, he has received applications from teachers in California, Georgia and Texas, but none locally.

"Everything will be paid for by the NSF grant except travel and hotel, which makes this workshop especially appealing to local high school and community college teachers," he said. "Faculty will leave the workshop with the knowledge and workshop materials to help them develop new curriculum to get students active in science, especially in plant genetics and genomics."

Workshop participants will use important food crops as plant models to illustrate key concepts of gene and genome analysis, Gonzalez-Ramos said. These concepts include the relationship between phenotype and molecular genotype, genetic modification of plants and detection of transgenes in foods, and linkage and bioinformatic methods for gene mapping.

"The computers used in this workshop will be provided to help us explore the fascinating world of bioinformatics resources which scientists use to access genetic information," he said.

The National Science Foundation awarded Gonzales-Ramos one of only two summer faculty fellowships last year in a nationwide competition. He took three weeks of high-level training at the Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory where he learned lab methods for teaching plant molecular genetics and genomics, including hands-on laboratory techniques.

The program required that each fellow be accompanied by a graduate student from their institution. Gonzales-Ramos was accompanied by Adriana Robbins, a native of Mexico now studying for her doctorate at Texas A&M University in College Station.

The fellowship, "Building Leadership to Expand Participation of Underrepesented Minorities in Plant Genetics and Genomics," also provides for the three-day training workshop.

Prior to the post-doctoral research he is now doing under the supervision of Dr. Erik Mirkov, a molecular biologist with the Texas Agricultural Experiment Station's facilities in Weslaco, Gonzales-Ramos taught plant genetics for five years at the University of Tamaulipas in Ciudad Victoria. He then moved to the Rio Grande Valley where he taught biology and genetics at the University of Texas at Brownsville-Texas Southmost College.

The canker-resistant transgenic varieties of citrus he developed in the laboratory are now being field tested in Florida for expression of resistance.

To apply for the workshop, contact Gonzales-Ramos at the Texas A&M facilities in Weslaco at (956) 968-5585, e-mailjrgonzalez@ag.tamu.edu, or download the application at www.dnalc.org .

Acceptances will be mailed by May 6.