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Aquilaria
trees grow in the tropical rainforests of Asia and produce
agarwood inside the tree. Old growth trees are rare due to
extensive harvesting by collectors of agarwood during past centuries.
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Flowers
of Aquilaria |
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Seeds
produced by Aquilaria |
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Henry
Heuveling van Beek, Director of The Rainforest Project Foundation
(TRP) and cooperator in our research, standing in the TRP nursery
among Aquilaria seedlings. |
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Hundreds
of thousands of seedlings are being grown and planted for future
agarwood production. |
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Trees
planted grow very fast with good forest management practices. This
Aquilaria tree growing in Vietnam is 3 years old. |
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Tree
being harvested in one of our experimental plots after inducing
agarwood formation. |
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Cross
section of a tree from one of our experiments showing dark regions
of agarwood formed inside the tree. |
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A
cross section of an experiemental tree with agarwood observed by
scanning electron microscopy showing copious amounts of resin formed
in the wood cells. Aquilaria has an unusual anatomy and
specialized cells within the xylem produce the resin. |
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A longitudinal section
cut from an experimental tree with some of the sound wood carved out
showing the column of agarwood that formed inside the tree. |
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Professor Blanchette
showing conference delegates results from experiements to produce
agarwood during the First International Agarwood Conference field
trip at Nui Guai Mountain, Vietnam. |
