Bridgestone increases guayule yield

Bridgestone has announced that, as part of a joint project with the Fukuoka Bio-Community (a regional science-industry cluster in Japan established to promote the bioeconomy) and Kyushu University, it has succeeded for the first time in the world in creating genetically edited guayule plants and developing a fundamental technology that will help increase the yield of this desert shrub—an alternative source of natural rubber. 

Bridgestone has been researching guayule rubber since 2012, and currently operates a dedicated farm in Arizona, which is expected to help reduce the company’s future reliance on rubber derived from the latex of the Brazilian rubber tree (Hevea brasiliensis), grown only in equatorial regions and vulnerable to diseases and climate change. 

“With the growing number of vehicles worldwide, demand for natural rubber is expected to rise. To ensure a stable supply of raw materials, Bridgestone is working to increase rubber tree plantation yields—using methods such as disease diagnostics—while also striving to diversify rubber sources,” the company notes. 

As part of the project aimed at increasing rubber tree productivity, genome editing technologies developed at Kyushu University were applied, and genetically modified plants were successfully grown. In the future, Bridgestone intends to use these technologies to identify and determine the functions of beneficial genes affecting guayule productivity.

Previously, Bridgestone reported its intention to begin commercializing guayule rubber by 2030.