Biotech Firm Says It Has Found Way to Grow Blue Rose

Australian scientists said Wednesday that they will produce the world’s first blue roses, which will be sold as gifts costing about $80 a bloom.

The scientists claimed that they have cracked the genetic code that creates blue pigment in flowers and said they expect to be producing blue roses in two years.

“It’s a very expensive process, so we’re initially targeting this at very large markets,” said Edwina Cornish of Calgene Pacific Pty Ltd. in Melbourne.

“It would initially be marketed as a very exclusive gift, but gradually production would expand and prices come down.”

Long sought by horticulturists, the blue rose has defied conventional breeding methods because the flower lacks the pigment to generate the color blue.

But a blue rose now appears possible after researchers at Calgene, a biotechnology company, said they isolated the gene that generates blue in flowers such as petunias and irises.

The company, which has already developed techniques for grafting genes onto the genetic code of roses, has been working to isolate the gene for the past four years. It will use the color genes in petunias to make roses blue.