The Annual Beltsville Symposium provides a forum for interaction among
scientists involved in research that has vital impact on agriculture and
on the agricultural sciences. The 10th Symposium in the series,
Biotechnology for Solving Agricultural Problems, focuses on the use of a
revolutionary new set of tools, biotechnology, and attempts to define
the set in terms of its applications in agriculture. Biotechnology has
already contributed to the genetic improvement of agricultural products.
Procedures that were impossible to test or to implement in the past
because of technological limitations are now routinely used by many
scientists. Four areas that have benefitted from advances in
biotechnology are covered in the symposium proceedings. These areas
include genetic manipulation, nutrition, health and disease, and natural
resource management. The 31 invited speakers have identified programs of
basic and applied research on plants, animals, and insects that fall
within these broad areas. Their research strategies included such
techniques as germline modification, gene mapping, monoclonal antibody
production, and gene transposition. These strategies have tapped new
well springs of information and technologies ranging from the regulation
of gene expression (and with it, the regulation of development, growth,
disease resistance, and nutrient metabolism) to degradation of
pesticides and toxic wastes. The applications of biotechnology to
agricultural research have opened virgin vistas with enormous potential.
The new biotechnological techniques and those that will evolve with
their use will contribute markedly to the capacity of the agricultural
sciences to advance the well-being of the human race.
