Lemnoideae (commonly called duckweed) is an ideal system for biofuels, bioremediation and carbon cycling due to their aspects of fast-growing, direct contact with media and simple growth requirements. Spirodela polyrhiza, one member of duckweed subfamily with the smallest genome size of 150 Mb, is becoming a model for functional genomics studies in aquatic plants. Its unique life cycle switching from growing phase (fronds) to dormant starch-rich state (turions) makes it a promising biofuel crops.

For years we have put much effort into developing the methods and tools to stimulate Spirodela as a model aquatic organism. In order to aid researchers in their duckweed experiments, we have summarized some methods we used and collected a list of resources. We have also included our representative publications that you may be interested in. We hope you find this information useful and if you have any questions feel free to contact us.

E-mail inquiries to: duckweed3@gmail.com or messing@waksman.rutgers.edu