By Sean Henahan, Access Excellence

HOUGHTON, MI (9/24/96) As Autumn falls in the West, the foliage of the aspen trees turns a brilliant yellow. Meanwhile, thanks to an unexpected discovery by a genetic engineer, it may be possible to change the color of the wood of this, and possibly other tress, to more commercially appealing shades.

Researcher, Chung-Jui Tsai at Michigan Technological University was working on a project to develop genetic engineering procedures for aspen and in the process introduced two different genes to aspens that were designed to alter their lignin to make it easier for pulping. Peeling away the bark of a test sapling, she found that one of the genes had manifested itself by causing the saplings to produce red wood instead of the usual white.

"You don't have to analyze the red aspen. You just look at it , and there it is. Usually you have to wait for years for results. We just pulled back the bark, and wow! Even a kid can tell," said Tsai.

The new aspens are a salmon color, rosier than cedar, less red than redwood. And it varied from tree to tree, in hue, intensity, and design. Some of the saplings were mottled, spotted like a Dalmatian, red and white. And the new color won't sink back into the gene pool, never to be seen again. The researchers have already produced a second group of colored saplings started from cuttings taken from the first samples.

Aspen which has a basic white color of wood, has never been a very popular wood for lumber. The reddish tinge in redwood and fir tree wood, in contrast has driven the price up on the lumber from those trees as supplies diminish. Several wood products corporations are interesting in developing the 'red aspen' technology.

"Now aspen wood will have other uses. Furniture, exposed beams, paneling. I'm looking forward to the day when I won't have to paint the house," says Dr. Vincent Chiang, director of the MTU School of Forestry and Wood Products' Plant Biotechnology Center.

Chiang, Tsai, and their colleague, Dr. Gopi Podila want to gain a fundamental understanding of how the color change takes place in aspens. And they also want to try out their red-wood gene on other species since it affects a genetic pathway that's common to many hardwoods.

The researchers have applied for a license from the U.S. Department of Agriculture to plant the red aspens outside, so they can be studied as they grow to maturity in a natural environment.