Ecology and Phytochemistry, Institute of Biology Leiden, Leiden University, Sylviusweg 72, 2333 BE Leiden, The Netherlands.
J Agric Food Chem. 2012 Feb 15;60(6):1488-93. doi: 10.1021/jf204864y. Epub 2012 Feb 3.
An important aspect of ecological safety of genetically modified (GM) plants is the evaluation of unintended effects on plant-insect interactions. These interactions are to a large extent influenced by the chemical composition of plants. This study uses NMR-based metabolomics to establish a baseline of chemical variation to which differences between a GM potato line and its parent cultivar are compared. The effects of leaf age, virus infection, and aphid herbivory on plant metabolomes were studied. The metabolome of the GM line differed from its parent only in young leaves of noninfected plants. This effect was small when compared to the baseline. Consistently, aphid performance on excised leaves was influenced by leaf age, while no difference in performance was found between GM and non-GM plants. The metabolomic baseline approach is concluded to be a useful tool in ecological safety assessment.
转基因（GM）植物生态安全的一个重要方面是评估对植物-昆虫相互作用的非预期影响。这些相互作用在很大程度上受到植物化学成分的影响。本研究使用基于 NMR 的代谢组学来建立化学变异的基线，然后将 GM 土豆品系与其亲本品种之间的差异进行比较。研究了叶片年龄、病毒感染和蚜虫取食对植物代谢组的影响。GM 品系与其亲本的代谢组仅在未感染植物的幼叶中存在差异。与基线相比，这种影响很小。一致地，取食离体叶片的蚜虫表现受叶片年龄的影响，而 GM 和非 GM 植物之间的表现没有差异。因此，代谢组基线方法被认为是生态安全评估的有用工具。
