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November 15, 2021November 15, 2021

Agrobiodiversity manifestly important

The process leading up to the just-started 2nd International Agrobiodiversity Congress included coming up with the “Rome Manifesto: Using Agrobiodiversity to Transform Food Systems.” This highlights three “commitments to help tackle global challenges including climate change, malnutrition, biodiversity loss, and environmental degradation.”

Consume diverse foods in diets that are nutritious, sustainable, affordable, acceptable, safe, and accessible to all.
Produce food in diverse, resilient, and sustainable food systems.
Conserve agrobiodiversity to give people the options they need to sustainably and inclusively transform food systems and improve lives, both now and in the future.

Yeah but how, you ask? You’ll have to attend the congress to find out, I guess, or at least follow on Twitter…

November 15, 2021December 9, 2021

Brainfood: Chickpea genomes, DIIVA, Maize evolution, Malting barley, Wild gluten, Cucurbit review, Coconut genome double, USDA rice collection, CIAT bean collection, PGRFA data integration, USA cattle diversity, PGRFA history

A chickpea genetic variation map based on the sequencing of 3,366 genomes. Where the good and the bad alleles are. Even The Economist is impressed.
Crop Wild Relatives Crosses: Multi-Location Assessment in Durum Wheat, Barley, and Lentil. There are lots of good alleles in the wild relatives.
The arches and spandrels of maize domestication, adaptation, and improvement. Some alleles are good by accident, and that’s ok.
Malting Quality of ICARDA Elite Winter Barley (Hordeum vulgare L.) Germplasm Grown in Moroccan Middle Atlas. Here are some alleles for good beer.
High molecular weight glutenin gene diversity in Aegilops tauschii demonstrates unique origin of superior wheat quality. And here are some alleles for good gluten. In a wild relative from unexpected place, as it turns out. More in the press release.
Genetic resources of bottle gourd (Lagenaria siceraria (Molina) Standl.] and citron watermelon (Citrullus lanatus var. citroides (L.H. Bailey) Mansf. ex Greb.): implications for genetic improvement, product development and commercialization: a review. Not just good as rootstocks, and lots of alleles to play with.
Coconut genome assembly enables evolutionary analysis of palms and highlights signaling pathways involved in salt tolerance. Looks like coconut might have lost a lot of good alleles at the end of the Pleistocene glaciations.
High-quality reference genome sequences of two coconut cultivars provide insights into evolution of monocot chromosomes and differentiation of fiber content and plant height. The same gene controls height in coconuts as in maize and rice.
Enhancing the searchability, breeding utility, and efficient management of germplasm accessions in the USDA−ARS rice collection. And now you can look for rice germplasm with the good height allele you want.
History and impact of a bean (Phaseolus spp., Leguminosae, Phaseoleae) collection. Hopefully will be able to do the same for this bean collection soon.
Integrating Genomic and Phenomic Approaches to Support Plant Genetic Resources Conservation and Use. The above, summarized.
Gene Bank Collection Strategies Based Upon Geographic and Environmental Indicators for Beef Breeds in the United States of America. The above, plus environmental data, for cattle.
History of Global Germplasm Conservation System. The above, writ large.

November 11, 2021

Nibbles: Wild wheat, Saving coffee, Wild rice, 3 Sisters video, Blenheim honeybees, NDCs

The ancient, wild, Georgian roots of bread wheat gluten.
Wild relatives could help us save coffee. But we knew that. Right?
Photosynthesis in wild rices responds more quickly to light changes than in the crop, stomata not so much. Sometimes domestication giveth, sometimes it taketh away.
It gave us the Three Sisters for sure. With video goodness.
Honeybees have wild relatives too. Well, maybe.
But do the NDCs recognise any of the above?

November 11, 2021November 15, 2021

Nibbles: Cheddar cheese, Chickpea festival, Senegal rice, Great Plains, Brazilian fruit, Hungry Eye

There’s a national chickpea championship, but in Spain.
Senegal is getting its rice back. No word on any championship.
The Great Plains are not coming back, alas. Spoiler alert: rice and chickpeas are not to blame.
Cheddar is trying to get its cheese back, though, and has a chance.
Cool book on the fruits of Brazil. I bet some would go great with cheddar.
Review of what seems a cool book on the history of food in Europe. I wonder if it explains the whole cheese-with-fruit thing.

November 10, 2021November 10, 2021

Nibbles: Mesopotamian ag & gardens, Old dogs, Ethiopian church groves, High Desert Seed, Australian Rubus, Fuggle hop, New sweet potato, Naming organisms

Jeremy’s newsletter deals with Sumerian grains, among other things.
Which may have been grown in the gardens of Uruk.
I suppose the Sumerians must have had weird dogs frolicking around their gardens?
Maybe they even thought of their gardens as sacred places. You know, like in Ethiopia.
Seeds for a desert half a world away from Sumeria.
Meanwhile, half a world away in the other direction, a thornless raspberry takes a bow.
The Sumerians had beer, right? Not with this hop though. Or any hops, actually.
Pretty sure they didn’t have sweet potatoes either. Of any colour.
They had names for whatever they grew of course. And such vernacular names can be a pain in the ass, but also kinda fun.