Perhaps readers of AgBioView would appreciate becoming aware of Messenger, a product containing harpin, a protein produced by the plant pathogenic bacterium, Erwinia amylovora, which causes fire blight of pear, apple and related plants. Harpin was isolated, characterized and its encoding gene cloned in my program at Cornell. We also found harpin elicits resistance to pathogens and insects and enhances growth of a wide range of plants that are treated with the protein by conventional means. The harpin-based technology was licensed in 1995, to a start-up company, EDEN Bioscience of Bothell, Washington. EDEN developed harpin as a commercial product, obtained EPA registration and is producing and selling harpin as Messenger(R). Last week the EPA awarded EDEN its Green Chemistry Award. The Messenger will be made available to third world farmers.

Harpin was discovered through biotechnological research, and it is produced through fermentation of Escherichia coli containing an engineered construct that results in enhanced production of the protein. Although transgenic plants expressing harpin are not yet available commercially, we have had very encouraging experimental results at Cornell with several plants. Thus, I feel that transgenic plants expressing harpin that confer the several beneficial effects of the protein, are likely to be available in the future.

More details at http://www.edenbio.com/

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