Posts

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Tracing the Polynesian migrations through DNA, but not only

I know you probably don’t have an hour to spare to listen to a lecture on the evidence for pre-Columbian contacts between Polynesians and South American cultures, but Dr Lisa Matisoo-Smith does a really good job of galloping though the DNA and archaeological evidence from humans, commensals and livestock in a recent podcast from the Bishop Museum. She even mentions crops.

The bottom line? The human anatomical and artifact evidence is compelling, but the DNA is not cooperating yet. At least the human DNA. But listen to it. While you’re preparing dinner or something. I just wish the Bishop had thought to put the slides online too.

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Open data, open germplasm

And that’s not all…

We wait to see what those concrete steps might be. But I hope Mr Gates and Sec. Vilsack talked to each other. Or at least listened to each other’s talks. And joined up the dots.

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Brainfood: Gender and agrobiodiversity, Insect diversity, Contests and agrobiodiversity, Chinese rice breeding, Wheat origins, Historic abundance, History and conservation

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Pacific taro debuts in West Africa

Readers with a long memory and a thing for root crops may remember our various posts over the past couple of years about an outbreak of Taro Leaf Blight in West Africa, and the promise that resistant varieties from the Pacific may hold for combating the epidemic. Well, our friends at the International Network of Edible Aroids are doing something about it. They’ve just published photos of TLB-resistant varieties from the genebank of the Secretariat of the Pacific Community in Fiji being evaluated in Cameroon. Fingers crossed. And I’m sure collections of the local varieties are being made. Aren’t they?

Taro varieties from SPC growing in Cameroon (Photo by Leke Walter Nkeabeng, Molecular Plant Virus Epidemiologist, National Scientific Coordinator of Annual Crops, Yaounde, Cameroon, reproduced by courtesy of the International Network of Edible Aroids)
Taro varieties from SPC growing in Cameroon

(Photo by Leke Walter Nkeabeng, Molecular Plant Virus Epidemiologist,
National Scientific Coordinator of Annual Crops, Yaounde, Cameroon,
reproduced by courtesy of the International Network of Edible Aroids)