BASF ups new ais and pipeline sales potential - Agrow

AGROW | No 633 | February 8th 2012 Products
Bayer debuts fluopyram in Turkey
Bayer CropScience has debuted a fungicide formulation based
on its new active ingredient, fluopyram, in Turkey. The country
granted registration late last year, and it is the first confirmed
product approval for a fungicide based on the active ingredient.
Luna Experience (fluopyram 200 g/litre + tebuconazole 200
g/litre) is a suspension concentrate formulation for use on
nine crops, including apples for the control of scab (Venturia
inaequalis), on grapevines against powdery mildew (Uncinula
necator), cherries against brown rot (Monilinia laxa), and
tomatoes, aubergines and peppers for the control of tomato
powdery mildew (Leveillula taurica). It is safe for bees and nontarget
organisms, Bayer notes.
Fluopyram comes from the pyridylethylbenzamide family of
fungicides. It is a succinate dehydrogenase inhibitor (SDHI).
Fluopyram was developed for use on over 70 crops, and was
unveiled in 2009 (Agrow No 567, p 23). Recommended
application rates for the ai range from 0.2-0.5 litres/ha.
The US EPA has recently proposed the registration of five
fungicide products based on fluopyram, some in formulation
with other ais, including Luna Experience (Agrow No 631, p
20). The EU registration application for the new fungicide was
declared complete in 2009, and first member state approvals
were expected by 2011 for use on grapevines and strawberries
(Agrow No 567, p 23).
BASF brands new dicamba
Engenia
BASF plans to apply for US approval for a new formulation of
the herbicide, dicamba, under the Engenia brand this year. It is
intended for use on Monsanto’s genetically modified dicambatolerant
soybeans. “Engenia will be an important new tool for
soybean growers battling herbicide-resistant weeds, like Palmer
amaranth, waterhemp [both Amaranthus spp] and marestail
[Conyza canadensis],” says Paul Rea, vice-president of BASF’s
US crop protection business. Research on advances in dicamba
formulations and the use of the herbicide on dicamba-tolerant
crops was presented at the US Southern Weed Science Society
annual meeting last month.
BASF and Monsanto have been collaborating on the
development of dicamba formulations for use on GM soybeans
for the past three years. The companies entered into a licensing
agreement covering the commercialisation of the herbicides last
year (Agrow No 612, p 2).
BASF expects to receive US approval for Engenia prior to the
commercialisation of Monsanto’s Genuity Roundup Ready 2
Yield dicamba-tolerant soybeans. Its first stacks of dicamba
tolerance and glyphosate tolerance are being lined up for
on-farm testing in 2013, with a commercial launch planned
for 2014 (Agrow No 631, p 4). Monsanto is also developing
dicamba-tolerant cotton, maize and canola.
JANUARY 2011
The US Patent and Trademark Office in December published
a total of 53 patent applications from 28 different assignees,
covering genetically modified plants and methods of producing
them.
Two were for input traits, one of which, from Bayer
CropScience, concerned a chimeric gene construct conferring
resistance to several different classes of herbicides. There were
27 applications published that concerned output traits, including
15 claiming improvements to stress tolerance or increasing
yield. Methods of altering the content of GM plants accounted
for nine applications. These included a pair of filings from BASF
concerning the production of arachidonic and eicosapentaenoic
acid in plants using desaturase enzymes derived from algae.
Three applications concerned methods of altering plant
phenotypes.
A further 24 applications concerned other aspects of
biotechnology, such as newly identified promoters, expressed
sequence tags or transformation methods. The latter included
two filings from Dow AgroSciences for nanoparticle-mediated
transformation methods.
DuPont, including seed subsidiary Pioneer Hi-Bred
International, dominated the field with 15 applications published.
Its closest rival was Monsanto, which had six filings published.
BASF, Ceres and Dow each had three applications published.
Bayer and the US Michigan State University each had two
applications published.
To browse the complete list of selected patents, please log in at:
http://www.agrow.com/plantbiotech/patentwatch.
For enquiries, please email the Plant Biotech editor,
Hazel Blake, at hazel.blake@informa.com.
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USPTO Patent Applications
January 2012
Herbicide Tolerance
Insect Resistance
Stacked
Nematode resistance
Other Pathogen Resistance
Altered Content
Altered Phenotype
Stress/Yield
Regulatory Sequences
Transformation Methods
Other Polynucleotide
Sequences