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February 1, 2023January 30, 2023

Food diversity, every day

Yet another thoroughly satisfying Eat This Newsletter from Jeremy. Here are two snippets on crop diversity, but there’s lots more…

Talking about Eating to Extinction

Dan Saladino’s book Eating to Extinction has justifiably won all sorts of awards since it came out about 18 months ago. Capitalising on that and the interest more generally in vanishing foods and ingredients, Dan and his chums put together a Food Diversity Day on 13 January. I was unable to watch any of it for a host of reasons, but a post by Patricia Bixler Reber on her marvellous Researching Food History website reminded me that all of it is now online. There’s probably enough there to keep you busy for a good long while, and if there isn’t, Researching Food History is always good for a suggestion or two. I’d already booked for one on 31 January that promises to be a bit of a myth-buster (and that may yet become an episode).

Preserving Potato Diversity

Dan Saladino doesn’t devote an awful lot of space to the always-humble potato, which is by no means a criticism; there is so much more to be concerned about. But I suspect he is well aware of some of the more exotic potatoes of the Andes and beyond, with their colourful flesh and skin. Diverse efforts to promote these varieties, by encouraging high-end restaurants as much as low-grade snacks, have had some success in Peru. The latest brings Ecuador into the fold, with crisps/chips made from ancestral varieties known locally as black heart and red heart. The tubers are grown by a collective of 180 small farmers, who are guaranteed a stable price for their crop. I hope they use some of that cash to improve their family nutrition.

And if you’re a gardener with a hankering for some creative potato diversity of your own, I highly commend true potato seed; read a bit about it thanks to Modern Farmer.

January 31, 2023February 1, 2023

Nibbles: Fonio commercialization, Naked barley, Food books, Ag decarbonization, Nepal NUS, Millets & women, Crop diversity video, Maize god, Cherokee genebank, CWR, Japan genebank

A Nigerian company is pushing fonio as the next global super-food. What could possibly go wrong?
Personally, I think naked barley has a better chance.
Humanities scholars recommend their favourite new books on food systems. I bet there will soon be one on fonio.
Food and agriculture analyst at the Breakthrough Institute pens whole essay on how there should be public investment in moving agriculture from productivity gains to decarbonization without mentioning fonio.
Well Nepal has orphan crops of its own and doesn’t give a fig for your fonio.
Blogpost highlights the role of women in the cultivation and conservation of millets in Tamil Nadu.
ISSD Africa video on the advantages of growing a diversity of crops, especially under climate change. Fonio, anyone?
What does maize have to do with turtles? Gather round, children…
The Cherokee Nation’s genebank is open for business. Maize available. No turtles.
Long article on collecting, conserving and using crop wild relatives, including by Kew’s Millennium Seed Bank. Could fonio do with some diversity from its wild relatives? I suspect it’s not a huge priority, but maybe it will become one.
It’s unclear how much diversity of orphan crops is in Japan’s high-tech genebank, but I bet it’s quite a bit. Fonio, I’m not so sure though. Maybe someone will tell me.

January 30, 2023January 29, 2023

Brainfood: Zea, Urochloa, Medicago, Solanum, Juglans, Camellia, Artocarpus, Lactuca, Phaseolus, and everything else

Genome sequencing reveals evidence of adaptive variation in the genus Zea. Alleles associated with flowering time were key to adaptation in highland and temperate regions.
THP9 enhances seed protein content and nitrogen-use efficiency in maize. And it came from wild teosinte.
Diverged subpopulations in tropical Urochloa (Brachiaria) forage species indicate a role for facultative apomixis and varying ploidy in their population structure and evolution. Polyploidy plus apomixis equals world domination. Maize next?
Plastid phylogenomics uncovers multiple species in Medicago truncatula (Fabaceae) germplasm accessions. Genebanks need to go beyond conventional taxonomy sometimes.
Comparative Analysis of the Genetic Diversity of Chilean Cultivated Potato Based on a Molecular Study of Authentic Herbarium Specimens and Present-Day Gene Bank Accessions. Native Chilean potato landraces are being replaced and polluted…
Diversity of Late Blight Resistance Genes in the VIR Potato Collection. …and will probably continue to be replaced and polluted.
The United States Potato Genebank Holding of cv. Desiree is a Somatic Mutant of cv. Urgenta. Shit happens, even in well-run genebanks.
Domestication and selection footprints in Persian walnuts (Juglans regia). Breeding hasn’t had much of an effect on diversity.
Comparative phylogenetic analysis of oolong tea (Phoenix Dancong tea) using complete chloroplast genome sequences. Oolong teas are a genetic thing.
Linking breadfruit cultivar names across the globe connects histories after 230 years of separation. Because of genebanks, botanic gardens, herbaria and three generations of women scientists we now know which breadfruit varieties Captain Bligh introduced to the West Indies.
Lactuca georgica Grossh. is a wild species belonging to the secondary lettuce gene pool: additional evidence, obtained by KASP genotyping. A wild species gets demoted.
Large genomic introgression blocks of Phaseolus parvifolius Freytag bean into the common bean enhance the crossability between tepary and common beans. A wild species helps with crossing two cultivated species. Figure out which genepool it belongs to after that.
Genebanking plant genetic resources in the postgenomic era. Yeah, but all the above leads to the question: “what happens when all crop diversity has been sequenced?” Read this to find out.

January 23, 2023January 22, 2023

Brainfood: Breeding edition

Climate change may outpace current wheat breeding yield improvements in North America. Breeders need to try harder, at least for spring wheat.
Large-scale genotyping and phenotyping of a worldwide winter wheat genebank for its use in pre-breeding. But winter wheat could do with some help too, and genebanks are there for you, breeders.
Exotic alleles contribute to heat tolerance in wheat under field conditions. Maybe wild relatives are the answer?
Agronomic assessment of two populations of intermediate wheatgrass—Kernza® (Thinopyrum intermedium) in temperate South America. Even really, really wild, and perennial, relatives.
Sustained productivity and agronomic potential of perennial rice. Maybe perennial wheat breeders can learn from perennial rice breeders.
CGIAR Barley Breeding Toolbox: A diversity panel to facilitate breeding and genomic research in the developing world. Good to see barley is not being left behind. Perennial barley next, anyone?
Developing drought-smart, ready-to-grow future crops. It’s not like breeders have no idea about what to do and how to do it…
Molecular evidence for adaptive evolution of drought tolerance in wild cereals. …and there’s diversity out there in the wild relatives to play with. Even without getting into the weird perennial stuff.
Impact of CGIAR maize germplasm in Sub-Saharan Africa. So let’s be optimistic, there are success stories. Although, cripes, I’d like to see perennial maize.
Genomic prediction for the Germplasm Enhancement of Maize project. Which is not to say there’s no room for improvement too.
Maize plants and the brace roots that support them. Yeah, like for example how many of these fancy CGIAR and GEM maize varieties have brace roots?
Retrospective study in US commercial sorghum breeding: I. Genetic gain in relation to relative maturity. US breeders have been really successful for sorghum too, though maybe not successful enough.
Evaluation of a Subset of Ethiopia Sorghum Collection Germplasm from the National Genetic Resources Program of the United States Department of Agriculture for Anthracnose Resistance. And that success may be spilling over to Ethiopia. Well I’d like to think so anyway, or the whole conceit of this Brainfood will go up in smoke.
Genomics-based assembly of a sorghum bicolor (L.) Moench core collection in the Uganda national genebank as a genetic resource for sustainable sorghum breeding. And maybe Uganda too? Yes, I’m doubling down.
GridScore: a tool for accurate, cross-platform phenotypic data collection and visualization. All these breeders need to store and manage their data, of course, and here’s a way to do that.
The Impact of N.I. Vavilov on the Conservation and Use of Plant Genetic Resources in Scandinavia: A Review. Arguably all of the above is the result of the sort of international collaboration that Vavilov exemplified, perhaps even pioneered?

January 17, 2023January 17, 2023

Nibbles: CIAT, AGG, Volcani, Restoration, Food diversity, Deforestation, Berries, Diverse systems

I’ve been told I need to be more explicit in my Nibbling. So here’s a CCTV video on the Future Seeds genebank in Colombia. You know the one.
The Australian Grains Genebank (AGG) in Horsham is announcing a new online seed catalogue. The genebank is also on Genesys.
According to this article, the Israel Plant Gene Bank of the Volcani Center Agricultural Research Organization near Tel Aviv has some pretty cool wheats. I wonder if any of them are also in the AGG. The Volcani genebank is not on Genesys, alas. But some of its material is.
The Director of Science of the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew and others say that we need lots more genebanks if we are to do all the ecosystem restoration that needs to be done around the world.
Short & sweet blog post on the importance of food diversity from the policy officer at the Soil Association. Genebanks not mentioned though, alas.
Vox has an article on a new European law aimed at preventing the sale of some agricultural commodities grown on recently cleared forest land. I guess the next step would be restoring those ecosystems. If only there were more genebanks…
Some hero mapped the distribution of all the berries of North America, and made cool videos of the results.
Report from Wageningen AU on “The need to enhance crop, livestock andaquatic genetic diversity in food systems.” Lots and lots on genebanks.
So, what did you think? Do you prefer telegraphic, impressionistic Nibbles, or these lengthier, more explicit versions? Let me know in the comments.