Transgenic rice expressing an amylopullulanase (APU) from the bacterium Thermoanaerobacter ethanolicus 39E produces grains which are less expensive to process for production of sugar syrup and protein-enriched flour. During risk assessment of the transgenic line in a field test, brown spot disease caused by Bipolaris oryzae was found more severe on the transgenic line APU than on its parental line TNG67. When lines APU and TNG67 were inoculated at seedling, tillering or heading stage with B. oryzae isolated from line TNG67, the disease was more severe on line APU than on line TNG67 at heading stage, but not at the seedling or tillering stage. However, when B. oryzae isolated from line APU was used in the inoculation tests, the disease was more severe on line APU than on line TNG67 at seedling stage, but not at the tillering or heading stage. To our knowledge, this is the first report of an unintended change in a transgenic plant to become more susceptible to a disease than the non-transgenic plant.
