Research Results
1. Mapping Millet Genes
Minor millets include proso millet, (Panicum miliaceum), foxtail millet (Setaria italica), little millet (Panicum sumatrense), finger millet (Eleusine coracana), barnyard millet (Echinochloa colona), etc. In the semi-arid tropics of Africa and Asia, these are mostly grown as livelihood crops of smallholder farmers. Close to 97% of millets grown worldwide are produced in developing countries.
Although crop improvement efforts have been underway for several decades in many countries, these continue to be called neglected crops (neglected by researchers) or underutilized crops (i.e., not exploited to their full potential). Recently, a team of international researchers from the University of Georgia and the International Crops Research Institute for the Semi-Arid Tropics (ICRISAT), India, have collaborated and developed genome-wide single nucleotide polymorphic (SNP)-marker data for kodo, proso, and little millet. Markers resulting from these studies will help to analyse genetic diversity that can be used to improve these crops, by tapping the identified desired traits. Understanding the underlying genetics will help to better determine the heritability of various traits, and traits with higher heritability could be better candidates for improvement of these crops for the benefit of smallholder farmers.
Given that the price of phenotyping is often a limiting factor, especially for fund-starved minor crops (often referred to as ‘orphan crops) such as minor millets, using throughput phenotyping, which is becoming cheaper by the day, would be the way forward.
For more, go to https://phys.org/news/2019-10-millet-genetics.html
and
https://dl.sciencesocieties.org/publications/tpg/pdfs/0/0/190021
2. Biodiversity Improves Crop Production:
Ecologists and biologists at the Department of Animal Ecology and Tropical Biology, University of Würzburg, Germany, carried out a study within the EU project, “Liberation,” where data from of about 1,500 agricultural fields around the world, including cornfields in the American plains, oilseed rape fields in southern Sweden, coffee plantations in India, mango plantations in South Africa, and cereal crops in the Alps were compared.
The researchers analyzed two ecosystem services: the pollination service provided by wild insects and biological pest control service, which is the ability of an environment to use predatory arthropods present in the ecosystem to defend itself from harmful insects. In mixed landscapes, the variety of crops, hedges, trees, and grasses is very high. Along with them, wild pollinators and “beneficial” insects are more abundant and diversified. With these organisms in the landscape, not only do pollination and biological control increase; so does the crop yield. On the other hand, monocultures are the cause of roughly a third of the negative effects on pollination that result from landscape simplification.
This effect is even greater with the control of harmful insects, where the loss of natural enemy richness represents 50% of the total consequences of landscape simplification. Maintaining the biodiversity of ecosystem service providers is, therefore, vital to sustaining the flow of benefits from key agroecosystems to society.
For more, go to https://phys.org/news/2019-10-biodiversity-crop-production.html
and access the full article at https://www.biorxiv.org/content/biorxiv/early/2019/02/20/554170.full.pdf
3. Photosynthesis Olympics: Can the best wheat varieties be even better?
More than 90% of crop biomass, which includes seed yield, is derived from photosynthetic products. Hence, it has been long recognized that enhancing photosynthesis of a crop plant can increase yields. Based on that premise, a group of scientists at the Australian Research Council (ARC) Centre of Excellence for Translational Photosynthesis, the Australian National University, Canberra, put several elite wheat varieties through a sort of “Photosynthesis Olympics” to identify which varieties have the best performing photosynthesis. The results indicated that best-performing varieties were more than 30% better than the worst-performing ones. Up to 90% of such differences were owing to their genes, and not to the environment they grew in, establishing the genetic basis for photosynthetic performance. While the study focused on traits related to photosynthesis, the results indicate a huge potential for improvement of yield.
Combining traits that contribute to higher photosynthetic performance with high-throughput measurement techniques and sequenced/mapped germplasm collections should provide cereal breeders with tools to build their genome selection strategies, or to screen directly to accelerate rates of genetic gain for radiation-use efficiency.
For more, go to https://phys.org/news/2019-10-photosynthesis-olympics-wheat-varieties.html?utm_source=nwletter&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=daily-n
and access the full article at: https://doi.org/10.1093/jxb/erz439
Potential Crops/Technologies
1. Developing More Nutritious Crops to Feed A Growing World
For developing an improved crop variety, several thousand germplasm accessions may have to be tested. Thus, developing a fast method to test can help to speed up the breeding and eventual selection process. A fast, accurate, and cost-effective technique to assess the nutritional value of pea varieties has been developed that can be used to screen thousands of seeds. This work was the result of collaborative research at the Department of Plant Sciences, University of Saskatchewan, Saskatoon; Canadian Light Source, Saskatoon; Plant Phenotyping and Imaging Research Centre, Global Institute for Food Security, University of Saskatchewan; and the Department of Food and Bioproduct Sciences, University of Saskatchewan, Canada. Quickly determining the levels of protein, starch, micronutrients and other elements enables breeders to select lines that provide the highest levels of dietary minerals for humans and offers a potential solution to mineral deficiency in crops grown in many parts of the world. One of the studies, published online in Crop Science, evaluated X-Ray Fluorescence spectroscopy against the widely-used atomic absorption spectroscopy to profile peas, a crop that is a rich source of protein, complex carbohydrates, fibre, B vitamins, and a range of minerals including iron, zinc, and magnesium.
The province is home to Canada’s only synchrotron and is a major exporter of field peas (eventually other pulses) to many other countries, including India, China, and Bangladesh.
For more, go to https://www.yorktonthisweek.com/agriculture/developing-more-nutritious-crops-to-feed-a-growing-world-1.23978299
and
https://agbio.usask.ca/news/2019/10/developing-more-nutritious-crops-to-feed-a-growing-world.php
Full article at https://dl.sciencesocieties.org/publications/cs/articles/0/0/cropsci2019.01.0004
2. Future Rice Could Reduce Reliance on Water Intensive Paddy Fields
Rice farming is heavily reliant on ready supplies of water and labour. Climate change and urbanization, however, threaten traditional paddy cultivation. In many parts of Asia, farmers are switching to direct-seeded rice (DSR) as a more sustainable alternative. This is grown in dry fields, so it uses less water and requires less work. It also cuts out the greenhouse gases that bacteria in paddy fields produce. But for DSR to be successful, seeds need to germinate quickly and grow vigorously. Current varieties are not best suited to such planting; therefore, Rothamsted Research UK is leading a consortium-funded research project to develop new rice varieties that can be grown with less water than conventional puddle transplanted rice.
Project leader Smita Kurup says that they have already identified in the lab hitherto ‘unknown’ varieties better suited to DSR in terms of their seedling traits, by screening several hundred varieties from the International Rice Genebank at IRRI (International Rice Research Institute). The next step would be to use these lines to combine with current good-yielding and disease-resistant rice cultivars to generate new high-yielding “DSR adapted” rice varieties.
The team at Rothamsted have developed a large-scale, high-resolution image-based system to tease out useful traits, along with a ground-breaking approach that allows them to make time-lapse images of germinating rice seeds in the dark─exactly the conditions that seed would experience when buried in the ground.
For more, go to https://seedworld.com/future-rice-could-reduce-reliance-on-water-intensive-paddy-fields/
3. New Method to Identify Genes that Control Plant Traits
A new approach that enables researchers to more efficiently identify the genes that control plant traits has been developed by an international team of scientists, led by the Georg-August-Universität Göttingen, Göttingen University, Germany and the University of Wisconsin, Madison, USA. The method basically consists of single-plant genome-wide association studies (GWAS), coupled with bulk segregant analysis, and allows rapid identification and corroboration of single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) for plant height Typically, GWAS in crops are performed using a panel of inbred lines, where multiple replicates of the same inbred are measured and the average phenotype is taken as the response variable. Thus, developing inbred lines will be a prerequisite. Plant height is an important agronomic trait in crop species such as maize, and the trait is highly heritable and associated with higher yields. This method will help plant breeders and scientists to develop more affordable, desirable, and sustainable plant varieties. The application will be most valuable for fruit, vegetable, and grain crops, which are also critical for global food security and nutrition.
Authors note that it is unlikely that the power of single plant GWAS (sp-GWAS) will ever rival the power of a traditional, replicated trial, plant GWAS that leverages a panel of inbred lines. However, when researchers are interested in finding candidate genes in crops where association panels are not available or are time-consuming to make, or when efficiency and cost are critically important, sp-GWAS represents a potential approach to identify candidate genes for important traits.
For more, go to https://bmcplantbiol.biomedcentral.com/track/pdf/10.1186/s12870-019-2000-y
News
1. As Climate Change Hits Crops, Debate Heats Up Over Use of
Plant Gene Data:Rich and poor countries are at loggerheads over how to share benefits from genetic plant data that could help breed crops better able to withstand climate change, as negotiations to revise a global treaty are set to resume in Rome. The little-known agreement is seen as crucial for agricultural research and development on a planet suffering rising hunger, malnutrition, and the impacts of climate change.
For more, go to https://www.pressreader.com/kuwait/kuwait-times/20191110/282020444111363
Also, see
2. International Research Community Calls for Recognition of Forests’ Role in Human Prosperity
Overexploitation of forests has resulted in loss of a great deal of forest land across the globe. World leaders convened for the UN Climate Summit in September amid dire projections of climate instability. The problem is multifaceted, of course, but a recent IPCC report identifies deforestation as the main driver of land-based greenhouse gas emissions, which comprise almost a quarter of all human contributions to climate change. Given the situation, could there be a payment for taking care of forest land? What if more people around the world are paid to keep forests healthy and intact? And what if doing so would not only curb the climate crisis but also help people move out of poverty and toward broader prosperity?
This concept is not new, but the report, still being developed by an expert panel, will examine it in detail.
For more, go to https://phys.org/news/2019-10-international-recognition-forests-role-human.html?utm_source=nwletter&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=dail
3. Agri biotech can help unleash a second Green Revolution
While India contributes 25% to the world’s pulse production, 22% to rice production, and 13% to wheat production, its agro yield is lower for most crops, as compared to China, Brazil, and the US. Productivity is expected to slump further on account of many challenges that the country is facing today. Although the use of biotechnology in agricultural research has great potential, India has not been able to benefit from it, owing to various reasons. One of the problems has been lack of a regulatory mechanism. A high-powered working group, constituted under the aegis of the Union Government’s Department of Biotechnology, has, in its strategy document dated July 2019, titled “Agriculture Biotechnology for Human Welfare,” sought a robust, time-bound, flexible, and transparent regulatory system for harnessing agro-biotechnology for injecting new life in India’s farmlands. They are pressing for a strong policy framework for development and commercial release of agro-biotech products.
For more, go to https://www.sundayguardianlive.com/news/agri-biotech-can-help-unleash-second-green-revolution
Editor’s note: Also, see AgriTech News 9 on our GRSV website for a related item on “Problems in/potential for exploiting the of GM crops in India”
4. Latest Agritech Projects Deployed by the Government
Agriculture serves as the backbone in India and, at the moment, it is stagnating for various reasons. Bringing innovation and applying emerging technologies should, thus, be one of the crucial goals for agritech projects in India. In line with this thinking, during the past few years, the Government of India has started emphasizing and commercializing agriculture in various innovative ways, from using drones for mapping to investment in data collection. The top 5 agritech projects deployed by the Government of India are listed and briefly discussed in a recent report.
For more, go to https://analyticsindiamag.com/5-latest-agritech-projects-deployed-by-the-government/
Events
1.The 43rd Indian Social Science Congress
The Indian Social Science Academy, in association with Bengaluru Central University, shall hold the 43rd Indian Social Science Congress during 17-21 January 2020 at Bengaluru Central University, Bengaluru.
Editors’ note: Two of GRSV’s co-founders, Drs SVR Shetty and V Ramanatha Rao will be giving plenary lectures on the Congress’s focal theme: “Current Science of Nature-Human-Society in India”
For more, go to http://www.issaindia.org/43_congress.aspx
2. 5th International Conference on Plant Science & Physiology,
17-18 February 2020, Osaka, Japan.
Theme: Exploring Emerging Innovations in Plant Science & Physiology.
For more, go to https://plantphysiology.conferenceseries.com/
3. 7th Annual Congress on Plant Science and Molecular Biology,
18-19 May 2020, Auckland, New Zealand.
Theme: Exploring the future advancements in the field of Plant Science and Molecular Biology.
For more, go to https://world.plantscienceconferences.com/