Biotechnology

January 9, 2014

Nibbles: Pig evolution, Genomics field guide, Genome editing, Chilean agroecology training, Oxford Farming Conferences, Grape variety database, Food prices database, Amazonian history, Debunking tomatoes, INFOODS NUS list, Coptic gardens, Aid agencies map

The catching up continues:

“Genomics is a powerful tool…”: Pigs speciate, admix, fly.
But in the wrong hands…
I wonder which types of hands these genome editors have.
Ok, enough of that. Women, agroecology, capacity building, a fashionable country: what’s not to like?
I wonder if any of the ladies are at the Oxford Real Farming Conference. Or were. They were probably NOT at the Oxford Farming Conference. Oh the wit of these alternative farming types. You could have followed both on Twitter, were you so minded, and less confused than I.
Chile — for it is she — of course grows a lot of grapes. Want to know which varieties? Course you do.
Damn, grapes not included in this World Bank crowd-sourced food price dataset. Which I think we may have linked to before, but what the hell.
I know we’ve linked to ancient Amazonian civilization stuff before, but this is a predictive model, no less.
Busted: The tomato.
The INFOODS “List of underutilized species contributing to the Nutritional Indicators for Biodiversity” is out. Prices not included.
I somehow thought there would be more underutilized species in this Ethiopian monastery.
Who pays for (some of) this? Check out the Guardian’s interactive map of European development agencies.

January 6, 2014December 4, 2013

Brainfood: Tea flower transcriptomics, Ag origins, Hunan rice, ITPGRFA & CBD, Mycorrhiza, Sugar beet breeding, Agronomy, Molecular domestication, Cactus domestication, Rice yield gene

Floral Transcriptome Sequencing for SSR Marker Development and Linkage Map Construction in the Tea Plant (Camellia sinensis). Neat, to be sure, but not entirely clear why the transcriptome of a part of a crop that is not economically exploited should be of more than academic use to anyone. But no doubt someone will set us right on this.
Emergence of Agriculture in the Foothills of the Zagros Mountains of Iran. Eastern Fertile Crescent just as important as western.
Analysis of main agronomic characteristics and utilization status of rice resources in Hunan Province. Hunan has a provincial genebank with more than 12,000 accession, “repetition eliminated.”
The comparison of the International Treaty on Plant Genetic Resources for Food and Agriculture and the Nagoya Protocol. Like the above, this is in Chinese, except for the abstract, which recommends ratification of both relevant instruments. I hope someone is listening.
Biodiversity of Arbuscular Mycorrhizal fungi in Agricultural crops of western Himalayas. Everybody’s at it. Well, almost.
Assessment of breeding progress in sugar beet by testing old and new varieties under greenhouse and field conditions. It has been steady and is set to continue. At least in Germany.
Why crop yields in developing countries have not kept pace with advances in agronomy. Let them eat German sugar beets. But seriously: agronomist says it’s about the agronomy.
Molecular mechanisms involved in convergent crop domestication. It’s mutations at orthologous loci, and it can be copied.
Differential survival and growth of wild and cultivated seedlings of columnar cacti: Consequences of domestication. Gotta wonder if mutations at orthologous loci were involved.
NAL1 allele from a rice landrace greatly increases yield in modern indica cultivars. But it came from a tropical japonica landrace from Indonesia, and works its magic via pleiotropic effect on plant architecture.

December 16, 2013November 29, 2013

Brainfood: Urban diets in Cameroon, Teak diversity in Brazil, Iranian wheat taxonomy, Mexican homegardens, Australian suburban landscapes, Food sovereignty, Sturgeon identification, Malaysian fruit, Amazon deforestation, Food processing & storage

Wild Food, Prices, Diets and Development: Sustainability and Food Security in Urban Cameroon. Local wild foods are better, imported processed foods are cheaper.
Genetic diversity of teak (Tectona grandis L.F.) from different provenances using microsatellite markers. In Brazil, that is. Lower than expected, therefore future breeding programmes should make more use of the most distinct provenances. But what about bringing some new ones in? Too damn difficult?
Taxonomic identity of the Iranian diploid Triticum as evidenced by nrDNA ITS. Splitters were right.
Plant management and biodiversity conservation in Nahuatl homegardens of the Tehuacan Valley, Mexico. Most diverse homegardens located near least diverse natural forest.
Amenity enhancement and biodiversity conservation in Australian suburbia: moving towards maintaining indigenous plants on private residential land. It would need better laws.
Food sovereignty: an alternative paradigm for poverty reduction and biodiversity conservation in Latin America. Economic poverty does not necessarily lead to biodiversity loss. But biodiversity loss does often lead to economic poverty.
Species and hybrid identification of sturgeon caviar: a new molecular approach to detect illegal trade. SNPs can detect the low value, hybrid, aquacultured stuff with great accuracy. In other news, there are sturgeon hybrids.
Malaysian Species of Plants with Edible Fruits or Seeds and Their Valuation. Over 500, of which about half wild.
The impact of commodity price and conservation policy scenarios on deforestation and agricultural land use in a frontier area within the Amazon. Weak enforcement leads to more deforestation. And you need fancy maths to figure that out?
Production and processing of foods as core aspects of nutrition-sensitive agriculture and sustainable diets. It’s no good producing diverse foods if you can’t store and process them.

December 10, 2013December 10, 2013

Nibbles: IK, Magi, Yield gap maps, ICRISAT DG, Maize and drought, Phenotyping workshop, Clone epigenetics, Root & tubers, Botanical social networking, Mexican archaeobotany, LOTW

Intergovernmental Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services documents examples of how indigenous people’s knowledge conserves biodiversity, including of the agricultural kind.
The truth about frankincense and myrrh. Talk about traditional knowledge.
Can global crop production meet future demands? The Story Map.
What ICRISAT is doing about the above, from the horse’s mouth.
Progress in Achieving and Delivering Drought Tolerance in Maize — An Update: “Germplasm collections are assuming greater importance if gains from native genes are to be sustained. Efficient and accurate field phenotyping remains essential for genetic progress.”
Workshop in Field-based High Throughput Phenotyping. Next April, in Arizona, you maize people.
A clone is a clone is… no wait.
Root and tuber people already planning their next big shindig, in October 2015. Meanwhile, they’re getting down to work in the Pacific.
AoB Blog on plant science on Facebook. Also on Facebook.
Solanum expert Dr Sandy Knapp on the of Global Plants Initiative.
Archaeological remains of agriculture found in Nuevo Leon are oldest for that Mexican state.
Legumes (genera) of the world now online, thanks to Kew.

December 9, 2013December 9, 2013

Brainfood: Gaming landuse decisions, Natura 2000, Expressing pears, Medicinal rice, Agroforestry and conservation, Grasslands, Cotton diversity, Ancient cattle, Neolithic Balkans, Indian guar

Gaming for smallholder participation in the design of more sustainable agricultural landscapes. Board game can be used to facilitate communal decision-making in landuse planning in the buffer zone of a Man and Biosphere Reserve. What’s not to like?
Mixed effects of long-term conservation investment in Natura 2000 farmland. It has been good for some things, not so good for others. No word on how CWRs have fared.
Microarray analysis of gene expression patterns during fruit development in European pear (Pyrus communis). They’re different to those of Japanese pear (Pyrus pyrifolia).
Quantitative and molecular analyses reveal a deep genetic divergence between the ancient medicinal rice (Oryza sativa) Njavara and syntopic traditional cultivars. Njavara is a cryptic variant of traditional Kerala varieties.
Relationships between Biodiversity and Biological Control in Agroecosystems: Current Status and Future Challenges. Management should aim to suppress pests while maintaining diversity of natural enemy guilds. Easier said than done, I suspect.
Agroforestry and Biodiversity Conservation in Tropical Landscapes. Between agroforestry cause and conservation effect are a bunch of pesky assumptions. I wonder if gaming would help.
Livestock grazing and biodiversity in semi-natural grasslands. It can be good. Just one paper in the proceedings of a recent major conference on grasslands.
Genetic diversity and population structure in the US Upland cotton (Gossypium hirsutum L.). Who needs wild relatives when you have diverse obsolete varieties?
Morphological and genetic evidence for early Holocene cattle management in northeastern China. Archaeology and DNA suggest parallel domestication of cattle in China.
Domesticated Animals and Biodiversity: Early Agriculture at the Gates of Europe and Long-term Ecological Consequences. For thousands of years the impact of agriculture in the Balkans was limited.
Characterization of released and elite genotypes of guar [Cyamopsis tetragonoloba (L.) Taub.] from India proves unrelated to geographical origin. And?