Endophytes can provide enhanced drought tolerance, summer survival, and insect and disease resistance to grasses. Endophytes are fungi belonging to the genus Neotyphodium that live in the leaves and stems of grasses and are carried from plant to plant only through seed. These fungi do not cause any disease in the grasses, but under most circumstances they are beneficial to the growth and surviv...

Temperate perennial grasses are important worldwide as a livestock nutritive energy source and a potential feedstock for lignocellulosic biofuel production. The annual temperate grass Brachypodium distachyon has been championed as a useful model system to facilitate biological research in agriculturally important temperate forage grasses based on phylogenetic relationships. To physically corrob...

A historic profile of endophyte-induced tall fescue toxicosis is presented. A chronology of events is presented, beginning with the importance of finding Balansia-infected grasses in a tall fescue pasture in north central Georgia. This initial finding was followed by the discovery that another related endophyte was present in tall fescue and other major forage grasses. This species of endophyte...

Many western grasslands and scrublands are being overrun by Mediterranean annual grasses that are a limiting impediment to grassland restoration throughout the western United States (Kay et al. 1981; Dyer and Rice 1997, 1999; Brown and Rice 2000). Conserving and restoring these invaded ecosystems are important biodiversity goals. Restoring perennial grasslands can also increase the forage quali...

Cinnamoyl CoA-reductase (CCR) and caffeic acid O-methyltransferase (COMT) catalyze key steps in the biosynthesis of monolignols, which serve as building blocks in the formation of plant lignin. We identified candidate genes encoding these two enzymes in perennial ryegrass (Lolium perenne) and show that the spatio-temporal expression patterns of these genes in planta correlate well with the deve...

Perennial species offer significant advantages as crops including reduced soil erosion, lower energy inputs after the first year, deeper root systems that access more soil moisture, and decreased fertilizer inputs due to the remobilization of nutrients at the end of the growing season. These advantages are particularly relevant for emerging biomass crops and it is projected that perennial grass...

The main directions of research on perennial grasses in the field feed production Feed Institute are revealed. analysis was carried out grasses: clover, alfalfa, galega and grasses. In chronological order, indicating names positions researchers, a list all areas on: introduction culture is given; terms, methods sowing, norms sowing seeds single-species mixed phytocenoses; selection cover crops;...