- Crop-to-wild gene flow and spatial genetic structure in the closest wild relatives of the cultivated apple. Some evidence of genetic differentiation within species, but not as much as you’d think. Probably because of the significant gene flow in all directions.
- Biosynthesis of Antinutritional Alkaloids in Solanaceous Crops Is Mediated by Clustered Genes. Which means they can be fairly easily silenced.
- Assessing the total economic value of threatened livestock breeds in Italy: Implications for conservation policy. It’s worth it, but farmers will need incentives.
- Strengthening informal seed systems to enhance food security in Southeast Asia. Including through identifying potential commercial species and also the odd seed fair and bank.
- Can Certain Intellectual Property Rights both Protect and Promote Unique Traditional Products and Cultural Heritage from Developing Countries for Economic Benefit? The Case of Georgia. Maybe.
- In vitro conservation of chestnut (Castanea sativa) by slow growth. Ok, now what?
- Getting the most out of natural variation in C4 photosynthesis. Through sequencing of a couple of key species and lots of RNA profiling.
- Coping with climate-induced water stresses through time and space in the mountains of Southwest China. Including by changing crops, changing crop varieties and changing cropping patterns. But other ways as well.
Brainfood: Crop genomics, Phenotyping, Smallholders and markets, Yacon diversity, Indian rice HYVs, Sustainable landscapes, Climate models, Food prices
- Genomics reveals new landscapes for crop improvement. Which are dominated by the looming presence of Mount Phenotyping.
- Where Have All the Crop Phenotypes Gone? Someone mention phenotyping?
- Smallholder agricultural commercialization for income growth and poverty alleviation in southern Africa: A review. On balance, it’s a good thing.
- Genetic diversity of yacon (Smallanthus sonchifolius (Poepp. & Endl.) H. Robinson) and its wild relatives as revealed by ISSR markers. Low diversity among the cultivated stuff, which is quite distinct from the wilds. All due to clonal propagation. No concrete recommendations apart from conserving all you can find. Pity.
- Molecular Genetic Diversity of Major Indian Rice Cultivars over Decadal Periods. Genetic diversity among high yielding varieties released in India went up between 1970 and 2010.
- Ten principles for a landscape approach to reconciling agriculture, conservation, and other competing land uses. Adapt, involve, multitask. And more, much more, from Mongbay.
- Uncertainty, ignorance and ambiguity in crop modelling for African agricultural adaptation. Be open about assumptions, communicate with and involve diverse stakeholders in appropriate ways, accept feedback from policy-makers. Could be talking about GMOs. Or the above.
- The effect of rising food prices on food consumption: systematic review with meta-regression. Worse for poorer countries, and worse for poorer households in all countries.
Is this automated Musa phylogeny any good?
PhyloGenerator is “an open-source, stand-alone Python program, that makes use of pre-existing sequence data and taxonomic information to largely automate the estimation of phylogenies.” Sounds intriguing, no? I found out about it via this Twitter exchange with Rich Grenyer:
@rich_ @Phalaropus Sure, of course!
— AgroBioDiverse (@AgroBioDiverse) July 11, 2013
He very kindly shared his automatically generated Musa phylogeny, which is reproduced below. I’m afraid you’ll have to click on the image to read the species names.
So now I’m reaching out to all you banana taxonomists out there. Does this make any sense?
Nibbles: Tree ID, Pyramid scheme, Looking ahead, Fun with mould, GM wheat, Sinai reclaimed
Stuff that’s been sitting around while I’ve been lying on a beach:
- Speaking of apps for agriculture, here’s one that identifies North American trees.
- R. Ford Denison spots the weakness in an afro-forestry get-rich-quick scheme.
- Public Radio International has a big series on feeding the 9 billion — and wants photos of your lunch.
- I’ve no idea why people are squeamish about smut. Huitlacoche is my personal favourite among Smithsonian MAG’s Four Fungi Fit For Your Plate.
- No idea what’s happened lately to Monsanto’s GM wheat fiasco. Is the US National Center for Genetic Resources Preservation off the hook?
- And something old yet new: reclaiming the Sinai for agriculture by reviving an ancient river.
Nibbles: CePaCT aroids, Chinese pigs, Vanuatu banana processing, Yam meeting, AAB meeting, Araucaria, Aquaculture, Malting barley, CIRAD baobab videos, US wine, Ancient grains, Barcode centre
- The Pacific pushes out its taros.
- China holds on to its pigs.
- Vanuatu preserves its bananas.
- The world talks about yams in particular. And crop breeding in general.
- How Britain got its monkey puzzles.
- Bangladesh goes for mola culture. But not only.
- Australia puts money into beer.
- France gets into the whole baobab factsheet thing, but with a video twist.
- Virginia makes wine. With infographic goodness.
- UK tries to slow down its food.
- Canada barcodes everything.