Biotechnology

December 5, 2008December 5, 2008

Go forth and grow halophytes

That seems to be the plea Jelte Rozema and Timothy Flowers make in a Science paper that’s just out. ((It’s behind a paywall, but you can read other people’s take on it at Mongabay and Wired.)) But, frankly, I found the paper disappointing, not least because it is short on clear recommendations. For example, what is one to make of this?

Because salt resistance has already evolved in halophytes, domestication of these plants is an approach that should be considered. However, as occurred with traditional crops such as rice, wheat, corn, and potatoes, domestication of wild halophytic plant species is needed to convert them into viable crops with high yields. Such a process can begin by screening collections for the most productive genotypes.

Are they telling us that domestication of new species is a more profitable approach than trying to breed salinity-tolerance into existing crops? I think so, in which case it would be an interesting view, but I’m not altogether sure that’s in fact the point they’re making. It could have been better phrased. I mean those first two sentences could be summarized as

Domestication of halophytes should be considered. However, domestication of wild halophytes is needed.

Not sure how the editors at Science let that one by. There was also no explicit reference in the paper to the International Centre for Biosaline Agriculture and its genebank. Or to the possible role of crop wild relatives in breeding for salinity tolerance. All around, an opportunity missed.

December 5, 2008July 1, 2013

Great Expectations

Nature has a (behind paywall) feature on Five crop researchers who could change the world. Rather than celebrating those who have arrived, Emma Marris highlights the work of five researchers who still have some way to go before reaching the Food Hall of Fame.

These are her picks.

Peter Dodds (CSIRO, Australia) works on the fundamentals of wheat stem rust. He investigates the substances that the rust fungus excretes, and the plant could use to trigger a defense reaction. He hopes to engineer new and more complex resistance, that the rust might not be able to break. Seems particularly relevant in the light of the UG99 scare.

Jerry Glover is a crop perennializer at the Land Institute, in Kansas, USA. The folks at the Land Institute want us to move from annual to perennial crops. That would be better for the soil and would take much less energy (nitrogen) to produce. They are clearly in it for the long run, but here’s a short and palatable piece about it.

Zhang Jinghua (Hong Kong Baptist University) works on deficit irrigation. The theory is that under modest water stress plants shift all their resources to reproduction and hence grain yield can increase. One trick in his book, and that of Australian grape growers, is ‘partial root zone drying’. Some roots are dry, and signal the need to fill the seeds, while other roots can access the water that is needed to keep producing. Water saving is particularly important in increasingly water scarce Northern China.

Richard Sayre, the director of the Institute for Renewable Fuels, Missouri, USA, was selected because he heads the BioCassava Plus collaboration. They are hoping to develop genetically modified cassava of which 500 g contains the daily requirements of protein, vitamin A and E, iron and zinc ((What will be left to do? Fluorescence to lighten up the nights, and the ability to use the root as cell phone battery?)). They have succeeded in transformations for individual traits, now they have to figure out how to artificially transfer 15 genes into a single variety.

Julian Hibberd (U. of Cambridge) studies photosynthesis. He is one of the brains in the C4 rice consortium led by IRRI. They are trying to create rice plants with C4 rather than C3 photosynthesis. C4 photosynthesis is more efficient at high temperature, and it could be the next big thing (after short straw) to radically elevate rice yield potential — “by a whopping 50%” ((Will they also re-engineer the straw so that it can carry all that grain?)), thinks Hibberd. Seems far fetched, but C4-ness has independently evolved in many plant families, so why not another time, with a little help?

An interesting group, but did Nature miss anyone? Perhaps in branches of research less dominated by biotech? Let us know.

December 2, 2008December 2, 2008

Onion tears

A Kiwi researcher laments that regulations make it pointless to work on GMO’s in New Zealand. He mentions a particular sad case in point: the obstacles to testing tearless onions. There is no reference to this in the trade-journal for this type of news, the Onion ((Compensated by their coverage of the new DNA test to reveal who is bald)). What to say? Perhaps there is nothing wrong with making onions tearless, but I feel it would be a loss. Not having rational objections, I search for a metaphysical answer. Something like Carlos Drummond de Andrade’s poem about an opposite case:

Mal do SÃ©culo

Como se nÃ£o bastasse o mundo de tristezas
entre cÃ©u e terra,
principalmente em terra,
vem o agrÃ³nomo, descobre
o vÃrus da tristeza nas laranjeiras.

My translation:

Times of Sorrow

As if there wasn’t enough sadness
between heaven and earth
particularly on earth
comes the agronomist, discovers
the sadness virus in the orange trees

November 25, 2008November 27, 2008

Flood-tolerant rice hits primetime

You remember Robert’s entry for last year’s competition? Well, now check out this piece from MSNBC. And there’s a video too:

Always nice to see a genebank on the evening news.

November 21, 2008November 21, 2008

Nibbles: Radishes, Fungi, Genomics, Bagel, Eels, Barack Hussein, Pomegranate

Vavilov does radishes.
“How would you describe the smell and taste of a fresh white truffle?“
“The gene … is in an identity crisis.”
“The basic roll-with-a-hole concept is centuries old.”
“He slid her gently into a nylon sack and hung her from a scale on which she clocked two kilograms, then slid her out and into the V of a varnished plywood measuring board, where she lay quietly, like a metre-long slab of tenderloin.”
“Activists” buttonhole Obama.
The Afghan pomegranate to hit supermarket shelves.