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Atomic gardening


Atomic gardening is a form of mutation breeding where plants are exposed to radioactive sources, typically cobalt-60, in order to generate useful mutations.

The practice of plant irradiation has resulted in the development of over two thousand new varieties of plants, most of which are now used in agricultural production. One example is the resistance to verticillium wilt of the "Todd's Mitcham" cultivar of peppermint which was produced from a breeding and test program at Brookhaven National Laboratory from the mid-1950s. Additionally, the Rio Star Grapefruit, developed at the Texas A&M Citrus Center in the 1970s, now accounts for over three quarters of the grapefruit produced in Texas.

Beginning in the 1950s, atomic gardens were a part of Atoms for Peace, a program to develop peaceful uses of fission energy after World War II. Gamma gardens were established in laboratories in the United States, Europe, parts of the former USSR, India and Japan. Though these gardens were initially designed with the aim of testing the effects of radiation on plant life, research gradually turned towards using radiation to introduce beneficial mutations that could give plants useful characteristics. Such characteristics include increased resilience to adverse weather, or a faster growth rate. In addition, the Atomic Gardening Society was established in 1959 by Muriel Howorth, an atomic activist from the United Kingdom, in conjunction with a growing movement to bring atomic energy and experimentation into the lives of ordinary citizens. In 1960, Howorth published a book entitled "Atomic Gardening for the Layman" along a similar theme. Notably, the Atomic Gardening Society utilized an early form of crowd-sourcing, in which members received irradiated seeds, planted them in their gardens, and sent reports back to Howorth detailing the results. Howorth herself made national news upon growing a two-foot-tall peanut plant after planting an irradiated nut. The youngest member of the society was Christopher Abbey (15), a student at Eastbourne College and the son of a dentist, who received a certificate of merit for propagating several species of irradiated seeds to maturity. Irradiated seeds were sold to the public by C.J. Speas, a Tennessee dentist who had obtained a licence for a cobalt-60 source; and sold seeds produced in a backyard cinderblock bunker. Speas did so upon seeing an opportunity for amateur gardeners to get involved in testing. Howorth, in an effort to give the members of her society a more broad selection, began ordering seeds from Speas in large quantities. By 1960, Speas had reportedly shipped Howorth over three and a half million seeds, which were then distributed to nearly a thousand individual Society members.


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