AUSTIN, Texas - They look no more significant than bits of popcorn
tossed into a finger bowl.  But the small balls of cotton floating
in a petri dish in the laboratory of Dr. R. Malcolm Brown Jr. could
hold the key to increased profits for a major Texas industry.
 

Brown, holder of the Johnson & Johnson Centennial Chair in Plant
Cell Biology, and his graduate student, Rong Feng, have developed a
novel method for growing cotton fibers in submerged cell culture,
which means they are growing plant cells away from the mother plant
using liquid filled with special nutrients.
 

Research by these biologists at The University of Texas at Austin
could pave the way for development of stronger, better textiles and
specialty cotton products, a potential boon for the $1.2
billion-a-year cotton industry in Texas.  The Texas Agricultural
Extension Service estimates the total economic impact of cotton in
Texas is $2.3 billion.
 

Their research is supported by a grant from the Texas Food and Fiber
Commission.  Brown is a professor in the section of molecular
genetics and microbiology at UT Austin's College of Natural
Sciences.  Rong, a native of the northwestern Chinese province of
Shanxi, worked in genetic breeding and tissue research at a cotton
research institute in China for six years before coming to study in
the United States.
 

Brown explained that previously, cotton fibers only could be
produced in culture by floating the ovules (or seed) on the surface
of a liquid medium.  If the ovules sank, fiber production ceased.
The new method involves actually submerging the seeds in the liquid,
which produces fibers very similar to those grown on the living
plant.
 

Brown said he hopes that some day it will be possible to produce a
fiber product that has better quality and more diverse traits for
yarn and textile production.  Brown said the new submerged ovule
culture technique has the potential to show researchers how the
cellulose walls of cotton fibers could be made stronger.
 

Fibers grown in submerged culture often are smaller in diameter and
have thicker cell walls.  The result is the laboratory production of
cotton fibers that may have unique traits worthy of further
investigation.
 

"Some of these fibers grown in submerged culture have characteristic
helical thickenings of secondary cell walls.  These patterns are
more like those found in the xylem elements of woody plants," Brown
said.
 

Brown said such cells might have important new properties such as
greater strength, greater plasticity and could have the potential to
alter and improve textiles and specialty cotton products, with major
implications for the Texas economy.
 

"If scientists can experimentally alter the dimensions of the cotton
fiber as well as cellulose biosynthesis, it should be possible to
alter its strength and thus change the way cotton can be handled,"
Brown said.  Brown said this also would be important for yarn and
textile production.
 

"Using the submerged cotton ovule technique, we have the ability to
investigate how the world's finest cotton is produced.  Submerged
fibers can give us clues for using genetic engineering to alter or
improve fiber traits important in producing yarn and textiles,"
Brown said.
 

Brown said the concept is still in its infancy.   Scientists need to
do more research at the cellular and molecular levels to understand
what causes cotton cellulose to develop the unique properties that
make it favorable for textile production and use.  "With the
submerged fiber technique, we can begin to develop a new
understanding of how cotton fiber grows.  The submerged cotton fiber
culture will provide the first direct clues to learning more about
this dynamic process," Brown said.
 

A manuscript detailing the research was published in September in
the journal titled In Vitro Cellular and Developmental Biology,
which ranks among the top 30 percent of cell biology journals.
Brown also recently presented the results of this work at the 2000
World Congress of In Vitro Biology in San Diego.
 

 The Brown laboratory is a pioneering facility in the
discovery of the genes and enzymes involving cellulose biosynthesis.
The submerged culture method developed by Brown and Rong allow
continuous monitoring of the growth process using some of the
world's best optical microscopes and advanced image processing
technology, yielding an unprecedented method for learning more about
the dynamics of cell growth, Brown said.
 

 The scientists have produced dramatic time-lapse videos
showing cellular movements within the cotton fibers, views of the
growth process never before seen.  Their research is continuing into
the molecular basis for the way the cotton fibers sprout when they
are submerged in the culture.

For more information, contact Dr. R. Malcolm Brown Jr. at (512) 471-3364,
visit his Web site at:
http://www.botany.utexas.edu/facstaff/facpages/mbrown/ or e-mail
rmbrown@mail.utexas.edu.

For colorful images of cotton fiber, contact Marsha Miller at (512) 471-3151.

For more information about the 2000 World Congress of In Vitro
Biology, visit the Web site at:
http://www.sivb.org/

The University of Texas at Austin Office of Public Affairs is
providing the following press release as an e-mail in the form of
text within this message. The article also will be posted in the
"New Releases"  section of the Office of Public Affairs Website,
located at www.utexas.edu/opa.
 

Contact: Mary Lenz,  (512) 471-3151