- Comprehensiveness of conservation of useful wild plants: An operational indicator for biodiversity and sustainable development targets. Lots to do. Lots.
- The East Asiatic region of crop plant diversity. Southwest China especially rich, with its 44 species of kiwifruit, for example.
- The Sorghum QTL Atlas: a powerful tool for trait dissection, comparative genomics and crop improvement. Maybe this will get the stuff used a bit more.
- Domestication and crop evolution of wheat and barley: Genes, genomics, and future directions. Much progress recently, but high-resolution identification of crop-wild introgressions remains a gap.
- Real-time PCR, a great tool for fast identification, sensitive detection and quantification of important plant-parasitic nematodes. Results in 3 hours.
- Gut microbiome transition across a lifestyle gradient in Himalaya. Composition (but not diversity) can change in a generation when foragers transition to agriculture.
- Are the old International Board for Plant Genetic Resources (IBPGR) base collections available through the Plant Treaty’s multilateral system of access and benefit sharing? A review. Well, about 80% of them may be.
- Speed breeding in growth chambers and glasshouses for crop breeding and model plant research. Hacking the breeders’ equation: one giant leap…
- The drivers and methodologies for exploiting wild Cajanus genome in pigeonpea breeding. Sources of high protein, CMS, self-pollination, and resistances to various biotic stresses; but may need to rethink the secondary genepool.
- Development and Application of High-Density Axiom Cajanus SNP Array with 56K SNPs to Understand the Genome Architecture of Released Cultivars and Founder Genotypes. Top 6 founders accounted for 50% of the genetic base of released cultivars. Could use more of the above, in other words.
- Genomic analysis of dingoes identifies genomic regions under reversible selection during domestication and feralization. They’re reverting to wolves, genetically speaking.
- Hongyacha, a Naturally Caffeine-Free Tea Plant from Fujian, China. Well, wild tea relative anyway.
- An EST-SSR based genetic linkage map and identification of QTLs for anthracnose disease resistance in water yam (Dioscorea alata L.). One QTL looks promising.
- Global assessment and mapping of changes in mesoscale landscapes: 1992–2015. Main changes were forest→agriculture, followed by agriculture→forest.
- Quantitative Genetics and Genomics Converge to Accelerate Forest Tree Breeding. Great potential, on the brink, just around the corner…
- Genome Editing in Trees: From Multiple Repair Pathways to Long-Term Stability. Great potential, on the brink, just around the corner…
Nibbles: Land use change, Herbarium data, Crop substitution, Agroforestry in PNG, Eat This Pickle
- That global land use change map put to good polemical use.
- Herbaria put to use.
- Let them grow coca.
- Well, it is sort of agroforestry, right?
- Jeremy gets into a slight pickle.
Nibbles: Sheepish, Camel caravan, More sheep, Cheese protection, CATAN, Qat, FAO online double, Potato in NZ, NUS dossier, Ramosmania
- There’s a world of coloured sheep out there, and a conference.
- Not to mention camels.
- Does this cute sheep qualify as coloured?
- You can’t copyright a cheese in Europe. Worth a Brexit joke? No.
- Like board games? You’ll LOVE this.
- Speaking of games, the only thing qat is good for is to use up your Q in Scrabble. Which is why you won’t find it in the new CATAN, despite the tempting near-homophony.
- Learn about the SDG 2.5 indicators from FAO.
- Oh, and since you’re there, take a gander at their new biodiversity website.
- Climate change affecting potato production in New Zealand.
- I think I may have overlooked this CTA Dossier on underutilized crops and nutrition, which is naughty of me.
- Coaxing “cafe marron” to have sex with itself.
Brainfood: Wild palm, Yield trends, Indigenous veggies double, Old goat grass, Saline soy, Carob history, Pesticidal plants, Rapeseed diversity, Livestock positives, Domestication syndrome, Kiwifruit evolution, Forest diversity
- Genetic structure of the Canarian palm tree (Phoenix canariensis) at the island scale: does the “island within islands” concept apply to species with high colonization abilities? High dispersal ability doesn’t always lead to high connectivity among populations.
- Uncertainties of potentials and recent changes in global yields of major crops resulting from census- and satellite-based yield datasets at multiple resolutions. Average overall annual yield increases of about 1.5% for maize, rice, wheat and soybean for 1981 to 2008 are uncertain and probably not sufficient.
- Indigenous underutilized vegetables for food and nutritional security in an island ecosystem. People in the the Andaman and Nicobar Islands eat a lot of different vegetables. Interestingly, most are perennial and a quarter are wild.
- Knowledge Loss and Change Between 2002 and 2017—a Revisit of Plant Use of the Maasai of Sekenani Valley, Maasai Mara, Kenya. But for how long will the above be true?
- Use of grass seed resources c.31 ka by modern humans at the Haua Fteah cave, northeast Libya. Including wild wheat relative(s).
- Soybean PI 675847 A as a new source of salt tolerance. But it can’t be the only one, surely?
- The carob tree at the crossroad of domestication center and refugia hypotheses. Out of the west, surprisingly.
- Pesticidal Plant Extracts Improve Yield and Reduce Insect Pests on Legume Crops Without Harming Beneficial Arthropods. Worth a try.
- Genome-wide selection footprints and deleterious variations in young Asian allotetraploid rapeseed. Asian rapeseed derived from European, diverged, introgressed, split into 2 groups.
- Essential amino acids: master regulators of nutrition and environmental footprint? If you take essential amino acids into account, livestock production doesn’t seem such a bad idea after all.
- Parallel selection on a dormancy gene during domestication of crops from multiple families. Cloned soybean dormancy gene also showed evidence of selection during domestication in rice and tomato.
- Two Likely Auto-Tetraploidization Events Shaped Kiwifruit Genome and Contributed to Establishment of the Actinidiaceae Family. And you can thank them for the high vitamin C content.
- Hydraulic diversity of forests regulates ecosystem resilience during drought. More diverse forests better at coping with dry spells.
Brainfood: Rye genus, Purple carrots, Breed conservation contracts, Livestock breeding, USDA sweetpotatoes, Apple breeding, Olive breeding, Landrace nutrition, Trade and SDG 2.5, Medicinal legumes, Tea in China, Non-rhizobia, Fungal cryo, Barcoding NUS
- Phylogeny and genetic structure in the genus Secale. The perennial species is different from the annuals, which are divided into an Asian and a non-Asia group and show all kinds of introgression.
- Consumers’ acceptance of a local landrace: the case of purple carrots. Sure, if produced locally.
- Saving the breeds: German Farmers’ preferences for Endangered Dairy Breed conservation programs. Sure, if they get paid.
- Analysing innovations among cattle smallholders to evaluate the adequacy of breeding programs. Intensification will need more than selection within the local breed. But it’s a start.
- Genetic diversity and population structure of the USDA sweetpotato (Ipomoea batatas) germplasm collection using GBSpoly. 4 clusters: Central American, North American, South American, and others.
- Updated review of potential medicinal genetic resources in the USDA, ARS, PGRCU industrial and legume crop germplasm collections. 22 species have potential.
- Apple (Malus spp.) Breeding: Present and Future. It’s bright, apparently.
- Strategies for Olive (Olea europaea L.) Breeding: Cultivated Genetic Resources and Crossbreeding. There’s an International Olive Council, and it has a Network of Germplasm Banks.
- Genetic flow among olive populations within the Mediterranean basin. Separate Syrian and Algerian genepools.
- Traditional farmers’ varieties: a valuable source of genetic variability for biofortification programs. Back to the future.
- SDG 2.5: How Policies Affecting Trade and Markets Can Help Maintain Genetic Diversity. It’s possible, but not automatic.
- Concept and protection of traditional knowledges in agricultural heritage system: a case study of Pu’er Traditional Tea Agrosystem. Based on 269 pieces of traditional knowledge, and in trouble.
- Mining alfalfa (Medicago sativa L.) nodules for salinity tolerant non-rhizobial bacteria to improve growth of alfalfa under salinity stress. They work even on their own.
- Frozen fungi: cryogenic storage is an effective method to store Fusarium cultures for the long‐term. I guess will also work on the above?
- DNA barcoding to promote social awareness and identity of neglected, underutilized plant species having valuable nutritional properties. Familiarity breeds contentment.