- Identification and diversity of Y‐chromosome haplotypes in Qinghai yak populations. 2 paternal lineages but weak genetic structure among the 9 populations and 3 breeds.
- Development and characterization of Triticum turgidum–Aegilops umbellulata amphidiploids. A bridge to bread wheat.
- Variation in total root length and root diameter of wild and cultivated lentil grown under drought and re-watered conditions. Some wild species have longer total root length under drought stress than crops. No word on whether bridges needed.
- The Peril of Gene-Targeted Conservation. Only warranted when said targeted genes are important for viability and have large phenotypic effects. Suspect crop breeders (see above) may beg to differ.
- Conservation of biodiversity in the genomics era. Need to target the whole genome, I guess.
- “What Matters Is Species Richness” — High School Students’ Understanding of the Components of Biodiversity. Must try harder.
- What Conservation Does. The right things, more or less, and not at all badly, so stop complaining.
- Absence of evidence for the conservation outcomes of systematic conservation planning around the globe: a systematic map. It’s not evidence of absence of conservation outcomes, but still. Maybe should get together with the above?
- East African diploid and triploid bananas: a genetic complex transported from South-East Asia. All introduced by Austronesian people, probably via Madagascar, but no longer to be found in Asia (much).
- Molecular and Cytogenetic Study of East African Highland Banana. Focuses on one of the 4 groups discussed in the above (Mutika). All derived from maybe a single hybrid clone.
- Sources of resistance to Xanthomonas campestris pv. musacearum, the causal agent of banana Xanthomonas wilt. Why bother with the above, you ask?
- Genetic diversity of day-neutral converted landrace Gossypium hirsutum L. accessions. Eastern and western hemisphere groups, with US varieties closer to the eastern.
- Crop Domestication Alters Floral Reward Chemistry With Potential Consequences for Pollinator Health. In highbush blueberry, domestication has decreased the chemical diversity of nectar and pollen, possibly increasing infection by bee gut pathogens.
- Ancient DNA analysis of Scandinavian medieval drinking horns and the horn of the last aurochs bull. Aurochs interbred with domestic cattle way back. In other news, you can extract aurochs DNA from medieval Scandinavian drinking horns.
- The USDA cucumber (Cucumis sativus L.) collection: genetic diversity, population structure, genome-wide association studies, and core collection development. Three groups, more or less: India, E. Asia, and everything else. A third of 1200 accessions recovers 96% of variation.
- Rapid improvement of domestication traits in an orphan crop by genome editing. Tomato orthologues in groundcherry mutated for more fruits and better plant architecture.
- Domestication of wild tomato is accelerated by genome editing. Or you can do it with the actual tomato genes. As suggested a couple of years ago.
Nibbles: Farm subsidies, Pressing and naming plants, Cowpea primer, California crop maps, Caribbean mangoes, ABS meeting, Banana mapping, Sarada Krishnan, Indian millets, Apple varieties, Early modern bees
- Fun Twitter thread on zombie tropes about farm subsidies in the US. Should have been a blog post, though.
- Kew boffins on how to make an herbarium specimen. More complicated than you might think. And why it’s important. While I’m at it, this is how you use herbarium specimens etc. to name plants.
- IITA genebank manager interviewed about cowpea.
- Everything you ever wanted to know about the history of cartography. Not very relevant here, I know, but a monumental achievement that I wanted to celebrate. And here’s a wonderful example of cutting-edge online cartography that will no doubt feature in a future edition.
- The banana mapping project is progressing nicely.
- Damn, I missed the St Lucia mango festival. Next year?
- Africa discusses ABS.
- Dr Sarada Krishnan of Denver Botanic Garden profiled. She worked on the global coffee conservation strategy. Among many other things.
- Millets to the rescue in Gujarat.
- Red Delicious bumped from top apple spot.
- Amateurs have spread information about beekeeping since 16th century.
Crowdsinking seeds
The saddest cereal box I’ve ever seen: Honey Nut Cheerios now includes a pack of flower seeds you can plant to help bring back the bees. Source: https://t.co/bSw8vrltvZ pic.twitter.com/rdl5KnlZbp
— Simon Kuestenmacher (@simongerman600) March 9, 2018
Sounds like a cool idea, no?
Well, maybe not so much: “context is important.”
LATER: Or maybe not so bad after all?
Brainfood: Red List, Dormancy variation, Conservation priorities, Intensification, Buckwheat book, Wild barley, Sugarcane diversity, Pollinator diversity, Red Listing, Oily camellia
- The Value of the IUCN Red List for Business Decision-Making. It’s actually a two-way street.
- Phylogeny and source climate impact seed dormancy and germination of restoration-relevant forb species. Significant variation among population for 7 out of 8 species tested.
- An integrated framework to identify wildlife populations under threat from climate change. Brings together exposure to change, sensitivity to change and range shift potential to prioritize among 10 bat populations. Maybe more widely applicable.
- Winners and losers of national and global efforts to reconcile agricultural intensification and biodiversity conservation. Agricultural intensification leads to significant threats to vertebrate diversity, most of which can however be avoided by international cooperation; that being unlikely, national level optimization in 10 countries is next best.
- Buckwheat Germplasm in the World. Its time will surely come.
- Geographical and environmental determinants of the genetic structure of wild barley in southeastern Anatolia. More diverse, and different from the domesticate, with distinct W and E groups, and 4 loci possibly responsible for abiotic adaptation.
- Pedigree, marker recruitment, and genetic diversity of modern sugarcane cultivars in China and the United States. Not much diversity, especially in China.
- Species turnover promotes the importance of bee diversity for crop pollination at regional scales. Pollinator diversity is even more important than we thought.
- Comparing and contrasting threat assessments of plant species at the global and sub-global level. Most of the almost 90,000 assessments come from regional efforts, not global.
- Determination of Camellia oleifera Abel. Germplasm Resources of Genetic Diversity in China using ISSR Markers. Hunan is the place for diversity of this woody oil crop I never heard of.
Brainfood: MSB value, Wild rice genomes, Media coverage, Ancient turkeys, Diverse covers, ABS & sequences, Red listing, Old crops, Wild pollinators, Rice breeding, Farm & dietary diversity, Forages positives, Kurdish sheep
- The conservation value of germplasm stored at the Millennium Seed Bank, Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew, UK. 10% of about 40,000 taxa, >8% of collections, are either extinct, rare or vulnerable at global and/or national level; 20% of taxa, representing 13% collections, are endemic at the country or territory scale. And the cost, though?
- Genomes of 13 domesticated and wild rice relatives highlight genetic conservation, turnover and innovation across the genus Oryza. Lots of things for breeders to play around with. Australians especially pleased.
- Our House Is Burning: Discrepancy in Climate Change vs. Biodiversity Coverage in the Media as Compared to Scientific Literature. Biodiversity conservation community really bad at getting the message out.
- Diversity of management strategies in Mesoamerican turkeys: archaeological, isotopic and genetic evidence. Separate domestications in Mesoamerica and SW USA; two types in former, one fed crops and the other, more flamboyant type, left to roam; neither eaten.
- Functional traits in cover crop mixtures: Biological nitrogen fixation and multifunctionality. Design mixtures with complementary plant traits for maximum on-farm benefit.
- Plant genetic resources for food and agriculture: opportunities and challenges emerging from the science and information technology revolution. The future is Norway.
- Quantifying progress toward a conservation assessment for all plants. A quarter done.
- The earliest occurrence of a newly described domesticate in Eastern North America: Adena/Hopewell communities and agricultural innovation. Erect knotweed used to be a crop, a mainstay of the Eastern Agricultural Complex. Now it’s a weed. Can the same be said of other plants? Well, maybe.
- Conserving honey bees does not help wildlife. Wild bees, that is.
- Breeding implications of drought stress under future climate for upland rice in Brazil. Wide adaptation of upland rice in Brazil is not going to cut it.
- Farm production diversity and dietary quality: linkages and measurement issues. Cash is often better than production diversity at predicting dietary diversity.
- Tropical forage legumes for environmental benefits: An overview. Ruminant livestock production need not be bad for the environment. Useful list of research needs to make sure.
- Complete mitogenomes from Kurdistani sheep: abundant centromeric nuclear copies representing diverse ancestors. There are lots of bits of mitochondrial DNA near the centromeres of all chromosomes bar the Y. Is that a problem for phylogenies?