Q: Who is Cibus?

A: Cibus is a privately-held San Diego-based trait development company that produces environmentally-friendly crop traits for the agricultural community. Through the application of a proprietary technology called the Rapid Trait Development System (RTDS™), Cibus creates traits that have none of the market-resistance or regulatory burden of attributes engineered through the introduction of foreign genetic material. RTDS has proven itself in the laboratory with several different crops as well as in initial field trials of Cibus' first commercial crop, canola.

Q: What is Rapid Trait Development System (RTDS)?

A: Developed by scientists at Cibus, Rapid Trait Development System (RTDS) is an all-natural, environmentally-safe "smart breeding tool" that helps farmers grow plants with traits that produce desired effects. Unlike transgenic engineering, which takes genetic material from one species and inserts it into another, RTDS derives its genetic traits from the very same plant species being altered.

Q: How does Rapid Trait Development System (RTDS) work?

A: RTDS utilizes the knowledge of gene function gleaned from differences that naturally exist between genes in all living organisms. Thanks in part to recent advancements in genome mapping, RTDS is vastly more precise and quick-to-market than both traditional plant breeding (with or without marker assisted selection) and transgenic technology, which can take years to perfect. Cibus calls the RTDS process "gene conversion."

Here's how gene conversion works: Every time a cell copies DNA, it makes "scrivener" errors or spelling mistakes. These errors happen all the time, which is how natural variation arises. Cibus' technology harnesses the cell's own natural DNA repair machinery to correct such spelling mistakes, directing DNA repair enzymes to correct and repair the targeted gene in a specific way in order to produce a desired trait. Given its precision, the process is similar to altering a letter in a single word contained within a large book. Nothing in the genome is altered by this approach other than the changes directed by the process.

Q: What are the benefits of RTDS-grown crops compared to transgenically grown crops?

A: Faster to develop: RTDS crops and products reach the market faster because they take three to four years less time to develop than crops produced by transgenic engineering, which takes a more random approach to arriving at a desired trait.

Natural and environmentally friendly: RTDS relies on traditional plant breeding techniques that have been around for hundreds of years to create new, improved strains of plants and products. With RTDS crops, American farmers will be able to enter the global markets that reject GMO crops and compete in those markets with a commercially-viable alternative.

Less regulatory burden: RTDS’s all natural crops can go to market directly and will not be subjected to any GMO labeling requirements. RTDS has already won USDA approval as a safe, natural technology that poses no threat to consumers or to the environment. Regulatory agencies actually classify RTDS crops in the same category as traditionally bred plants—not in the same group as transgenic crops. Because of this classification, RTDS technology can save farmers an estimated $25 million per crop in the United States in regulatory costs.

Better yield with improved performance: Since RTDS-converted plants make their own natural change, their yield and performance are inherently better than the yield and performance of plants with traits developed using older transgenic methods as the RTDS operates exclusively within the genome of the plant, just like normal plant breeding. RTDS converted genes remain in their native location without random, uncontrolled or adverse patterns of expression.

Q: How does RTDS compare to gene marker assisted selection, which has been in the news?

A: Gene marker assisted selection (also known as Marker Assisted Selection, MAS) has been in use within the biotechnology and seed breeding industry for more than 20 years. MAS is completely different from RTDS. MAS does NOT create new traits; it merely follows genetic characteristics already in the plants using a clever form of molecular fingerprinting. MAS breeding helps plant breeders with their traditional selections and movement of traits to other germplasm pools (e.g. disease resistance, standability, etc) within a plant species. Cibus’ revolutionary RTDS technology has the ability to create new traits in plants without the insertion of foreign DNA.

Q: How does RTDS differ from mutagenesis?

A: Used by scientists since the early 1900s, mutagenesis is a natural process whereby changes occur in genes. Products of traditional mutagenesis are widely accepted by consumers but the process involves random change and is not reliably predictable. RTDS, on the other hand, allows precise gene targeting with predictable and certain outcomes.

Q: What is genomics, and how does it differ from RTDS?

A: The genomic revolution, which began in the 1990’s, seeks to understand the blueprint for life by mapping the DNA code of all genes and their associated DNA code. This genomic information allows us to understand the way an individual’s genes interact to create the individual’s traits. Genomics, in and of itself, only creates the road map between genes and traits. Until RTDS, there was no tool to exploit the information contained in the roadmap to create new traits. Transgenic technology can make changes using the roadmap, but it is a crude process---like a doctor going into surgery with a sledgehammer--- whereas Cibus—with RTDS—can use the roadmap to make very precise changes in genes.

Q: How does RTDS differ from "Tilling®"?

A: Tilling is traditional mutagenesis that utilizes chemicals as the mutagenic agent combined with high throughput molecular screening. Tilling uses a clever molecular screen to pick desired mutations out of a population of hundreds of thousands of random mutations in the hope of producing a desired trait. Unlike RTDS, tilling is unpredictable and unreliable. Tilling is not a site-specific mutagenesis process. RTDS allows precise gene targeting with predictable and certain outcomes. Scientists using a tilling approach could search for a desired result forever without success.

Q: What is the future of Cibus’ Technology?

A: The possibilities for developing traits using RTDS are endless. With new gene functions in plants being regularly discovered, Cibus scientists are provided with a continual host of new trait targets. RTDS promises a revolution in genetics-profitable new products that are acceptable to environmentally conscious consumers and governments. RTDS technology can be used to create traits including but not limited to:

• Tolerance to most herbicide chemistries currently marketed to farmers
  
• Starch modification in corn or wheat benefiting the food processors and end-use consumers
  
• Healthier oils and nutraceutical oils in crops such as canola and soybeans
  
• Industrial oils with important new functionalities