In a new biological twist to the old blended weave of cotton and polyester, a Middleton company is developing cotton plants that grow their own polyester as part of the cotton fiber.

Using genetic engineering, the cotton plants produce wrinkle-resistant, shrink-proof cotton fibers, said Russell Smestad, an executive with Agracetus Inc., near Madison.

The cotton plants actually grow "biopolymers," a polyester like compound, but the result should be the same as polyester, Smestad said Tuesday.

The fiber is the first of its kind, Smestad said, and could make the ailing American textile industry competitive worldwide.

At least, that's what the U.S. Commerce Department hopes for in granting Agracetus, a subsidiary of W.R. Grace & Co., a $1.1 million award to develop genetically engineered cotton fibers containing biopolymers.

Genes for growing the polymers are isolated from a common bacteria, Smestad said, and shot into young cotton plants using a gene gun developed at Agracetus.

The gun fires tiny gold particles coated with the genes into the nuclei of cotton plant cells where the genes direct the production of the polymer, which grows in the normally hollow center of the cotton fibers.

Altered plants have been grown in greenhouses at the Middleton site and in a field in Arkansas, but the cotton has yet to be turned into a shrink-proof T-shirt, Smestad said.

Smestad said the new fibers are "expected to create a high performance natural fiber that will combine the preferred appearance and texture of cotton with enhanced properties such as wrinkle resistance, better thermal characteristics and reduced shrinkage and absorbency."

Even though the grant money came from the government through the Advanced Technology Program, Agracetus retains rights to any patents developed through the research, Smestad said.

Agracetus' plans call for the company to grow the cotton itself and supply it to the American textile industry, Smestad said. The seeds would not be made available to cotton growers.

The product would compete with regular cotton and synthetic fibers, he said.

"We are taking the cotton fiber, which is preferred by most consumers, and we are retaining the texture and feel that people want. It is an entirely new fiber in the industry and should produce an improved thread, fabric and garment," he said.

The fiber could be produced of about the same cost as cotton but more cheaply than synthetics.

"Cotton was an unchanging raw product. Now we can take cotton in ways that breeding never could," he said.

The company continues to experiment on which bacterial polymer genes work best, he said.

"There are many biopolymers in nature. Research to determine which is best suited or offers the best result still has to be done," said Smestad, a co-manager of the company.

"We have already scaled the largest hurdle, which is to show the basic feasibility of the concept," he said.

One of the next steps will be development of biopolymer cotton fiber that already is colored. Blues and blacks are particularly being sought, he said.

"We are providing something that is not available anywhere in the world. It will help the domestic market," he said.

"It's sophisticated, but it's not magic," he said of the technology that has taken ten years to produce the plant.