Microbes

August 9, 2018July 17, 2019

N-fixing maize goop

The news that a maize landrace has been found to fix atmospheric nitrogen because of microbes growing in gunk on its aerial roots has been getting a lot of traction. Understandably. The best take on it I’ve come across is this Twitter thread from Dr Sarah Taber:

https://twitter.com/sarahtaber_bww/status/1027388643973812224?s=21

May 28, 2018May 16, 2018

Brainfood: Cassava breeding, Teosinte gaps, Arabidopsis and CC, Urban pineapple, Minnesota apples, European CWR, Spiderplant review, British condiments, Yeast diversity, Diversity & productivity

Toward improving photosynthesis in cassava: Characterizing photosynthetic limitations in four current African cultivars. The landraces are better at photosynthesis than the improved cultivars. Maybe because the aim of producing the latter was pest and disease resistance rather than yield.
Ecogeography of teosinte. Only 11% in protected areas.
A map of climate change-driven natural selection in Arabidopsis thaliana. Summer is coming.
Urban backyards as a new model of pineapple germplasm conservation. Two thirds of citizen scientists did a really good job.
Identification of unknown apple (Malus × domestica) cultivars demonstrates the impact of local breeding program on cultivar diversity. 330 unknown highly diverse trees in northern Minnesota, 264 unique genotypes, 76 matched to 20 named cultivars from local breeding program at the University of Minnesota, or imported Russian cultivars.
Development of national crop wild relative conservation strategies in European countries. 30 countries: 13 in preparation stage, 14 with drafts, and 3 not yet started.
Current knowledge and breeding perspectives for the spider plant (Cleome gynandra L.): a potential for enhanced breeding of the plant in Africa. I actually like the bitterness of the leaves.
Condiments before Claudius: new plant foods at the Late Iron Age oppidum at Silchester, UK. Benefits of a customs union, I guess.
Adaptation of S. cerevisiae to Fermented Food Environments Reveals Remarkable Genome Plasticity and the Footprints of Domestication. Genetics linked to lifestyle differences.
Plant spectral diversity integrates functional and phylogenetic components of biodiversity and predicts ecosystem function. About 50% of variation in productivity in the Cedar Creek biodiversity experiment explained by spectral diversity.

May 21, 2018November 15, 2018

Brainfood: Czech genebank value, AnGR value, Korea rice core value, Cannabis value, Red rice diversity, Aquaculture trends, Mexican CWR, Rice male sterility, Evidence base, Siberian cheese

Estimating the Value of Crop Diversity Conservation Services Provided by the Czech National Programme for Agrobiodiversity. Willingness-to-pay (WTP) amounts to country-wide benefits of $68 million.
Animal genetic resources diversity and ecosystem services. Traditional breeds make a significant contribution to non-provisioning ecosystem services, but their keepers are often marginalized. Maybe somebody should calculate WTP?
Genome-wide association study reveals candidate genes related to low temperature tolerance in rice (Oryza sativa) during germination. 100 genes on 2 chromosomes, based on data from the Korean core collection.
The Role of Agriculture in Supplying Nutritional, Medicinal, and Recreational Cannabis Products. We need a Green Ganja Revolution, man.
Diversity and population structure of red rice germplasm in Bangladesh. Red rices, actually.
Comparative terrestrial feed and land use of an aquaculture-dominant world. Farming fish spares more land than farming livestock. And is better for you.
A Crop Wild Relative Inventory for Mexico. 310 taxa, 30% endemic.
Genetic analysis of male sterility obtained from a rice cultivar Lebed backcrossed with Taichung 65. You can get it here.
The major barriers to evidence‐informed conservation policy and possible solutions. Convince the public, and the policy-makers will come.
Using PacBio sequencing to investigate the bacterial microbiota of traditional Buryatian cottage cheese and comparison with Italian and Kazakhstan artisanal cheeses. Buryatia is a mountainous Russian republic in eastern Siberia, and they make really diverse cheese there, bacterially speaking.

April 18, 2018April 19, 2018

A Nibble big enough to choke on

Yeah, yeah, it’s been quiet here for the best part of a month. Work, you know. When you notice lack of action here, though, that doesn’t mean that I’m being completely idle. Not always, anyway. Check on Twitter and Facebook, if you dare, and you’ll see new stuff on a fairly regular basis, because that’s easier to do than a fully-fledged blog post. Anyway, what I’ll do here is a mega-Nibble hoovering up snippets from the past few weeks that I posted on social media but not here.

Vegetable History 101.
If you have a heirloom of one of the above to name, try this neural network approach.
Just as long as the name doesn’t end up being racist.
It’s too late for some German veggies. Though not, it seems, for German forests. What’s the difference?
Not yet too late for Tanzanian wild veggies, but winter is coming. Maybe giving them cool names would help.
And for some North American indigenous crops too, thanks to some committed people.
And for beans in Mexico for that matter.
Why all the above is important.
And urgent.
And this is the resulting problem if you ignore that lesson.
You see, the Australians are on the case, with their bush tucker fixation.
Mind you, it’s not all sweetness and light: the quinoa bubble bursts.
Maybe we can make a game of this diversification lark. Oh, look, it seems we can.
You can even breed for it.
Wherein I pontificate about genebank data. Again.
Maybe these guys will listen?
These guys obviously did, and built a better peanut.
Yeah, but can you see them from space?
The cost of ending hunger. The cost of ensuring crop diversity conservation in genebanks seems, well, peanuts.
The archaeology of gardens. Two of my favourite topics, combined. If only there was beer too. And peanuts.
A banana is a banana is a banana. Not.
All those bananas? You can help to map them.
They’ll put them on Google Earth next, like Kew did for these beautiful natural areas, with all their crop wild relatives :)
A Japanese agricultural encyclopaedia. Illustrated to boot.
Or, for the more Euro-centric, food art at the Met…
This cheese should probably be at the Met there too.
And this weed strain may well soon be on sale in the gift shop.
The sweet potato made it to Oceania on its own.
Oh no it didn’t.
On the other hand, livestock generally need to be accompanied.
All the yeast belong China.

March 19, 2018March 24, 2018

Brainfood: Tunisian carrots, Benin & CC, Tree variation, Grape phenotyping, Small ruminant domestication, Rio herbarium, Barley domestication, Millet groupings, Greek cheese

Genotyping-by-sequencing reveals the origin of the Tunisian relatives of cultivated carrot (Daucus carota). D. carota subsp. gummifer is different.
Impacts of climate change on cropping patterns in a tropical, sub-humid watershed. Recent advances in both rainfed and irrigated cropping in central Benin will be undone. Genetics to the rescue?
Is local trait variation related to total range size of tropical trees? No.
High-Precision Phenotyping of Grape Bunch Architecture Using Fast 3D Sensor and Automation. Next, put it on a drone.
Convergent genomic signatures of domestication in sheep and goats. Same genes, different selection pressures.
Herbarium collection of the Rio de Janeiro Botanical Garden (RB), Brazil. Any crops wild relatives? Pretty sure there must be.
Targeted resequencing reveals genomic signatures of barley domestication. Distinct ancestor populations at eastern and western ends of the Fertile Crescent implicated in domestication.
Towards Defining Heterotic Gene Pools in Pearl Millet [Pennisetum glaucum (L.) R.Br.]. Hybrid pearl millet is just around the corner.
Biodiversity and microbial resistance of lactobacilli isolated from the traditional Greek cheese kopanisti. Impressive biodiversity, alarming resistance.