By decree of the President of the Russian Federation on the basis of the All-Russian Institute of Plant Genetic Resources named after N.I. Vavilov (VIR) created a new scientific organization – the National Center for Plant Genetic Resources. The emergence of such a center will help the development of the healthy and sports nutrition industry and will allow creating products with desired medicinal properties, experts are sure.
The Institute has the world’s most diverse collection of 320,000 specimens of cultivated plants and their wild relatives. The samples are stored in the form of seeds, field collections, under deep freezing conditions (cryocollection), as well as in the form of test-tube microplants (in vitro).
One of the primary tasks of the new structure is the search for methods for obtaining food products with specified functional properties that meet the challenges of healthy, sports, functional, individualized nutrition.
The National Center for Plant Genetic Resources is the first in the country; it will serve as an example to test the mechanisms of operation of network gene banks. Then similar structures will combine the genetic resources of farm animals and microorganisms.
If genetic editing of plants is allowed in Russia, then the inhabitants of the country will see its fruits on their tables in two or three years.
SuperFood: The ability to change DNA fragments has always been the holy grail of biotechnology and medicine. Now we can see how medicine and the food industry are intertwined to develop innovative technologies and create food products that replace medication.