- Assessment of Genetic Diversity and Population Structure in a Global Reference Collection of 531 Accessions of Carthamus tinctorius L. (Safflower) Using AFLP Markers. Bayesian analysis of genetic diversity of global (43 countries) collection held in India reveals 19 geographic groups, with most diversity in the Near East and Iran–Afghanistan regions.
- Molecular evaluation of orphan Afghan common wheat (Triticum aestivum L.) landraces collected by Dr. Kihara using single nucleotide polymorphic markers. Analysis (Bayesian, natch) of genetic diversity of over 400 wheat landraces collected 1950-1970 and conserved at the Kihara Institute for Biological Research, Japan reveals agroecological patterning and hotspot in Badakhshan province.
- Sources of pest resistance in cassava. Analysis of 89 trials over 25 years involving the CIAT cassava collection identifies 129 landraces with high resistance to thrips, 33 to green mites and 19 to whiteflies.
- Screening sweetpotato genotypes for tolerance to drought stress. Days to permanent wilting point (DPWP) points to 8 promising clones in Kenya.
- Olive domestication and diversification in the Mediterranean Basin. About 400 wild and cultivated accessions divide up into W, central and E groups and show evidence of admixture among them and local domestication events.
- The Multiple Functions and Services of Community Seedbanks. More than just conservation.
- Diversification practices reduce organic to conventional yield gap. More data and fancier maths finds a lower organic yield gap (20%), which is halved by multi-cropping and crop rotations.
- Conserving landraces and improving livelihoods: how to assess the success of on farm conservation projects? All you need is two graphs.
- Finding Our Way through Phenotypes. “We urge all biologists, data managers, and clinicians to actively support the development, evaluation, refinement, and adoption of methodologies, tools, syntaxes, and standards for capturing and computing over phenotypic data and to collaborate in bringing about a coordinated approach.” Amen.
- Wild food in Europe: A synthesis of knowledge and data of terrestrial wild food as an ecosystem service. 65 million people collect, and at least 100 million consume, wild food. But only 81 plants? Thought it would be more. But even so, quite an ecosystem service.
Nibbles: Palms, Walnuts, Gardening game, Measuring biodiversity, Promoting biodiversity, Restoring land, Honeybee evolutions, Amaranth recipes, Cider communication
- Someone you know might need to know the difference between a coconut palm and an oil palm.
- Or between English walnuts and French walnuts (and much more besides).
- Is an interactive game really the best way for children to learn about organic gardening?
- Canadian Cattlemen magazine shares a woman scientist’s deep insights into measuring biodiversity.
- And Indian priests used Konnsanchem fest to urge the revival of agrobiodiversity.
- Other Indians are restoring their land by getting rid of an interloper crop.
- DNA suggests a new ancestral home for the honeybee.
- Now I know what to do with the amaranth blocking every pavement in Rome: how to cook this prolific leafy green.
- Nominally about cider and apples, Pete Brown downs Strongbow’s communications in a few quick drafts.
Brainfood: Ethiopian wild veggies, Cold tolerant rice, Chickpea genomics, Improved tilapia, Wild cassava oil, Chinese horses, Chinese melon, Seed sampling, Tomato spp sequencing
- Wild and semi-wild leafy vegetables used by the Maale and Ari ethnic communities in southern Ethiopia. 30 of them.
- Collection and Conservation of Cold Adapted Indigenous Rice Landraces from Western Ghats, South India. 56 of them.
- Exploring Germplasm Diversity to Understand the Domestication Process in Cicer spp. Using SNP and DArT Markers. 3 populations among domesticated types; more diversity in the wilds.
- Genetically-Improved Tilapia Strains in Africa: Potential Benefits and Negative Impacts. Mean present value of introducing an improved strain to Ghana is 1% of GDP, but you could get same with better management. Both would of course be best.
- Diversity in oil content and fatty acid profile in seeds of wild cassava germplasm. Some species could be oil crops.
- The Study of Genetic Diversity and Phylogenetic Evolution in Indigenous Horses (Equus caballus) of Gansu. If I understand the abstract correctly, this suggests, among other things, that some local horse breeds can be traced back to Przewalski’s Horse, maybe.
- Microsatellite Diversity, Population Structure, and Core Collection Formation in Melon Germplasm. In China. Frankly not nearly as interesting as the horse story.
- Optimal sampling of seeds from plant populations for ex-situ conservation of genetic biodiversity, considering realistic population structure. 25–30 individuals per population from few but widely-spaced populations.
- Exploring genetic variation in the tomato (Solanum section Lycopersicon) clade by whole-genome sequencing. 20x more diversity in the wilds than the cultivated, correlated with habitat.
- Understanding Sustainable Diets: A Descriptive Analysis of the Determinants and Processes That Influence Diets and Their Impact on Health, Food Security, and Environmental Sustainability. The determinants of sustainability are agricultural, health, sociocultural, environmental and socioeconomic, and fiddling with one to improve it may screw up another.
- Anchoring durum wheat diversity in the reality of traditional agricultural systems: varieties, seed management, and farmers’ perception in two Moroccan regions. Farmers grow both improved varieties and landraces, the latter mainly for their quality characteristics.
- Unraveling the nexus between water and food security in Latin America and the Caribbean: regional and global implications. Production has increased, but at the cost of the natural capital of the region, and nutritional problems persist.
Brainfood: Greek olives, Slovak grapes, Wild cotton, Livestock breeding, Urban veggies, Dismal millet, Beautiful plumage, Nutritious millet, Kiwifruit double
- Genetic structure of the Greek olive germplasm revealed by RAPD, ISSR and SSR markers. Reflects usage.
- Genotyping of Vitis vinifera L. within the Slovak national collection of genetic resources. Unclear whether it reflects usage.
- Molecular confirmation of species status for the allopolyploid cotton species, Gossypium ekmanianum Wittmack. It has been hiding in collections as “wild” G. hirsutum, but it really isn’t.
- North American animal breeding and production: meeting the needs of a changing landscape. We’ll need a better fit of genotype to production environment, better meat quality, better animal health and decreased residual feed intake; climate change will make it more difficult, but it will still be possible, especially using new genomic tools.
- Urban agriculture: a global analysis of the space constraint to meet urban vegetable demand. We’re going to need bigger cities, to grow enough vegetables in them, to feed them. No, wait…
- Niche Markets for Agrobiodiversity Conservation: Preference and Scale Heterogeneity Effects on Nepalese Consumers’ WTP for Finger Millet Products. That’s Willingness to Pay. And there is a bit of the population with enough of it to suggest that a price premium could translate into more acreage. And maybe more public investment.
- Selection and Crossbreeding in Relation to Plumage Color Inheritance in Three Chinese Egg Type Duck Breeds (Anas platyrhynchos). Hybrids are better layers, but then you can lose the desired plumage. Here’s how to have your beautiful duck and eat it too.
- Micronutrient Density and Stability in West African Pearl Millet — Potential for Biofortification. There is some, but there would be more if some Indian material was used in breeding too.
- Genetic diversity in kiwifruit polyploid complexes: insights into cultivar evaluation, conservation, and utilization. Interploid crosses can increase genetic diversity. The red-fleshed cultivars are genetically distinct. Red? Really?
- Natural hybridization, introgression breeding, and cultivar improvement in the genus Actinidia. We should collect new material in natural hybrid zones.
Brainfood: Ethiopian coffee, Kenyan climate change, Biofortification, Pasture legume adoption, Moroccan veggies, Economics of pests, Grassland diversity & fire, Seed storage, Resistant beans, Maize OPVs, Low P tolerance in NERICA, Brazilian beans
- Prospects for forest-based ecosystem services in forest-coffee mosaics as forest loss continues in southwestern Ethiopia. Coffee agroforests provide about half to two thirds of the ecosystem services of plain old forests.
- Social Process of Adaptation to Environmental Changes: How Eastern African Societies Intervene between Crops and Climate. Your seeds may not be able to cut it in the future.
- Bioavailability of iron, zinc, and provitamin A carotenoids in biofortified staple crops. Focus on breeding varieties with elevated micronutrient concentrations is justified. Phew.
- The future of warm-season, tropical and subtropical forage legumes in sustainable pastures and rangelands. Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it. And the past, in this case, was full of mistakes.
- Wild leafy vegetable use and knowledge across multiple sites in Morocco: a case study for transmission of local knowledge? The Rif Mts are a hotspot of weed diversity. Not that kind of weed, settle down. No, wait…
- Agricultural Trade, Biodiversity Effects and Food Price Volatility. Pests are damaging to neat economic models. Pesticides fix that but damage the environment. No word on the economics of natural enemies, integrated pest management, varietal diversity etc.
- Annual burning drives plant communities in remnant grassland ecological networks in an afforested landscape. In the southern Afromontane region, annual burning does not reduce the species diversity of grassland patches, but does make these patches look more and more alike. Add heavy cattle grazing though and that does reduce diversity.
- Responses to fire differ between South African and North American grassland communities. Decreasing fire frequency increased species diversity in Kansas, decreased it in Kwa-Zulu Natal. It’s because of the rhizomatous species in America. What does this and above mean for crop wild relatives?
- Prolonging the longevity of ex situ conserved seeds by storage under anoxia. Remove oxygen to make seeds last longer in genebanks.
- Identification of Sources of Bacterial Wilt Resistance in Common Beans (Phaseolus vulgaris L.). Only 1 resistant accession out of 500 in the USDA collection. And it’s a wild one.
- Evaluation of Evolution and Diversity of Maize Open-Pollinated Varieties Cultivated under Contrasted Environmental and Farmers’ Selection Pressures: A Phenotypical Approach. OPVs are diverse and change over time. Still no cure for cancer.
- A novel allele of the P-starvation tolerance gene OsPSTOL1 from African rice (Oryza glaberrima Steud) and its distribution in the genus Oryza. Kasalath comes to the rescue of NERICA. Must be the only sativa gene NOT in NERICA.
- Agronomic potential of genebank landrace elite accessions for common bean genetic breeding. Yeah, but are they in the Brazilian genebank? Doesn’t look like it.