The study, recently published in the Journal of the American Academy of Sciences, describes a method of genetic engineering that may allow a plant to neutralise excess salt.

In many parts of the world, including the northern Negev and the Jezreel Valley in Israel, large amounts of salt remain in the soil after the irrigated water evaporates, or is used by plants. Salt impairs the supply of water to the plant and causes cell toxicity, and in many places irrigation must be increased so that water not taken up by plants will drain the salt that they have accumulated.

Professor Alex Levine and PhD student Yehoram Leshem, from the Hebrew University of Jerusalem's Silverman Institute, studied the effects of exposure to salt in the thale cress). Leshem commented that this plant is able to get rid of excess salt through a special organ. “Oxygen coming from the root of the plant to this organ damages its covering and impairs the plant's ability to challenge its exposure to salt,” said Leshem. The damage is cumulative and the plant dies within a few days.

The research followed the movement of the oxygen until it reaches the covering organ and then manipulates the gene allowing the oxygen to reach the covering and impair its function. Further testing compared genetically manipulated thale cress sprouts exposed to salt with those that were not manipulated. The former survived a few more days than the latter.

Despite the damage that the oxygen does to the organ, it has other functions, said Leshem. Their research will be now be tested on other crops.

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