Yield Protection Technology® (YPT®)

Weatherproofing Crops

Yield Protection Technology® (YPT®) is a breakthrough genetic technology for protecting plants against seed yield losses sustained under suboptimal rainfall or irrigation. YPT® protects the plant without yield drag under well-watered growing conditions. Greenhouse experiments have shown that YPT® can improve yields up to 40% under controlled drought stress condition.

In five years of field trials, YPT® protected canola delivered up to 26% more seed yield with moderate drought stress and never underperformed unimproved canola, even during seasons with ideal water. In addition to canola and model plants, YPT® has been successfully demonstrated in corn and petunia and stacked with commercial biotech traits. It is currently being developed in soybean, rice, sorghum, cotton and turf grass.

Peer-reviewed scientific papers on the YPT® mechanism and field trial results can be found at:

• Crop Science review article in 2009
• Molecular Plant article in 2009
• Plant Journal article in 2005

"This work demonstrates that conditional antisense downregulation of the α or β subunits of protein farnesyl transferase, which is involved in the ABA signaling pathway, enhances the drought tolerance of Arabidopsis or canola plants. The authors confirmed the tolerance in field tests, which demonstrated that seed yield, oil content and composition were maintained." From Engineering drought tolerance in plants: discovering and tailoring genes to unlock the future (Current Opinions in Biotechnology 2006, 17:113–122)

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