New York News
The Demise and Potential Revival of the American Chestnut
Before a disastrous blight, the American chestnut was a keystone species in eastern forests. Could genetic engineering help bring it back? "In the 1990s, William Powell, a professor at SUNY College of Environmental Science and Forestry in Syracuse, New York, who'd...
Can Genetic Engineering Bring Back the American Chestnut?
The [American chestnut] tree helped build industrial America before disease wiped out an estimated three billion or more of them. To revive their lost glory, we may need to embrace tinkering with nature. Read the full story at New York Times Magazine
High-tech chestnuts: Researchers genetically modify tree to save species
Researchers at the State University of New York's College of Environmental Science and Forestry will soon seek federal clearance to distribute thousands of modified trees as part of a restoration effort — a closely watched move that could expand the frontier for...
Progress being made toward restoring a blight-tolerant American chestnut
UNE is the only place in New England where students are working with fungal blight-tolerant American chestnut seedlings. A team of scientists created the seedlings by inserting a gene from wheat into them. The wheat gene protects the plant from fungal blight. Many...
Diversifying transgenic blight‐tolerant American chestnut population
Over four billion American chestnut trees have been killed as a result of an introduced pathogen, the chestnut blight. But recently, thanks to science and the hard work of TACF and our partners, transgenic blight‐tolerant American chestnut trees have been developed....
Science Saves an Old Chestnut
A blight-tolerant American chestnut tree is the latest example of what the science community has begun to call a GRO—a genetically rescued organism. In the past century approximately four billion chestnut trees have been lost in the U.S. due to blight that spread when...