Current Perspectives on Transgenic Plants – A Review

Abstract

The world's population may top nine billion people by the year 2050. To meet the needs of such a vast number of people, food production will need to be increased at the same rate or even faster. So, there is a need to use the genetic techniques to improve crops production and quality. Agricultural and horticultural crops offer substantial inputs to crop productivity, nutritional quality and human health. In recent times with advances in scientific and technological knowledge, there has been a high degree of success in crop improvement through marker assisted selection and genetic modification. Transgenic plants are the ones, whose DNA is modified using genetic engineering techniques with the main aim to introduce a new trait to the plant which does not occur naturally in the species with various benefits such as reduced environmental impact from pesticides and insecticide, increased yield, soil conservation, phytoremediation etc. However, it is now more than fifteen years since the first transgenic plants were generated experimentally. In that period there have been dramatic advances in our understanding on both basic and applied aspects of plant biology. Therefore, in the current narrative review of literature we mainly aimed describe and delineate on the current prospectives of transgenic plants, and their potential applications.