Multimedia Gallery
Mutant Maize Plant
A mutant of maize that cannot produce brassinosteroids--a natural plant steroid hormone--develops female sex organs, with female kernels growing where male tassel flowers would normally occur.
Burkhard Schulz, assistant professor of horticulture and landscape architecture at Purdue University, wanted to better understand the relationship between brassinosteroids and the architecture of plants, and in particular, how they affect their height.
Through his research, which was funded in part by the National Science Foundation, Schulz found that maize plants that lost their ability to produce brassinosteroids became dwarf, but more importantly, they were unable to produce male organs. They grew kernels where the tassels should be.
Schulz says that changing the architecture of plants--for example, making corn shorter and sturdier--is very important because it would minimize the amount of land you would need to produce food and fuels. Additionally, the lack of tassel growth would be beneficial to the seed industry because hybrid seed producers must remove the male, pollen-producing tassels from each plant so they don't pollinate themselves. The detasseling step could be removed if maize plants produced only female organs.
To learn more about this research, see the Purdue University news story Stronger corn? Take it off steroids, make it all female. (Date of Image: 2011)
Credit: Burkhard Schulz, Purdue University
See other images like this on your iPhone or iPad download NSF Science Zone on the Apple App Store.
Images and other media in the National Science Foundation Multimedia Gallery are available for use in print and electronic material by NSF employees, members of the media, university staff, teachers and the general public. All media in the gallery are intended for personal, educational and nonprofit/non-commercial use only.
Images credited to the National Science Foundation, a federal agency, are in the public domain. The images were created by employees of the United States Government as part of their official duties or prepared by contractors as "works for hire" for NSF. You may freely use NSF-credited images and, at your discretion, credit NSF with a "Courtesy: National Science Foundation" notation.
Additional information about general usage can be found in Conditions.
Also Available:
Download the high-resolution JPG version of the image. (2.2 MB)
Use your mouse to right-click (Mac users may need to Ctrl-click) the link above and choose the option that will save the file or target to your computer.