Genebanks

August 7, 2014

Vavilov all over

Just a quick reminder that the BBC’s wonderful From Roots to Riches programme, charting the history of botany, tackles Nikolai Vavilov today. Coincidentally, one of Vavilov’s stamping grounds, Central Asia, has been featuring prominently at the 2014 Festival of Fruit, on now in Portland. Megan Lynch has been tweeting the hell out of it. Well worth following.

https://twitter.com/may_gun/status/497136905624899584

August 4, 2014August 4, 2014

Brainfood: Luffa diversity, Pyrennean landraces, Sorghum diversity, Eucalypt diversity, French wheat, Genomic breeding, Hotspots, Protected areas, Apple diversity

Population structure and diversity in cultivated and wild Luffa species. Luffa hermaphrodita is the closest wild species.
Factors Enhancing Landrace in Situ Conservation in Home Gardens and Fields in Vall de Gósol, Catalan Pyrenees, Iberian Peninsula. It’s not just about landrace performance.
Sorghum Genetic Resources: Conservation and Diversity Assessment for Enhanced Utilization in Sorghum Improvement. 236,000 accessions, 38,000 at ICRISAT alone, of which 3 have proved useful. Wait, what?
Genetic Diversity in Eucalypts. It’s high, and needs to be used.
Explaining the decrease in the genetic diversity of wheat in France over the 20th century. Because breeding.
Animal-breeding schemes using genomic information need breeding plans designed to maximise long-term genetic gains. You can’t just wing it.
Remaining natural vegetation in the global biodiversity hotspots. 15%, and fragmented.
Targeting Global Protected Area Expansion for Imperiled Biodiversity. Increasing protected area coverage to Aichi targets would do little to achieve threatened species coverage in situ, at least for vertebrates.
Phenotypic evaluation and characterization of a collection of Malus species. German apple collection characterized the old school way, and none the worse for that.

August 4, 2014

Nibbles: Sorghum research, Alternative millet, IRRI genebank genomics, Cattle genomes, CIAT genebank, Rainforest genebank, Saving seeds, Millet in India, Varied diets, Cheese rind microbes, Fermentation, Artisanal hooch, Truffle oil, Coconut water, Fancy carrots, Edible insects, Farming tuna, Saving cetaceans, Fancy tomato database

What must be done about sorghum in Africa, by someone who should know because they worked at ICRISAT, which has a sorghum genebank.
ICRISAT also has pearl millet genebanks — in India and Africa. So when did pearl millet become “alternative” in India? Well, at least it’s not on this list of “indigenous foods.”
3000 rice genomes (from the IRRI genebank), and 1000 bull genomes. Brave new world.
The CIAT genebank makes the news, and not a genome in sight.
An in situ forest genebank deep in the heart of Sabah.
And you can bet they’re all saving seeds the right way. But there’s always a webinar if not. Or this.
Micronutrients? It’s the food system, stupid. Yes, indeedy. And there’s even a webinar about it.
The fascinating microbial system of cheese rinds.
Sauerkraut has a pretty fascinating microbial system too, I bet.
Artisanal whiskey is a thing? Isn’t it, basically, moonshine?
Truffle oil is a scam. Damn.
Coconut water tries not to seem a scam.
Heifer Farm shows off its weird carrots. Yeah, they’re more than just about livestock at Heifer.
Though that doesn’t include insects, I don’t think. Yes, insects.
Or bluefin tuna. Or the vaquita. But enough of that.
Plenty of weird tomatoes on this great wiki I came across.

July 31, 2014August 2, 2014

Wheat everywhere

Wheat has been much in the news in the past few days. There’s been the announcement of the draft genome sequence. And some fancy gene editing from China. But I want to point to a couple of more down-stream stories.

From Spain, there’s news of how an old variety — and much effort from a local family — brought back the particular taste of Los Monegros’ bread. Should anyone else be interested, the variety in question, Aragon 03, seems to be available in various genebanks.

And, from an area that is even more inhospitable to the crop, comes an announcement by Nigeria’s minister of agriculture himself that a new variety may turn the country into a major producer:

#Nigeria to be a major wheat producer with new tropical wheat that gives 6 tons per hectare. It will change the north pic.twitter.com/QRDQw9jdrP

— Akinwumi A. Adesina (@akin_adesina) July 27, 2014

Intrigued, I investigated further, and found that the variety in question, called Norman Borlaug in Nigeria, is Norman F2008, which was released by a private company a few years back in Mexico, based on CIMMYT material.

We’re going to need heat resistant wheat like this.

July 29, 2014August 11, 2014

Surviving Glenda

We have finally received news of the Philippines national genebank. Teresita Borromeo, who has worked there for some years, sent us the following email:

Yes, after 8 years, we were again devastated by the typhoon. The storage room is fortunately safe but our regeneration areas were completely damaged as well as our field gene bank. There was not much flood water as in 2006 but the winds were strong which lasted around ten hours. We had electricity just last Friday afternoon, so our freezers were first powered by generator. This again highlights the need for safety duplication within and outside the country. UPLB is greatly damaged, many trees fell down.

Seconded.