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Volume 7, Issue 4 (Suppl) J Biotechnol Biomater, an open access journal
ISSN: 2155-952X Bio America 2017
October 19-20, 2017
October 19-20, 2017 | New York, USA
18th Biotechnology Congress
The impact of plant biotechnology on agriculture in a changingworld: Present achievements and challenges
ahead
Ana Rosu1, Dorina Mocuta1, Stelica Cristea1, Georgia Boros1, Magdalena Turek Rahoveanu2, Adrian Turek Rahoveanu1 and Stefana Jurcoane1
1University of Agronomic Sciences and Veterinary Medicine of Bucharest, Romania
2University of Galati, Romania
Plants are the key of life on earth and since the beginning of agriculture humans used the plants that nature provided and modified
them through selective breeding to have desirable characteristics and to increase their productivity. Empirical at the beginning,
the natural and human-directed selection continued, due to scientific progress, with the tremendous achievements of the green
revolution. At present, in conditions of a population growth that is outstripping food production, more than ever agriculture is
fundamental to the economies and environments of the entire world. The modern agriculture must meet the needs of the increased
population and the expectations of improved living standards, in the conditions of alarming deleterious effects of environmental
pollution and declining arable land. Biotechnology became a major source of innovation for agriculture, offering a key to more
effective utilization of the world’s limited resources that can help to achieve sustainable development, though still remains a challenging
objective the overcoming of some significant barriers to largely adoption of these new and powerful technologies. Such a barrier is the
common misconception that is reducing plant biotechnology to only genetic engineering and transgenics. In fact plant biotechnology
is a broad collection of tools that together with genetic engineering are parts of the biotech-driven revolution in agriculture. A
wide range of crop biotechnologies are available and are increasingly used worldwide, such as micropropagation based on cell and
tissue culture techniques, mutagenesis, interspecific and intergeneric hybridization, marker-assisted selection, disease diagnostics
and bioprotection, biofertilization, cryopreservation, somatic embryogenesis, artificial seed production, exploiting apomixis, male
sterility and others. Biotechnology programmes will become effective in creating the „evergreen revolution” only by complementing
the well-structured conventional plant breeding and well-managed agronomy research and development programmes
Biography
Ana Rosu is a graduate of the Faculty of Biology, University of Bucharest and had her expertise as Scientific Researcher in the field of Cell Biology and Plant Biotechnology
at the Institute of Biology, Romanian Academy of Sciences, obtaining her PhD in Biology in 1987. Over the years, she worked both as Scientific Research Coordinator and
was responsible for professional formation of young specialists as Professor of Plant Biology and Biotechnology at the Faculty of Biotechnologies, University of Agronomic
Sciences and Veterinary Medicine of Bucharest. She has more than 70 articles published in scientific journals and 25 scientific presentations at national and international
scientific events
Ana Rosu et al., J Biotechnol Biomater 2017, 7:4 (Suppl)
DOI: 10.4172/2155-952X-C1-079