Keeping up with new transgenes for control of ECB and other corn insect pests.

Based on previous experience with transgenes, our agronomist was determined to keep up with the information on the latest events. Therefore when the Herculex event gained regulatory approval in 2002, they started organizing their field notes to account for Black cutworm, Fall army worm and Southwestern corn borer problems in addition to ECB. In areas where combinations of these pests presented management problems, they looked closely at the performance of new hybrids with the Herculex event (Figure 4). What did this event offer that the Yieldgard events did not? The Cry1F protein. This ‘Bt’ protein is an endotoxin that kills these other three insect pests as well as ECB. The transgene uses the corn ubiquitin promoter which directs expession in all plant tissues. While hybrids with these Cry transgenes are are all Bt hybrids, there are definite management implications with using Yieldgard (Cry1ab) compared to Herculex (Cry1F).

**Herculex diagram.** *(Image credit: D. Lee)*

Quiz

Question

The coding region that encodes a protein that will be an endotoxin to ECB is...

Cry1Ab

Incorrect: all three coding regions code for different Cry proteins but each has toxicity to ECB larvae.

Cry1F

Incorrect: all three coding regions code for different Cry proteins but each has toxicity to ECB larvae.

Cry9c

Incorrect: all three coding regions code for different Cry proteins but each has toxicity to ECB larvae.

all of the above

Correct: all three coding regions code for different Cry proteins but each has toxicity to ECB larvae.

Looks Good! Correct: all three coding regions code for different Cry proteins but each has toxicity to ECB larvae.

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