Patent ID: 7205455

Claim:
A method of selectively inducing expression of a nucleotide sequence of interest in a plant, said method comprising: a) stably incorporating into the genome of said plant a first expression cassette, said first expression cassette comprising a first promoter operably linked to a first nucleotide sequence that encodes a first protein having ecdysone receptor activity, wherein said first nucleotide sequence has at least 90% sequence identity to the coding sequence set forth in nucleotides 368–2005 of SEQ ID NO: 1; b) stably incorporating into the genome of said plant a second expression cassette, wherein said second expression cassette comprises a transcriptional regulatory region operably linked to a second nucleotide sequence which is designated the target sequence; c) stably incorporating into the genome of said plant a third expression cassette comprising a promoter operably linked to a third nucleotide sequence that encodes a second protein having ultraspiracle activity, wherein said third nucleotide sequence has at least 90% sequence identity to the coding sequence set forth in nucleotides 224–1603 of SEQ ID NO: 3; and d) contacting said plant with a ligand that binds to at least one of said proteins to form a ligand-protein complex, wherein said ligand-protein complex interacts with said transcriptional regulatory region to induce expression of said target sequence.