Enhancing growth and quality of medical marihuana (cannabis sativa) in hydroponic systems

在加拿大，有执照的种植者和个人对医用大麻（以及未来可能的娱乐用途）的种植兴趣迅速增长，这引起了人们对产品质量和生产中使用的菌株一致性的关注。此外，人们还担心生产环境的可靠性以及种植方法可能对患者和消费者可获得的最终产品产生的影响。使这些关切更加严重的是，事先缺乏对影响作物的疾病和生产者可用的疾病管理办法的研究。在拟议的研究中，将解决生产高质量医用大麻面临的各种挑战。首先，将使用分子方法评估广泛种植的大麻品系之间的遗传变异程度。使用该信息，将靶向基因组中的特定区域，目的是开发可用于鉴定/确认生产中特定菌株的遗传同一性的DNA指纹图谱方法。这将在确保产品的质量和一致性方面具有商业适用性。第二，将研究在高度集约化种植期间影响大麻的疾病，以及病原体可能引入和传播的潜在方法。将通过评价用于疾病管理的已注册生物防治产品来调查基于生物方法的疾病防治备选方案，以确定最具潜力的产品。虽然组织培养方法为大麻的繁殖提供了优点，可以是均匀的和无病原体的，但这种方法的通用性和适用性尚未被研究。因此，利用组织培养方法获得高质量的大麻植株将作为第三个目标进行研究。在拟议的研究中，将评估选定菌株对组织培养方法的反应。该合作研究项目的成果将为加拿大的医用大麻行业以及监管机构提供一套急需的研究指导方针，以确保为消费者提供高质量的产品。********

The rapidly growing interest in cultivation of marihuana (Cannabis sativa) for medical use (and potentially recreational use in the future) in Canada by licensed growers and individuals has raised concerns over product quality and consistency of the strains used in production. In addition, there are concerns about the reliability of the production environment and the impact that cultivation methods could have on the final product available to patients and consumers. Compounding these concerns is the lack of prior research on diseases affecting the crop and disease management options available for producers. These various challenges to the production of high quality marihuana for medical use will be addressed in the proposed research. Firstly, an assessment of the extent of genetic variability amongst widely grown strains of marihuana will be made using molecular approaches. Using this information, specific regions in the genome will be targeted with the objective of developing a DNA fingerprinting method that can be used to identify/confirm the genetic identity of specific strains in production. This will have commercial applicability in ensuring quality and consistency of the product. Secondly, the diseases affecting marihuana during highly intensive cultivation will be studied, as well as potential methods through which pathogens may be introduced and spread. Disease control options based on biological approaches will be investigated by evaluation of registered biological control products for disease management to identify those with the most potential. Although tissue culture methods provide advantages to propagation of marihuana that can be uniform and free of pathogens, the versatility and applicability of this approach has not been investigated. Therefore, the utility of tissue culture methods to obtain high quality plantlets of marihuana will be studied as a third objective. Select strains will be assessed for their response to tissue culture methods in the proposed research. The outcome of this collaborative research project will provide the medical marihuana industry in Canada, as well as regulatory agencies, with a much-needed set of research-derived guidelines to ensure that a high quality product is guaranteed for consumers. ********