Diter von Wettstein
From Analysis of Mutants to Metabolic and Genetic Engineering
WSU researcher Dr. Diter von Wettstein leads a team working on breeding high-yielding, proanthocyanidin-free barley, which allows breweries to bottle brilliantly clear beer without chill-haze proofing.
Proanthocyanidins (condensed tannins) from the seed coat tissue in the grain are carried through the brewing process into beer where they cause chill-haze. Currently, that haze is removed by chemical treatment to achieve clear beer with the long shelf life desired by consumers. von Wettstein’s identification of the genes and enzymes synthesizing proanthocyanidins in barley led to mutation breeding of “Radiant,” an elite barley variety which lacks these compounds. Brewer interest in this research is increasing as attention is focused on the undesirable use of chemicals for chill haze proofing.
von Wettstein also is researching the unique genes available in barley to produce proanthocyanidins in the leaves of alfalfa, where they are desired to protect cows and sheep from pasture bloat and can improve amino acid uptake.
The 8 billion broiler chickens produced yearly in the United States are fed with genetically-modified corn. Typically, barley feed for poultry is low in nutritional value due to the absence of an intestinal enzyme for efficient de-polymerization of (1,3:1,4)- β-D-glucan. von Wettstein has developed high yielding barleys containing a protein-engineered (1,3;1,4)-β-D-glucanase. Chicken trials show the addition of just 0.02 percent protein-engineered barley/per kg diet added to non-GMO barley provided the same growth rates and quality as chickens fed GMO corn. Thus, this environmentally friendly barley feed additive for non-ruminant animals consisting of grain containing a novel enzyme is needed only at a concentration comparable to the amount of trace minerals in the diet, and can increase non-transgenic barley production many times over in states like Washington where 3 million broilers are produced yearly.
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Contact Information
Diter von Wettstein
R.A. Nilan Distinguished Professor
Department of Crop and Soil Sciences
Washington State University
PO Box 646420
Johnson Hall 267
Pullman, WA 99164-6420
Telephone: 509-335-3635
Fax: 509-335-8674
E-mail: diter@wsu.edu
Dr. Diter vonWettstein holds the Robert Nilan Distinguished Professorship in the Department of Crop and Soil Sciences and the School of Molecular Biosciences at Washington State University.
As a youngster, von Wettstein spent many days visiting the Botanical Gardens of Göttingen and Munich, Germany, and was schooled in Berlin, Vienna and Innsbruck. He earned Ph.D.s at the University of Tübingen, Germany, in biology/ biochemistry in 1953 and the University of Stockholm, Sweden, in genetics the same year. In 1957, he earned a D.Sc. in genetics at the University of Stockholm, Sweden.
Awarded a Rockefeller fellowship in 1958, he researched in the phytotron at California’s Institute of Technology, learned the ropes of bacterial and phage genetics at the Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory in New York, and pursued spectroscopic analyses of his mutants at Carnegie Institution's Department of Plant Biology at Stanford University.
This work provided the opportunity for a seminar and visit with Dr. Robert Nilan at Washington State University, which subsequently developed into a long-standing cooperation on mutation research and breeding of novel barley varieties.
From 1962 to 1975, von Wettstein served as professor in genetics and head of the Institute of Genetics at Copenhagen University in Denmark; from 1972 to 1996 he was professor and head of the Department of Physiology at Carlsberg Laboratory (also in Denmark), and director of Carlsberg Plant Breeding. In 1996, von Wettstein accepted the R.A. Nilan Distinguished Professorship at Washington State University. To date, he has supervised 73 Ph.D. students with dissertations in genetics, plant and brewers yeast breeding, developmental physiology, cell biology, plant biochemistry, and molecular biology. Much of the research in his laboratories at Copenhagen and Pullman was carried forward by 120 postdoctoral fellows and visiting scientists.
von Wettstein is a member of 11 Academies of Sciences, has been awarded an honorary Dr. agro.h.c. by the University of Agriculture, Copenhagen, and received from the president of Austria the distinguished decoration for rendering outstanding service to the Republic of Austria.
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