CETS (Controlled Environmental Technology System) LLC is a supplier of equipment and innovation that produces AstroTubers (nuclear material, the earliest generation in potato production). The company’s technology uses computer-controlled growth phytotrons for the production of new AstroTubers every 60 days in any geographic location and in any climate. It minimizes the time required for introduction of new varieties and maximizes the availability of desired quantities of seed material in the shortest time possible.
The CETS facility houses 10 phytotrons in a 30-square-meter production area. Here, more than 100,000 AstroTubers are produced annually using only 150 tissue plantlets in sanitary conditions that require only 45 days to break dormancy for initial field planting.
The traditional way to grow tubers is through the use of greenhouses, which only produce one or two crops per year and needs thousands of plantlets that are typically produced in the laboratory following a very strict procedure requiring costly sterol conditions and use of expensive chemicals. These plantlets are not easy to grow, are expensive to transport, and suffer high mortality rates when planted directly in screen, glass or field conditions. A greenhouse environment is susceptible to disease and, once infected, it is difficult and costly to clean. Annual production per square meter is up to 400 tubers. In addition, it takes 180 or more days to break dormancy before initial field planting. In contrast, production of AstroTubers through the use of phytotrons can yield 3,000 tubers in only 45 days.
In a recent field test conducted by a certified Wisconsin seed grower, yield from AstroTubers was 30 percent higher than the yield experienced from seed generated both hydroponically and in a greenhouse (the traditional method) for the same variety.
The cost of imported seed typically represents 60 percent of the cost of potato production, negatively impacting net income from each harvest for those who import the seed they need. Poor quality of imported seed has been identified as a problem. Non-local disease and pests often accompany imported seed and take root in a location that previously had been free of them. Eradication is costly and time-consuming and hurts productivity. The practice of reusing potato stocks as seed results in the reduction of up to 50 percent of the saleable production in order to procure seeds for the following year’s crop.
The interior and exterior walls and floor of CETS’s phytotron are stainless steel and can be thoroughly sanitized after each harvest. More costly disinfection is not required. The sanitizing procedures used eliminate any possibility of carryover of disease infestation from one growth period to subsequent ones. This feature, coupled with the options of not reusing the rooting material for subsequent plantings and not re-circulating the nutrient solution during the growth period, provides an optimum situation for elimination of any potential for disease infection during the production of AstroTubers.
A simple structure is required to house the phytotrons. Each 60-day growing cycle requires 1,680 kilowatt-hours of electricity (a cost of around $1 per day) and 80 gallons of water per phytotron. After initial setup and training, CETS phytotrons are fabricated by contract.
In addition, CETS is a custom producer of AstroTubers and also provides technical expertise and educated counseling to the growers to assure that the field production results in the availability of a constantly renewed supply of high-quality seed potatoes that the industry demands.
CETS currently produces AstroTubers in Ukraine, Russia and the U.S.
In southern Russia, 10 CETS phytotrons have produced AstroTubers since 2009 to supply seed for a 30,000-acre potato operation, even though the owners were advised that healthy seed cannot be produced in their warm climate. Latkin farm, located in Arzamas, Russia, was able to eliminate the need to purchase imported seed, improving profitability by 60 percent in less than four years.
As is well understood, commercial potato production operations depend on a constantly renewed supply of high-quality, disease-free seed material. Additionally, major emphasis is currently being placed on seed production systems that limit or reduce the number of tuber field multiplications of generations derived originally from tissue culture plantlets because each successive planting of tubers in the field raises the potential for increased levels of disease infection. Such limited generation seed potato production increases the demand for nuclear stock. AstroTubers produced from tissue culture plantlets can meet this demand.
Another advantage of producing disease-free AstroTubers from stem cuttings derived from tissue culture plantlets in controlled environment facilities is that it fosters rapid multiplication of seed material. New cultivars can be rapidly multiplied to commercial seed quantities and made available to seed growers.
Phytotron technology has been optimized for potatoes; however, production of other crops can also be developed. Someone well-versed in growing another crop may be able to employ the technology for that particular crop simply by changing the programmable operating characteristics of the existing technology, without the need for any additional developmental modification. The technology is most readily adaptable to a crop that can be generated or multiplied from tissue culture, such as barley, rice and grasses