Patent ID: 7348179

Claim:
A method of introducing a structural gene of interest into plants, comprising: (a) providing a plant cell having in its transcribed region a first nucleic acid construct comprising in operable association, at least one tobamovirus IRES (internal ribosome entry site), at least one site-specific recombination site and a reporter gene; (b) providing the plant cell of (a) with a site-specific recombinase which recognizes said site-specific recombination site(s) wherein said recombinase is provided recombinantly, and wherein recombinase-recombination site is selected from the group consisting of CRE-lox from bacteriophage PI, FLP-FRT from Saccharomyces cerevisiae , R-RS from Zygosaccharomyces rouxii , Gin-gix from bacteriophage Mu, integrase/att from bacteriophage Phi C31, and yeast endonuclease I-Scel; (c) introducing into the plant cell of (a) a second nucleic acid construct comprising a structural gene of interest flanked by recombination sites such that said structural gene of interest is integrated into the first nucleic acid construct at the site-specific recombination site(s) and wherein said structural gene of interest is under operable control of the IRES, wherein said site-specific recombinase catalyzes integration of the structural gene into the first nucleic acid construct; and (d) selecting for plant cells having the structural gene of interest integrated into the first nucleic acid construct, and which is under operable control of the IRES.