AgriTech News, Number 14, 15 April 2020

Research Results

1. Genetic Marking Discovery Improves Fruit Quality, Bolsters Climate Defences:

Plant breeders always look for genetic markers that are linked to desirable traits to make new lines with traits that are transferred. Transferring genetic markers has been a challenge and has often proved tedious. A team of grapevine breeders and scientists at Cornell University have come up with a powerful new method that improves fruit quality and acts as a key defence against pests and a changing climate. The team’s new technique for developing genetic markers has improved the markers’ transfer rate across grapevine species from 2% to 92%. With it, breeders worldwide can screen their collections and find out immediately which vines have the traits they want—without worrying about the variety or species their parents were.

“It’s applicable for breeding and genetic studies across different grape breeding programmes, plant species, and other diverse organisms,” says Bruce Reisch, professor of horticulture in the College of Agriculture and Life Sciences, and leader of Cornell’s Grapevine Breeding and Genetics Program. The research team used a new automated DNA sequencing technology to create a “Core genome” for grapevines, matching important regions shared between 10 species’ genomes. Using powerful new genetic mapping technology, they targeted those regions to develop robust DNA markers. This marker development strategy should be widely applicable for genetic studies in many taxa, particularly those ~20 million years divergent.

For more, go to https://www.newswise.com/articles/genetic-marking-discovery-improves-fruit-quality-bolsters-climate-defenses

Access the full article at https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-019-14280-1

2. Plant Genomes Reveal the Basis for Adaptation to Contrasting Climates:

Identification of plant species and varieties that can adapt quickly to changes in the environment is essential to ensure that our crop plants remain productive in a changing climate. Plants are confronted with similar climate adaptation challenges when colonising new regions, as conditions can change quickly across climates. Researchers studied the plant Lotus japonicus, which, with its relatively limited genomic changes, has been able to adapt to diverse Japanese climates, ranging from subtropical to temperate. Associate Professor Stig Uggerhøj Andersen, Department of Molecular Biology and Genetics, Aarhus University, Denmark says that their work has helped to identify plants with specific traits, including winter survival, under selection for local adaptation to contrasting climates. The link between selection signatures and specific traits is critical for understanding the process of local adaptation, he adds.

The rapid adaptation of L. japonicus to widely different climates indicates that genetic variation underlying the adaptations was already present before plant colonisation. This could be true of other plant species on a planet with rapid climate change, and it will allow more rapid adaptation. The research has shown that different climates have resulted in distinct plant populations adapted to their local environments. The extreme subpopulation differentiation overlaps strongly with other signals that associate phenotypes with specific overwintering and flowering time traits. The results suggest that strong selection has acted on Lotus alleles that are beneficial for perennial winter survival in cold climates. Based on the candidate genes identified, the molecular genetic mechanisms that underpin those fundamental adaptations can now be investigated.

For more, go to https://phys.org/news/2020-01-genomes-reveal-basis-contrasting-climates.html

Access the full article athttps://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-019-14213-y

 

3. Better Anchor Roots Help Crops Grow in Poor Soils:

In plants, many carotenoid products are known to play key biological roles; little is known about one group of cleavage molecules called di-apocarotenoids. Among these, a metabolite in plants that regulates the growth of anchor roots—vital for sustaining water and nutrient uptake in plants—has been identified and may have useful applications in agriculture. Anchor roots (ANRs) arise at the root-shoot junction and are the least investigated. These roots are important not only to anchor the plants but also in the uptake of nutrients. “We identified the di-apocarotenoid anchorene as a metabolite that sends a specific signal to trigger the formation of Arabidopsis anchor roots,” says Research scientist Kunpeng Jia of King Abdullah University of Science and Technology (KAUST), Biological and Environmental Sciences and Engineering Division, Saudi Arabia.

Their research showed that anchorene modulates the distribution of the plant hormone auxin in the anchor root formation site, which stimulates growth. It has been shown that anchorene changes the root architecture by promoting anchor root formation, which increases root volume and facilitates water and nutrient absorption. It is worth mentioning that anchorene is a commercially available compound, used as a building block for the manufacturing of different carotenoids on an industrial scale, which makes its application quite feasible.

For more, go to https://phys.org/news/2019-12-anchor-roots-crops-poor-soils.html

Access the full text at

https://advances.sciencemag.org/content/advances/5/11/eaaw6787.full.pdf

4. Learning from Nature: Wild Wheat Responds to

Climate Change: To understand how plant populations respond to climate stress, Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada researchers and collaborators are looking at modern wheat’s ancestor, wild emmer, to see how it has genetically adapted to deal with the stress of changing climates. A research team led by Dr Yong-Bi Fu looked at 10 populations of wild emmer wheat in Israel. They analysed population samples collected in 1980 and 2008. In those 28 years, the average annual temperature in Israel increased, while the average annual precipitation decreased. Predictive models (using statistics to predict outcomes) can guide when it comes to crop production vulnerability in a changing climate.

The Key findings of the study, says Dr Fu, are as follows:

• Over the years (1980–2008), the wild emmer populations faced increased selection pressure due to global warming and accumulated more mutations, which suggests population vulnerability and the need to conserve genetic resources in plants.
• Emmer wheat reacted in a very complex manner; however, some populations were still capable of acquiring climate-resistant mutations for future adaptation.
• Researching and identifying climate-resistant genes could lead to the development of more climate-resistant crops.
• Understanding the genetic responses to global warming could also inform the prediction of crop production vulnerability in a changing climate.

For more, go to https://www.yorktonthisweek.com/agriculture/learning-from-nature-wild-wheat-responds-to-climate-change-1.24057606

Access the full article at

https://www.pnas.org/content/pnas/116/40/20002.full.pdf

5. Researchers Struggle to Engineer Plants That Cope with Climate Change:

Climate change increases the level of stress for plants. Plants put down roots, and rooted to one place, they don’t have the option of moving to where the weather suits them. Hence, there is the need to screen for plant varieties and species that adapt well to changed conditions. A new study published by biologists at Faculty of Biology, Ludwig Maximilians University (LMU), Munich, demonstrates that there are no simple or universal solutions to the problem of engineering plants to enable them to cope with the challenges posed by climate change. Plants developed sophisticated cellular mechanisms that protect them against the damage caused by high light intensities on photosynthesis. The excess light energy is dissipated as heat before it can damage the photosynthetic apparatus. This depresses yields, but it is very much in the plant’s interest.

LMU biologists Antoni Garcia-Molina and Dario Leister have performed essentially the same experiment in the model plant Arabidopsis thaliana (thale cress). These lines triggered photoprotection more rapidly, but growth rate and biomass accumulation were impaired under fluctuating light. This implies that the strategy might interfere with other mechanisms controlling excitation energy distribution, or with source–sink relationships or plastid signalling. The authors conclude that, in the context of climate change, “the idea is to help plants adapt to the changing conditions by introducing targeted genetic changes that allow them to handle the altered environmental parameters,”

For more, go to https://phys.org/news/2020-01-struggle-cope-climate.html

Access article abstract at https://www.nature.com/articles/s41477-019-0572-z

6. Identifying a plant cell barrier to breeding more nutritious crops:

Scientists at Michigan State University are studying a protein that has been a roadblock in attempts to grow plants that are both larger and provide higher nutritional content. They have identified a protein that could be a major roadblock to growing such plants. The target of rapamycin (TOR) kinase is an evolutionarily conserved hub of nutrient sensing and metabolic signalling. In plants, a functional connection of TOR activation with glucose availability was demonstrated, while it is yet unclear whether branched-chain amino acids (BCAAs) are a primary input of TOR signalling as they are in yeast and mammalian cells. For decades, scientists have been trying to increase amino acid content in crops by ramping up their production systems, but they have always run into the same problem: the crops get sick. “TOR protein is a master regulator of metabolism in plant cells,” said Pengfei Cao, post-doc in the lab of Federica Brandizzi. However, TOR is very powerful and controls many biosynthetic processes and cell structures, and it can thus cause problems if it is not regulated well.

“Actin filaments make up the ‘skeleton’ of the plant cell that upholds the cell’s endomembrane system. The latter builds several of the cell’s building blocks,” Cao said. “Maybe these crops get sick due to side effects on tiny structures inside their cells. Once we figure out some major dynamics that cause plants to get sick, we could retry ways to overproduce amino acids in a balanced and healthy way.” Results of this study demonstrate that branched-chain amino acids (BCAAs) contribute to plant TOR activation and reveal previously uncharted downstream subcellular processes of TOR signalling.

For more, go to https://phys.org/news/2019-12-cell-barrier-nutritious-crops.html

Access the full article at https://elifesciences.org/articles/50747

Potential Crops/Technologies

1. Feeding the World Without Wrecking the Planet is Possible:

Excepting a few pockets of land, especially in poorer countries, current food production is harmful to our planet—causing biodiversity loss, ecosystem degradation and water stress. But as the world population continues to grow, can that last? An international study now suggests a comprehensive solution package for feeding 10 billion people within our planet’s environmental constraints.

The study uses a process-detailed, spatially explicit representation of four interlinked planetary boundaries (biosphere integrity, land-system change, freshwater use, nitrogen flows) and agricultural systems in an internally consistent model framework, Researchers led by Dieter Gerten (also the lead author), from Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research (PIK) and professor, the Humboldt University, Berlin show that almost half of current global food production depends on planetary boundary transgressions (PBT) (i.e., planetary boundaries within which humanity can operate safely. Transgressing one or more planetary boundaries may be deleterious or even catastrophic due to the risk of crossing thresholds that will trigger non-linear, abrupt environmental change within continental-to-planetary-scale systems.

The authors also demonstrate that transformation towards more sustainable production and consumption patterns could support 10.2 billion people within the planetary boundaries analysed. But achieving such a production level will require spatially redistributed cropland, improved water–nutrient management, food-waste reduction and dietary changes (including consumption close to 2,355 kcal per capita per day). With the cooperation of all countries, this should be possible. In line with scenarios adopted in the present study, the most recent IPCC Special Report on land use found that currently, up to 30% of all food produced is lost to waste. Transitioning to more sustainable land use and management is a challenge to policymaking.

For more, go to https://phys.org/news/2020-01-world-planet.html

Access the article abstract at https://www.nature.com/articles/s41893-019-0465-1

2. New Study Shows ‘Organic’ Wounds Improve Produce:

Texas A&M AgriLife Research scientists report benefits of insect leaf-wounding in fruit and vegetable production. Results of a study on strawberry fruit (Fragaria x ananassa) show that stress responses created in the fruits and vegetables initiated an increase in antioxidant compounds before harvest, making them healthier for human consumption. “There was the existing idea proposed by others that insects present in the field in organic farming could cause a stress response in the plant and increase antioxidant compounds,” said Cisneros-Zevallos, AgriLife Research Horticulture and food scientist in College Station and principal investigator of the study.

Facundo Ibanez, an investigator for the project associated with the Instituto Nacional de Investigacion Agropecuaria, Uruguay, said that the study emphasized fresh produce as an excellent source of health-promoting compounds, and that insects in some way perhaps can be allies to achieve even healthier produce. “This observation was key when we designed the strategies to be used in the study, that simple wounding stress on leaf surfaces elicited this systemic response with the unique observation of higher accumulation of phenolic antioxidants in fruit,” Ibanez said. These results support the idea that higher levels of healthy phytochemicals reported in organic fruits and vegetables could be due to the wounding component of the biotic stress attributed to the insects to which the plant are exposed.

For more, go to https://phys.org/news/2020-01-wounds.html

Access the related article at https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-019-55033-w.pdf

3. A New Tomato Ideal for Urban Gardens and Even Outer Space:

Hoping to produce a more compact tomato plant, the researchers tweaked three genes that influence the growth patterns of cherry tomatoes. “When you’re playing with plant maturation, you’re playing with the whole system,” explains study co-author Zach Lippman, a plant biologist at the Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory in New York State, “and that system includes the sugars, where they’re made—which is the leaves—and how they’re distributed, which is to the fruits.” A breakthrough came when Lippman and his colleagues identified a third gene, SIER, which controls the lengths of plant stems.

According to Kat Eschner of Popular Science, the team used the CRISPR gene-editing tool to “turn off” all three genes—which in turn led to short stems and a compact bouquet of cherry tomatoes. The primary goal of this new research is to engineer a wider variety of crops that can be grown in urban environments or other places previously not considered suitable for plant growth.

For more, go to https://phys.org/news/2019-12-tomato-ideal-urban-gardens-outer.html or https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/gene-edited-tomatoes-grow-bunches-could-be-ideal-urban-farming-180973858/

Access the article abstract at https://www.nature.com/articles/s41587-019-0361-2

4. Microalgae: A potential sustainable commercial source of sterols

Microalgae have been in the news as a source of biofuels. More recently, they are seen as important natural sources of high-value compounds that could be used in pharmaceutical and nutraceutical applications.

Ankitha Randhir, Algae R & D Centre, and others from Murdoch University, Murdoch, Australia, have explored the feasibility of producing microalgae on a commercial scale. Microalgae mass culture represents a sustainable commercial source of phytosterols, and the sterol content in microalgae can be manipulated using culture conditions. Advances in molecular level knowledge are required to improve phytosterol yield. Combining culture conditions and molecular approaches can enhance phytosterol productivity, they found.

For more, see

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2211926419306836#!

 

 

News:

1. Open Source Plant Material and Intellectual Property:

Today we hear the term “open source” more and more, mostly in the context of computer software. However, the term is becoming common in the plant industry as well. A vast majority of registered plant varieties in the United States do not appear to be protected by a patent. This is because a patent allows the holder to prevent others from making, using, or selling a patented variety, allowing a breeder to control use of the new variety for the term of the patent.

However, it is also becoming an increasingly common practice in the seed industry for breeders to license their patented varieties to other breeders at companies and universities. If a researcher is interested in breeding with a variety, he/she can reach out to the patent holder and see about a license. The vast majority of plant material in the United States, when legally accessed, may be used for breeding and research without IP restrictions. And for those materials that are protected by intellectual property rights, the material may be available for licensing.

(Note from Editor: Similar studies in other countries may help local breeders to access desired material to work on.)

For more, go to https://seedworld.com/open-source-plant-material-and-intellectual-property/

 

2. Introducing the Future Crops Collection:

Future Crops Collection, the result of an interdisciplinary call for papers convened by PLOS ONE and a team of Guest Editors, has been launched. The theme of the Collection encompasses a broad range of research, aimed at the development and delivery of resilient, climate-smart crops and cropping systems for the 21st century. The Collection features research articles that span a considerable diversity of crop species, geographical locations, and fields of research. All submitted research was evaluated by the Guest Editors, who have selected the articles included in the Collection. At the time of the launch, there were twenty-one research articles featured in the Collection, and more will follow.

For more, go to https://blogs.plos.org/everyone/2020/01/20/introducing-the-future-crops-collection/

3. A Wild Bean’s Genes May Help a Key Crop Thrive on a Hotter Earth:

Researchers are working to exploit the genes responsible for climate robustness in the tepary bean—known as Phaseolus acutifolius—and breed them into the common bean, or Phaseolus vulgaris. “Low-fertility soils have been a problem for a long time, but we didn’t address heat before,” said Celestina Xerinda, a bean breeder at the Mozambique Institute of Agricultural Research, referring to her institution’s research priorities.

Bean breeders gathered recently at CIAT headquarters in Colombia to discuss this research, and to standardize protocols to help compare their advances across continents and ecosystems. The meeting was part of the Crop Trust-led Crop Wild Relatives Project, which builds on years of research at CIAT into breeding hardier bean varieties.

For more, go to https://blog.ciat.cgiar.org/a-wild-beans-genes-may-help-a-key-crop-thrive-on-a-hotter-earth/

4. Experts Call for an Overhaul of Pesticide Regulations:

Many aspects of agricultural intensification across the world have been criticized for their negative impact on biodiversity. In that context, pesticides have been linked to declines in insects, birds, and biodiversity in aquatic systems. If pesticide use is to blame, even partially, then it raises questions about both pesticides use and the regulatory procedures in place to protect the environment.

Three researchers from Aarhus University, Agroscope, Wädenswil and Vetagro Sup, France, Marcy l’étoile have published a Policy Forum piece in the journal, Science, calling for an overhaul of the regulatory frameworks that define the ways that pesticides can be used. Christopher Topping, Annette Aldrich, and Philippe Berny suggest that the current system is outdated and needs to be changed, because the current system is allowing more environmental damage than need be.

For more, go to https://phys.org/news/2020-01-experts-overhaul-pesticide.html

Abstract of the journal article can be found at

https://science.sciencemag.org/content/367/6476/360

5. Global Warming Could Harm Biodiversity Generation Processes:

An international team, led by researchers from Pablo de Olavide University (UPO) and the Autonomous University of Madrid (UAM), has carried out research that suggests global warming could harm the processes that generate biodiversity. The study analysed the causes for the enormous diversity of Carex species, concluding that climate cooling was a key factor behind their speciation. “The study is the first to deal with global distribution patterns and diversification of a megadiverse genus of plants, and it suggests that climate warming is not only causing the extinction of species, but it also could negatively affect the processes that generate them,” says Santiago Martín-Bravo, a researcher at UPO’s Botany Area and one of the study’s main authors. The study offers conclusions that are of broad general interest to understand how, when, and why species are generated; the causes of their uneven distribution; and, especially, the role of the global climate as a driver of the genesis of biodiversity.

For more, go to https://phys.org/news/2020-01-global-negative-impact-biodiversity.html

Access the full article at

https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/pdf/10.1111/jse.12549

6. INNOVAR KICKS OFF! Next-Generation Variety Testing for Improved Cropping on European Farmland:

Existing and de novo genetic (Single Nucleotide Polymorphism, SNP) data for selected varieties will be added to the InnoVar database. These data, combined with the phenotypic and phenomic data, will be used in genome-wide association studies to identify genomic loci and markers associated with traits of interest. That will enable a better understanding of the genetic basis of the plant phenotype, leading to greater efficiency of plant variety testing, with the potential to enhance the breeding of optimised varieties and reducing the need for plant protection products. Andrew Parnell of the University of Maynooth introduces partners to the potential uses for machine learning in next-generation variety testing. One of InnoVar’s key outputs will be an App to provide a decision-support system to empower growers to select crops that are best suited for their agroclimatic region, end use, and growth scenarios.

For more, go to https://www.afbini.gov.uk/news/innovar-kicks-next-generation-variety-testing-improved-cropping-european-farmland

Events

Not included, on account of the global uncertainty resulting from Covid-19 infections.

Other Topics of Interest

1. Want to know what climate change will do in your backyard? There’s a dataset for that

For more, go to https://phys.org/news/2020-01-climate-backyard-dataset.html

Access the full article at https://www.nature.com/articles/s41597-019-0343-8.pdf

2. Mangroves give cause for conservation optimism, for now

For more, go to https://www.cell.com/current-biology/fulltext/S0960-9822(19)31687-2

3. Can ecosystems recover from dramatic losses of biodiversity?

For more, go to https://phys.org/news/2020-01-ecosystems-recover-losses-biodiversity.html

4. 15 surprising biodiversity conservation trends to watch for in 2020

For more, go to https://ensia.com/notable/biodiversity-conservation-2020/

5. Monitoring conflict and climate could help stop famines before they happen

For more, go to https://phys.org/news/2019-12-conflict-climate-famines.html

6. Fighting infectious crop diseases with big data analyses:

For more, go to https://www.openaccessgovernment.org/fighting-infectious-crop-diseases-with-big-data-analyses/80681/

7. UN outlines 2030 goals to save planet’s biodiversity:

For more, go to https://www.climatechangenews.com/2020/01/13/un-outlines-2030-goals-save-planets-biodiversity/

8. Get the Sustainable Development Goals back on track:

For more, go to https://media.nature.com/original/magazine-assets/d41586-019-03907-4/d41586-019-03907-4.pdf