hi-tech!! you guys are like the chinese of breeders
Could not have put it better myself, the Chinese copy other people's products all the time too! lol
Just joking, I looked up this technology, it's been around since the early 90s, sounds like it could have some merit:
Seed Treatments
Author: Dr. Gregory Welbaum
Assistant Professor
Department of Horticulture
Virginia Tech
Blacksburg, VA 24061-0327
December 1994
The use of treated vegetable seeds has increased dramatically during the past 10 years. Many growers now use more expensive hybrid seeds, so they are willing to pay for treatments that will help improve performance in the field to protect their investment. Fungicide applications are one of the more common seed treatments used today. A light coating of fungicide is usually applied to the seeds coat. A brightly colored dye is sometimes added as a reminder that a fungicide has been applied. Legume seeds are frequently treated with rhizobium to improve nitrogen fixation after germination. Coating and pelleting are two widely used seed treatments, particularly with small-seeded species. Coated seeds have a thin layer of material such as clay or
diatomaceous earth applied to the surface of the seed to make them larger and easier to handle. However, coating does not change the overall shape of the seed. Seeds are coated to make them easier to handle, to deliver chemicals, to improve soil contact, or to inoculate seeds with microbes The exact composition of coating material is a carefully guarded secret by the companies who develop them. Pelleted seeds are seeds that have been coated until they have a round shape. This makes seeds easier to handle and plant particularly with seeders that utilize belts with prepunched holes of a specific size. To make identification easier, coated seeds are often color-coded, so cultivars or types are not mixed at planting. One successful pelleting treatment splits upon hydration and does not pose a barrier to radicle growth or limit oxygen availability to the seeds. Another recent innovation is film coating. Many coating materials produce a lot of dust. However, film coats are made of the same materials used by the pharmaceutical industry to coat pills. These coatings are water soluble but dust free. Coated pregerminated seeds, particularly celery, are marketed by some companies in Europe. One company marketed pregerminated celery seeds in the United States during the mid-1980's. Synthetic seeds derived from tissue culture and coated in gelatinous material have been developed but are expensive, difficult to ship, have a short shelf-life, and are excessively variable for commercial use. Current research has focused on developing synthetic seeds that are desiccation tolerant and can be handled like other seeds. Although progress has been made in developing desiccation tolerant synthetic seeds, it is unlikely that they will be commercially available for many years. Primed seeds have been subjected to a controlled hydration process followed by redrying. Generally, priming reduces the time to germination and may improve the seed's ability to germinate under temperature or moisture stress. Priming does not usually improve the viability of poor quality seeds. Peppers, tomatoes, and lettuce show a greater response to priming than some other types of seeds. Since the seed law does not required that primed seeds be labeled, they seldom are. Some seed companies advertise seeds as `vigorized' instead of calling them primed. Sized seeds have been carefully sorted for large size and uniformity. In many cases, large seeds are sold at a premium, because they are often more vigorous and may produce more uniform emergence. Some growers prefer sized seeds in order to get more uniform placement when belt seeders are used. It is possible to buy seeds spaced at a specific interval on tape. The tape is buried in the ground and dissolves when wetted. `Seed tapes' are used mainly by small growers and home gardeners.
