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{{Taxobox
| color = lightgreen
| name = Guayule
| image = Parthenium argentatum (USDA).jpg
| image_width = 240px
| regnum = [[Plant]]ae
| divisio = [[Flowering plant|Magnoliophyta]]
| classis = [[Dicotyledon|Magnoliopsida]]
| ordo = [[Asterales]]
| familia = [[Asteraceae]]
| genus = ''[[Parthenium]]''
| species = '''''P. argentatum'''''
| binomial = ''Parthenium argentatum''
| binomial_authority = [[Carolus Linnaeus|L.]]
}}
'''Guayule''' (''Parthenium argentatum''), pronounced 'why-YOU-lee', is a [[shrub]] in the genus ''[[Parthenium]]'' of the family [[Asteraceae]], native to the southwestern [[United States]] and northern [[Mexico]]. The plant can be used as an alternate source of [[latex]] that is also [[hypoallergenic]], unlike the normal ''[[para rubber tree|Hevea]]'' rubber. In pre-Columbian times, the guayule was a secondary source of latex for rubber, the principal source being the [[Castilla elastica]] tree. The name "guayule" derives from the [[Nahuatl]] word ''ulli/olli'', "rubber".
In the 1920s, the plant saw a brief an intense amount of agricultural research when the Intercontinental Rubber Company in California produced 1400 tons of rubber after leaf blight decimated the Brazilian rubber industry. Then again during [[World War II]] when [[Japan]] cut off America's Malaysian [[latex]] resources. The war ended before large-scale farming of the guayule plant began, and the project was scrapped, as it was cheaper to import tree-derived latex than to crush the shrubs for a smaller amount of latex.
[[Image:GuayuleProducts.jpg|left|thumb|Experimental products made from guayule.]]
Recently, the guayule plant has seen a small but growing resurgence in research and agriculture due to its [[hypoallergenic]] properties. While [[Hevea]]-derived rubber contains proteins that can cause severe allergic reactions in a few people, guayule does not. With the AIDS crisis of the 1980s, the surge in rubber-glove usage revealed how many people were allergic to latex (about 10% of health-care workers, according to OSHA), and thereby created a niche market for guayule. There are synthetic alternatives for medical device products, but they are just not as stretchy as natural rubber. Guayule performs like Hevea but contains none of the proteins that cause latex allergies.
The company leading the commercialization of guayule is [http://www.yulex.com Yulex Corporation], which is the world's leader in manufacturing and marketing safe, natural rubber latex for medical products from guayule. Via their proprietary, high-yielding lines of Guayule, Yulex® is a cost-effective, clinically proven solution to the serious health risks posed by tropical latex products imported from Southeast Asia.
With millions of Americans suffering from various symptoms of latex allergy disease, Yulex is rapidly expanding its operations to bring natural latex products that are free of tropical proteins to the health care and consumer markets. Yulex's biorefinery extracts biomass into economic renewable, bio-based materials such as cellulosic ethanol, adhesives, organic pesticides, wood preseratives and other specialty chemicals.
==External links==
*[http://www.hort.purdue.edu/newcrop/proceedings1993/v2-338.html Guayule: A Source of Natural Rubber]
*[http://books.google.com/books?vid=OCLC69204390&id=PrEO3ZItYMEC&dq=Guayule+(Parthenium+Argentatum+Gray):+A+Rubber-plant+of+the+Chihuahuan+Desert+By+Francis+Ernest+Lloyd&hl=en Guayule (Parthenium Argentatum Gray): A Rubber-plant of the Chihuahuan Desert]
* [http://www.yulex.com Yulex Corporation]
* [http://www.fastcompany.com/magazine/115/next-innovation.html Next Innovation: Another Rubber Tree]
[[Category:Asteraceae]]
[[Category:Crops originating from the Americas]]
[[es:Guayule]]
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