article_snippet: New research funded by farmers aims to breed a wheat variety for people who can't eat the  grain, an endeavor that comes as wider consumer interest in gluten-free foods is booming.
article_snippet: The Kansas Wheat Commission is spending $200,000 for the first two years of the project, which is meant to identify everything in wheat's DNA sequences that can trigger a reaction in people suffering from celiac disease.
article_snippet: Chris Miller, senior director of research for Engrain, a Kansas company that makes products to enhance the nutrition and appearance of products made by the milling and cereal industry, said funding research to breed gluten-free wheat is 'the right thing to do' The only known treatment known is a gluten-free diet, which consists of not eating foods that contain wheat, rye and barley.
article_snippet: Miller shows a flour solution from a specific strain of wheat at a research facility in the Wheat Innovation Center in Manhattan, Kansas.
article_snippet: The research for gluten-free wheat began in July at the Wheat Innovation Center in Manhattan, Kansas.
article_snippet: It is still in It early stages and researchers are looking at proteins inside the grain . '
article_snippet: The research, which began in July at the Wheat Innovation Center in Manhattan, Kansas, is still in its early stages, with researchers extracting proteins from seeds of various varieties of wheat.
article_snippet: Miller also plans to examine the wild relatives of wheat as well as modern varieties, and will tap into a Kansas wheat variety repository that dates back to the 1900s in hopes of finding a variety - perhaps one that fell out of favor among commercial farmers - that might already be low in reactivity for celiac sufferers.
article_snippet: Researchers hope to use that variety to develop a gluten-free wheat using traditional breeding methods.
article_snippet: Miller (pictured) plans to look at wild relatives of wheat as well as modern grains.
article_snippet: Researchers hope to use these varieties and traditional breeding methods to develop a gluten-free wheat .
article_snippet: The idea of having a variety of wheat that they could eat that has those wonderful wheat-like properties would certainly be very interesting for they.'
highlights_snippet: The research aims to identify things in wheat's DNA sequence that can trigger a reaction from those suffering from celiac disease .
  