While great gains have been made in the use of hybrid
maize in the productivity and yield per acre, over that
of inbred maize, further substantial gains due to hybrid
vigor are not anticipated. Consequently, efforts must be
directed to drastically changing the characteristics of
the commercial maize plant by genetic or environmen
tal manipulation.
Hence one of the objects of this invention is to signi?
cantly increase the yield per acre of maize. For exam
ple, in the Apr. 17, 1974 edition of The Wall vStreet
Journal, the article entitled “In Search of Superbean”, it
was pointed out that soybeans could not easily be hy
bridized and therefore fell far behind corn in productiv
ity increase. During the period of 1950 to 1973, soy
beans increased in productivity from 21.8 to 27.8 bush
els per acre while corn increased from 38.4 to 91.4 bush
els per acre.