What's New
Prof to Use Dandelions to Help Rubber Industry
March 18, 2011
An OAC plant breeder hopes to coax natural rubber from Russian dandelion to feed a growing global rubber market and to offer a potentially lucrative new crop for farmers in southern Ontario. Plant agriculture professor Dave Wolyn has received a grant from the Sand Plains Community Development Fund (SPCDF) in Tillsonburg, Ont., to study the growth and breeding of Russian dandelion plants to develop a Canadian rubber industry, it was announced Thursday.
“There’s a potential opportunity for this plant to produce rubber and for us to create a rubber industry and an alternative crop for this region,” said John Klunder, SPCDF program co-ordinator.
Wolyn received a $143,500 grant from SPCDF. The project has also received support from KoK Technologies Inc. in Penticton, B.C., whose owner, Anvar Buranov, has developed a patented process for recovering natural rubber.
Wolyn and other Guelph researchers will use this year’s plant trial results to see whether Russian dandelion can become a new field crop for a natural rubber industry and for related products such as latex, food additives and biofuels.
