Yield, yield components, and fiber properties of insect-resistant cotton lines containing a Bacillus thuringiensis toxin gene

Crop yield and quality could be affected in transgenic crop plants carrying foreign genes which confer resistance to plant pests. Scientists at Monsanto Company produced nine transgenic cotton (Gossypium hirsutum L.) lines, each containing one of the two Bacillus thuringiensis var. kurstaki (Berliner) constructs, cryIA(b) or cryIA(c), that encode a protein toxic to lepidopteran insects. We undertook this study to determine whether these transgenic lines exhibit any undesirable agronomic or fiber properties. At Maricopa, AZ, we grew five, four, and three transgenic lines in field plots in 1990, 1991, and 1992, respectively; the parental «Coker 312» and the locally adapted, nectariless, high fiber-strength «Md 51 ne» were included each year