- Conserving heirloom rice in the Philippines.
- A seed production company run by farmers.
- Tapping toddy. With audio goodness.
- Lots of goodness in Jeremy’s latest newsletter.
- Australia gets serious about coconut conservation in the Pacific and beyond.
- Australia’s own genebanks are very serious. Oh yes indeedy.
- Will sweet potatoes get young people into farming in Kenya? If my nephews are anything to go by, the answer, alas, is no.
- Maybe they should try mungbeans.
- Or NERICA.
- The Bing cherry didn’t help Ah Bing much though.
- Whatever the crop, it’s total factor productivity that you have to watch for.
- And then don’t forget to include whatever intervention you come up with in subject-wide evidence synthesis.
- Prize for best title of the week: “Nordic cooperation on genetic resources – what’s the point?” Nice video.
Brainfood: Rationalizing acquisition, Empowering women, Breadfruit domestication, Rice hybrid sterility, Long-distance crop dispersal, Diversification, African leafy greens, GIAH, Silkworm cryo, Bean in situ
- Molecular markers as a tool for germplasm acquisition to enhance the genetic diversity of a Napier grass (Cenchrus purpureus syn. Pennisetum purpureum) collection. Win-win for the ILRI and Embrapa genebanks.
- Women’s empowerment in agriculture and agricultural productivity: Evidence from rural maize farmer households in western Kenya. 1% increase in women’s empowerment led to a 6-16% increase in maize yields, depending on fanciness of math.
- A transcriptome screen for positive selection in domesticated breadfruit and its wild relatives (Artocarpus spp.). Evidence of selection in 1000 genes.
- A selfish genetic element confers non-Mendelian inheritance in rice. Pollen toxin-antidote genetic system controls hybrid sterility in wild-cultivated crosses.
- Between China and South Asia: A Middle Asian corridor of crop dispersal and agricultural innovation in the Bronze Age. It’s not all demic diffusion.
- Determinants of crop diversification in rice-dominated Sri Lankan agricultural systems. Not everyone can diversify.
- Improving food-system efficiency and environmental conservation using agricultural biodiversity in Busia County: a pilot study. Giving farmers nutritional data increased their cultivation of traditional vegetables, and their income.
- The impacts of farmers’ livelihood endowments on their participation in eco-compensation policies: Globally important agricultural heritage systems case studies from China. Giving farmers money increased their income.
- Conservation of wild silkworm genetic resources through cryopreservation: Standardization of sperm processing. It’s best to recover sperm from the bursa copulatrix and spermatheca of the female moth after mating.
- Short-Term Local Adaptation of Historical Common Bean (Phaseolus vulgaris L.) Varieties and Implications for In Situ Management of Bean Diversity. 3 years of multiplication of heritage varieties in contrasting organic farms leads to genetic changes: it takes a network to truly conserve.
Brainfood: Potato errors, Cryo maize, Fish ABS, Salamander poaching, Better niches, Diverse urban farms, Old growth, Space seeds, Breeding networks, Mating systems
- Genetic Identity in Genebanks: Application of the SolCAP 12K SNP Array in Fingerprinting and Diversity Analysis in the Global In Trust Potato Collection. 11 mismatches between 250 original samples and their putative in vitro counterparts.
- Maize seed cryo-storage modifies chlorophyll, carotenoid, protein, aldehyde and phenolics levels during early stages of germination. But do the effects last?
- Sharing aquatic genetic resources across jurisdictions: playing ‘chicken’ in the sea. Fish resources need cooperative governance too.
- Imminent extinction in the wild of the world’s largest amphibian. Because it’s a luxury food, believe it or not.
- Community structure informs species geographic distributions. Include coexisting species in niche models for better results.
- Increasing plant diversity with border crops reduces insecticide use and increases crop yield in urban agriculture. Planting soybeans, maize and vegetables around rice was bad for pests and good for profits in Shanghai.
- Where are Europe’s last primary forests? Mountains, mainly.
- Seeds in space. Orbiting Svalbard, anyone?
- Resistance Genes in Global Crop Breeding Networks. Networks for cassava, potato, rice, and wheat “are clustered due to phytosanitary and intellectual property regulations, and linked through CGIAR hubs.”
- Plant Mating Systems Often Vary Widely Among Populations. One estimate is never enough.
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.
Nibbles: Garlic history, Collecting, GMO course, Rice genebank, Mango diversity, Chilli diversity, Virtual plant breeding, Navel orange, LA tree, Cotton sustainability, Saudi agritourism
- Trying to promote a “poor person’s crop”? Try the garlic trick, ennobling.
- A Reference Manual for Expedition Plant Collectors, courtesy of the The Arnold Arboretum.
- Cornell runs a MOOC on GMOs. How about one on genebanks, eh?
- Maharashtra could maybe use it.
- You can never have too many mangoes.
- Or dried chillies.
- Next generation plant breeding.
- Riverside protects its famous citrus tree.
- But not all famous California trees are so lucky.
- Making cotton sustainable. Hard row to hoe.
- Saudi farm tourism. Even harder.