The Global Partnership Initiative for Plant Breeding
Capacity Building (GIPB) brings you:
PLANT BREEDING NEWS
EDITION 187
18 February 2008
An Electronic Newsletter of Applied Plant Breeding
Clair H. Hershey, Editor
chh23@cornell.edu
Sponsored by FAO/AGPC and Cornell University,
Dept. of Plant Breeding and Genetics
Archived issues available at: FAO Plant Breeding
Newsletter
1. NEWS, ANNOUNCEMENTS AND RESEARCH NOTES
1.01 Prioritizing
climate change adaptation needs for food security in 2030
1.02 Gates Foundation
announces $306 million package of agricultural development grants
1.03 African, Asian crops
'to be hit hard by climate change'
1.04 Crop biofuels 'create carbon debt'
1.05 Iowa Staters talk biofuels, healthy
oils and 'pharma crops' at AAAS meeting
1.06 Development of smart crops for biofuels
ensures food and environmental security
1.07 Latin American 'potato
network' to aid poor farmers
1.08 Wheat roundup in the UK
1.09 India may turn into
a big producer of GM rice and vegetables by 2010
1.10 Transgenic rice seeds still await
the go-ahead in China
1.11 Uganda approves Bt
cotton trials
1.12 First documented case of pest resistance to biotech
cotton
1.13 Plant DNA 'barcode' boosts biodiversity research
1.14 USDA/ARS and Bioversity International
partner with the Global Crop Diversity Trust to develop a global plant genebank
information system
1.15 Thousands of
crop varieties from the four corners of the world depart for Arctic seed vault
1.16 University of
Wisconsin-Madison scientists hunt for the roots of the modern potato
1.17 Engineering fungal
resistance in rice
1.18 Submergence-tolerant rice line now
in the pipeline
1.19 A new hybrid rice group aims to increase rice yield in the
tropics
1.20 Indian and US
Scientists develop high protein rice
1.21 Breeding cotton to beat the heat
1.22 Wild cassava
relatives as source of stress-resistance genes
1.23 Beans suited for the harsh Mediterranean
1.24 Wheat landraces
may hold promise against rust
1.25 The power of three: wheat trigenomic chromosome
1.26 Researchers identify cause of watermelon vine decline
1.27 Tolerance and response
to iron deficiency in plants
1.28 Resistance to selenium toxicity
1.29 Scientists discover
plant compound that improves iron absorption
1.30 New cranberry variety
with increased antioxidants
1.31 New banana and plantain varieties
for Africa
1.32 Three Striga resistant
cowpea varieties available for Africa
1.33 Unlocking the
genetic basis of pine tree defense
1.34 Kansas State University researchers
move one step closer to curbing pests´ appetite for crops
1.35 Root or shoot? EAR calls the shots
1.36 A guardian of
grasses: Specific origin and conservation of a unique disease-resistance gene
in the grass lineage
1.37 How plants cope with excess light
1.38 Genetic map should
speed development of snow mold-resistant wheat
1.39
2. PUBLICATIONS
2.01 Introducing ‘African Journal of Agricultural Research
(AJAR)’
2.02 Conserving Plant Genetic Diversity in Protected Areas
2.03 Reviewers needed to assess applications
for Ph.D. and post-doctoral applications in French
2.04 An Economic Assessment of Banana Genetic Improvement
and Innovation in the Lake Victoria Region of Uganda and Tanzania
3. WEB RESOURCES
3.01 DOE JGI releases a new version of its metagenome data management & analysis system
4 GRANTS AVAILABLE
4.01 GCP Fellowships 2008Deadline
for applications extended
4.02 Rice scholarships: The Asian Rice Foundation USA
4.03 Training Plant Breeders
for the 21st Century: USDA National Needs Graduate Fellowships
5 POSITION ANNOUNCEMENTS
5.01 Position Announcement: Horticulturist
– Vegetables
6 MEETINGS, COURSES AND WORKSHOPS
7 EDITOR'S NOTES
=========================
1. NEWS, ANNOUNCEMENTS AND RESEARCH NOTES
1.01 Prioritizing climate change adaptation needs for food security
in 2030
This article analyzes the potential risks posed by climate change for crops
in 12 food-insecure regions of the world, with the goal of identifying adaptation
priorities. The risk analysis is based on statistical crop models, and climate
projections for 2030 from 20 "general circulation" models. The results indicate
South Asia and Southern Africa as two regions that, without sufficient adaptation
measures, will likely suffer negative impacts on several crops that are important
to large food-insecure human populations. The article notes that uncertainties
vary widely by crop, and therefore priorities will depend on the risk attitudes
of investment institutions. For example, one set of institutions might wish to
focus on those cases where negative impacts are most likely to occur, in order
to maximize the likelihood that investments will generate some benefits. By this
criterion, South Asia wheat, Southeast Asia rice, and Southern Africa maize appear
as the most important crops in need of adaptation investments. Other institutions
might wish to focus on crops for which possible negative impacts would be extreme,
even if there is a lower likelihood of these impacts occurring. A different subset
of crops is identified for this criterion, with several South Asian crops, Sahel
sorghum, and (again) Southern Africa maize appearing as the most in need of attention.
The article can be viewed online at the link below.
http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/full/319/5863/607?ijkey=04CySFc/NojU.&keytype=ref&siteid=sci
Author:David B. Lobell et al.
Source: Science via SeedQuest.com
7 February 2008
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1.02 Gates Foundation announces $306
million package of agricultural development grants
Davos, Switzerland
The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation
today announced a $306 million package of agricultural development grants designed
to boost the yields and incomes of millions of small farmers in Africa and other
parts of the developing world so they can lift themselves and their families out
of hunger and poverty.
Announcing the grants at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, Bill
Gates, co-chair of the foundation, said that support for agriculture in the developing
world had been relatively neglected in recent decades, but was a critical tool
to drive development in rural areas, where the vast majority of the world's poorest
people still live. Gates was joined by Dr. A. Namanga Ngongi, President of the
Alliance for a Green Revolution in Africa (AGRA) and World Bank President Robert
B. Zoellick.
"If we are serious about ending extreme hunger and poverty around the world, we
must be serious about transforming agriculture for small farmersmost of whom
are women," said Gates. "These investmentsfrom improving the quality of seeds,
to developing healthier soil, to creating new marketswill pay off not only
in children fed and lives saved. They can have a dramatic impact on poverty reduction
as families generate additional income and improve their lives."
The grants nearly double the foundation's investments in agriculture since the
launch of its Agricultural Development initiative, part of the foundation's Global
Development Program, in mid-2006. The foundation believes that with strong partnerships
and a redoubled commitment to agricultural development by donor and developing
country governments, philanthropy, and the private sector, hundreds of millions
of small farmers will be able to boost their yields and incomes and lift themselves
out of hunger and poverty. To that end, the foundation plans to invest a total
of $900 million through 2008.
The largest grant in the package is $164.5 million to AGRA to establish a Soil
Health Program that will complement its existing Seeds Program and help small-scale
farmers make full use of new high-yielding varieties of Africa's staple food crops.
The Rockefeller Foundation will contribute an additional $15 million.
The Alliance for a Green Revolution in Africa, an Africa-based and African-led
partnership, is focused on helping small farmers increase their productivity and
incomes through a comprehensive approach that addresses issues from seeds, soil
and water to markets, agricultural education and policy. AGRA announced the Soil
Health Program earlier today at its offices in Nairobi, Kenya. AGRA was established
in 2006 with an initial $150 million investment from the Gates and Rockefeller
foundations.
"Africa's soils are among the poorest in the world, and poor soils produce poor
crops," said Kofi A. Annan, Chairman of the Board of AGRA. "This program aims
to revitalize Africa's severely depleted soils in order to increase the fertility
and sustainability of small-scale farms while safeguarding the environment."
The other five grantsto CARE, Heifer International, International Development
Enterprises, International Rice Research Institute, and TechnoServetotal
$141.5 million. The grants will primarily support work in country, including the
development of local science, technology, farmer extension services, and market
systems. Gates said the grants illustrated the range of intervention needed to
ensure small farmers in Africa and around the world have the tools and opportunities
to improve their lives: rice that can tolerate extreme weather conditions, more
fertile soil, affordable microirrigation systems, improved farmer training, and
enhanced connections to local and global markets in areas such as dairy and premium
coffee.
"It is of little use if a farmer, through access to better seeds or soil or irrigation,
boosts production but doesn’t have a market to sell the surplus," said Gates.
"Our approach focuses on the entire agricultural value chainfrom seeds and
soil to farm management and market access. We believe that is the only way to
get long-term, sustainable results."
According to the World Bank, three-quarters of the 1.1 billion people who live
on less than $1 a day live in rural areas and depend on agriculture for a living.
More than 820 million people suffer from chronic hunger in the developing world,
and the number is rising. In the world's poorest areas, small farmers frequently
labor in harsh conditions. They face depleted soils, pests, drought, diseases,
and lack of water. Even if they manage to grow a surplus, they lack access to
reliable markets to sell their crops.
Despite the urgent need, the percentage of official development assistance that
went to agriculture fell from over 16 percent in 1980, to under 4 percent in 2004;
in addition, agriculture accounts for only 4 percent of public spending in agriculture-based
developing countries.
But there is reason for optimism. For the first time in 25 years, the World Bank
focused its World Development Report on agricultural development. The report shows
that agriculture can drive massive poverty reduction and overall development.
Almost no country has managed a rapid rise from poverty without increasing its
agricultural productivity. Advances during the Green Revolution in Latin America
and Asia doubled the amount of food produced and saved hundreds of millions of
lives.
"We need a 21st Century Green Revolution designed for the special and diverse
needs of Africa," said World Bank President Robert B. Zoellick. "It must be driven
by greater investments in technological research and dissemination, sustainable
land management, agricultural supply chains, irrigation, rural microcredit, and
policies that strengthen market opportunities while assisting with rural vulnerabilities
and insecurities."
African heads of state recently endorsed a plan, the Comprehensive African Agricultural
Development Program (CAADP), which aims to increase government budget allocations
for agriculture to 10 percent of national spending.
Cecilia Kapinga, a small farmer who lives in Mbinga, Tanzania with her husband
and six children, has already experienced the powerful impact of agricultural
development. TechnoServe, one of the partners in today's announcement, has helped
Cecilia and her family grow and process their coffee in a way that will fetch
higher prices. The project has also connected them to buyers of high-quality coffee.
The extra income has helped pay for food and running water and supported new business
opportunities for Cecilia and her family.
"The biggest difference is the confidence we have in our future and in our children's
future," she said. "We know the road we're on and where it leads."
######
Today's announcement includes, among others, the following grants:
Alliance for a Green Revolution in Africa (AGRA)
African Soil Health Program: $164.5 million
To revitalize Africa's severely depleted soils in order to increase the fertility
and sustainability of small-scale farms and raise the yield and income of farmers,
thus alleviating hunger and poverty. The project aims to boost the incomes and
improve the well-being of more than 4.1 million smallholder farmers through 50
to 100 percent increases in their crop yields.
International Rice Research Institute (IRRI)
Stress-Tolerant Rice for Poor Farmers in Africa and South Asia: $19.8 million
To reduce poverty and hunger and increase food and income security of resource-poor
farm families and rice consumers in South Asia and Sub-Saharan Africa through
the development and dissemination of stress tolerant rice. Within three years,
the project expects that 300,000 farmers in South Asia and 100,000 farmers in
Sub-Saharan Africa will have adopted the initial set of improved varieties.
Click HERE
for full list
Source: SeedQuest.com
25 January 2008
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1.03 African, Asian crops 'to be hit hard
by climate change'
T V Padma
[NEW DELHI] Crops in South Asia and Southern Africa are likely to be worst hit
by climate change and need greater investment in agriculture development and adaptation
strategies, say US scientists.
The conclusions, reported today (1 February) in Science, are based on an
analysis of climate risks for crops in 12 food-insecure regions.
The research team, led by David Lobell from the US-based Woods Institute for Environment
at Stanford University, used statistical crop models and 20 climate change models
for the year 2030.
The regions studied contain groups of countries with broadly similar diets and
crop production systems, and a significant number of the world's malnourished
people. The researchers calculated the 'hunger importance' of individual crops
by multiplying the number of malnourished individuals by a crop's percentage contribution
to calorie intake.
The more important crops that more malnourished people depend on in
South Asia were found to be millets, groundnut, rapeseed and wheat. In the Sahel
region of Africa it was sorghum, and maize in southern Africa.
The researchers say there are uncertainties in the crop and climate models, and
several regions with poor climate and yield data, such as Central Africa, require
further research to develop adaptation strategies.
But, they say, the analysis shows a clear impact of climate change on crops, and
the data is particularly robust for South Asia and Southern Africa.
Increasing and sustaining attention on agricultural investment in the developing
world "is one of the best things we can do for climate adaptation", says Marshall
Burke, director of the Food Security and Environment Program at Stanford University.
He told SciDev.Net that several recent initiatives such as the World Bank's
increasing investment in agriculture, and the Rockefeller and Gates Foundations'
work on improving Africa's seeds systems "look like good investments in
climate adaptation for agriculture; investments in improved crop varieties, in
better ways to get them in the hands of farmers, investments in rural infrastructure".
The researchers say their study only intends to highlight major areas of
concern and that finer-scale studies are needed to identify local 'hot spots'.
Burke says difficulties with this include most climate models not addressing the
high uncertainty in how much the climate will change in a region and how crops
will respond to that change. Models also tend to focus narrowly on a small subset
of crops of importance to vulnerable regions.
Link
to full paper in Science
Reference: Science 319, 607 (2008)
Source: SciDev.net
1 February 2008
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1.04 Crop biofuels 'create carbon debt'
Carla Almeida
Two studies have shown that changes in land use to produce crop-based biofuels
can actually result in more greenhouse-gas emissions than burning fossil fuels.
The studies, both published in Science last week (8 February), estimate
the impact of converting forests and grasslands into cropland for the production
of biofuels.
Both conclude that the resulting carbon emissions, released through decomposition
or burning of biomass, create a 'carbon debt' that takes decades or even centuries
to be paid back through biofuel usage.
This finding undermines previous claims that substituting fossil fuels with biofuels
should offset greenhouse-gas emissions because biofuels sequester carbon while
they grow.
According to Timothy Searchinger, researcher at Princeton University and the lead
author of one of the studies, previous assessments did not include the carbon
storage and sequestration sacrificed when diverting land from its existing use.
Searchinger and colleagues looked at the use of US cropland to produce corn-based
ethanol and calculated it would take 167 years to repay carbon emissions resulting
from land-use change, and that in 30 years greenhouse-gas emissions from corn
ethanol could be nearly double those from gasoline.
"Biofuels in the US and Europe are increasing the price of crops, which naturally
results in more efforts to clear land. In that way, farmers make more money,"
he says.
Much of this land clearing will occur in Brazil, China and India, the authors
write.
In the other study, by the Nature Conservancy and University of Minnesota, researchers
estimate carbon debts and pay back years for different cases of conversion from
native vegetation.
They found soybean biodiesel produced on converted Amazonian rainforest would
take around 320 years to gain a 'carbon benefit' over petroleum diesel. For biodiesel
and sugarcane-based ethanol produced on Brazilian cerrado tropical
savannah the estimations are 37 and 17 years, respectively.
Improving the productivity of agricultural land, creating biofuels from waste
biomass and municipal waste, or from biomass grown on abandoned agricultural land,
are all ways to avoid the need for a change in land use, the authors suggest.
The results of the studies do not surprise Roberto Schaeffer, researcher at the
Federal University of Rio de Janeiro. "Nobody thought deforestation for biofuel
production would be a good solution," he told SciDev.Net.
"Biofuels are only effective in specific situations, as in the case of Brazilian
ethanol. It is possible to increase production without devastating forests."
Link
to the article by Searchinger et al ![[]](cid:7.1.0.9.0.20080218094706.01baf228@cornell.edu.0)
[kB]
Link
to article by Fargione et al [kB]
References:
Science 10.1126/science.1151861 (2008)
Science 10.1126/science.1152747 (2008)
Source: SciDev.net
15 February 2008
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1.05 Iowa Staters talk biofuels, healthy oils and 'pharma
crops' at AAAS meeting
AMES, Iowa – There’s more to biofuels than the food vs. fuel debate and talk
of the various technologies associated with biofuels production.
And so Steven Fales, a professor of agronomy and a member of the Science and Engineering
Board of Iowa State’s Bioeconomy Institute, organized and moderated a three-hour
symposium on Friday, Feb. 15, at the annual meeting of the American Association
for the Advancement of Science in Boston.
The title of the discussion was, “Energy, Agriculture, and People: Global Implications
for Science and Policy.”
“We thought it would be appropriate to take a big picture view of issues regarding
energy and agriculture that go beyond the science and technology,” Fales said.
And so there were presentations about climate change, production of biofuel crops
on marginal lands, the effects of biofuel production on the poor, the ethics of
using agriculture for energy production and the politics associated with renewable
energy.
Fales said the idea was to mirror the global theme of the annual meeting and acknowledge
that biorenewable issues extend beyond energy into many other concerns of society.
Two other researchers with ties to Iowa State also made presentations during the
AAAS annual meeting Feb. 14-18:
• Robert Wisner, a recently retired University Professor of agricultural economics,
addressed a 90-minute symposium on Friday, Feb. 15, titled, “Drugs in our Corn
Flakes" Our Health and the Economic Risks of ‘Pharma’ and Industrial Crops.”
Wisner’s talk addressed the economics of growing crops with medicinal traits engineered
into them. Key economic issues include the risks of co-mingling medical drugs
and industrial chemicals with the food supply and the alternatives for controlling
that risk. But those aren’t the only economic issues he identified. Others were
determining the real and long-term costs and benefits of pharma crops, identifying
who gains from the crops and learning whether producing medicines and chemicals
in non-food crops is more economical and less risky than using food crops. Wisner
also noted several instances when unapproved genetically modified crops were found
in food supplies. In those instances, Wisner said there were major disruptions
in grain export markets, price impacts and very high public and private costs
to purge the grain from the food system.
Linda Pollak, a research geneticist for the U.S. Department of Agriculture and
a collaborative associate professor of agronomy at Iowa State, addressed a 90-minute
symposium on Saturday, Feb. 16, titled, “Crops for Health: Improving the Health-Promoting
Properties of Food.”
Pollak’s message was that traditional plant breeding can be a tool to improve
human health. Plant breeders, for example, have been able to reduce some of the
problems with oils from soybeans, canola, sunflowers and corn. She said plant
breeders have developed soybeans with lower levels of fatty acids to help reduce
trans fats after processing. Breeders have also developed canola lines with safe
levels of toxic erucic acid. And plant breeders have decreased saturated fats
and increased monounsaturated fats in canola, sunflower and corn oils to reduce
the risk of heart disease. And so Pollak argued traditional plant breeding can
still develop better crops for healthier foods.
Contact: Mike Krapfl
mkrapfl@iastate.edu
Iowa State University
Source: EurekAlert.org
16 February 2008
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1.06 Development of smart crops for biofuels ensures food
and environmental security
Patancheru, India
While the global debate ranges on whether the biofuel revolution is causing imbalances
in food security systems and increasing the emissions of greenhouse gases, the
'smart' biofuel crops developed, utilized and promoted by the International Crops Research Institute for the Semi-Arid
Tropics (ICRISAT) ensure energy and environmental security.
According to Dr William Dar, Director General of ICRISAT, the time has come to
ensure that only smart biofuel crops are developed and utilized so that they can
link the poor farmers of the drylands to the biofuel market, without compromising
on their food security, or causing environmental damage.
"Smart biofuel crops are those that ensure food security, contribute to energy
security, provide environmental sustainability, tolerate the impacts of climate
change on shortage of water and high temperatures, and increase livelihood options,"
Dr Dar said.
Through its BioPower Strategy, ICRISAT is developing and promoting sweet sorghum
as a major feedstock for bioethanol. Sweet sorghum is a carbon dioxide neutral
crop, which is a big contributory factor of being called a smart crop.
ICRISAT-bred sweet sorghum varieties and hybrids have increased sugar content
in the juice in their stalks. ICRISAT's rainy season varieties give 42% higher
sugar yield, and rainy season hybrids give a 20% increased sugar yield.
Sweet sorghum has a strong pro-poor advantage since it has a triple product potential
- grain, juice for ethanol, and bagasse (crushed stalk waste) for livestock feed
and power generation. Its highlight is that there is no compromise on farmers'
food security, since the grain is available for the farmers, along with the sugar-rich
juice from the stalk that can be distilled to ethanol.
There are other benefits also. It is a cost-effective and competitive feedstock.
It has a shorter crop cycle of 4 months compared to the 12 months of sugarcane.
It has a water requirement of 4,000 cubic meter to produce a kiloliter of bioethanol,
compared to 36,000 cu.m required for sugarcane. Putting all the factors together,
the feedstock cost to produce one kiloliter of ethanol from sweet sorghum is US$
81.6, whereas it is US$ 111.5 for sugarcane and US$ 89.2 for maize.
Sweet sorghum is tolerant to water scarcity and high temperatures, two qualities
which will keep the crop in good stead when the climate changes with global warming.
It also has high water use efficiency. While sorghum requires 310 kg of water
per kg of dry matter, maize requires 370 kg of water per kg of dry matter.
Sweet sorghum is a carbon dioxide neutral crop that makes it environment friendly,
and does not add to greenhouse gas emissions. During its growth cycle, a hectare
of sweet sorghum cultivation absorbs and emits 45 tons of carbon.
The crop also has a good energy balance, that is unit of energy generated per
unit of fossil-fuel energy invested in its cultivation. Sweet sorghum generates
8 units of energy for every unit of fossil-fuel energy invested, which compares
favorably with sugarcane's 8.3, and for corn it is only 1.8 units.
It has been studied that gasoline blended with ethanol has lower emissions when
run through an automobile engine than pure gasoline. E85, the fuel with 85% ethanol,
has only 1 part per million concentration of nitrogen oxide whereas gasoline has
9 ppm.
ICRISAT's initiative to produce biofuels is not limited to bioethanol from sweet
sorghum alone. Through its watershed development project, it is promoting the
cultivation of Pongamia and Jatropha, from which biodiesel can be extracted.
ICRISAT is promoting the cultivation of these biodiesel crops by marginalized
communities such as tribal groups and women's self-help groups and ensuring that
they are planted on wastelands. The groups get additional income after harvesting
and crushing the seeds, selling the oil, and selling the seedcake (the residue
after crushing) to farmers as an organic fertilizer. Some of the oil is used to
power village diesel engines such as generators and irrigation pumps.
"Likewise, our biodiesel initiatives produce green fuel and rehabilitate degraded
lands, enhance greenery, conserve rainwater, and provide a sustainable income
source for the landless and marginal farmers," said Dr Dar.
The issues of food versus fuel, climate change and environment, land use, and
impact on poverty alleviation vis-à-vis biofuels call for stimulating and informed
science-based policy-making. That means a framework to promote biofuels should
be linked to national and regional poverty reduction, food security and climate
proofing strategies.
Source: SeedQuest.com
15 February 2008
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1.07 Latin American 'potato network'
to aid poor farmers
2008 has been designated the International Year of the Potato
Daniela Hirschfeld
[MONTEVIDEO] With 2008 designated the International Year of the Potato, ten Latin
American countries and Spain have formed the Latin American Network for Innovation
on Potato Improvement and Dissemination, known as Red Latinpapa.
The network was announced following a meeting of regional experts last week (15–18
January) in Lima, Peru, organised by the International Potato Centre (CIP) in
Peru.
Latinpapa's aim is to help poor potato farmers in Latin America improve their
income and reduce costs by making it easier for them to access new technologies
and varieties and getting their input into what traits are most useful.
Ten countries from Latin America and the Caribbean will take part, including Argentina,
Bolivia, Costa Rica, Ecuador, Uruguay and Venezuela. Individuals and organisations
that wish to become members of the network are asked to join their national network
first, or create one where one does not exist.
Stef de Haan, chair of Latinpapa's coordinating committee and a scientist at CIP,
says Latinpapa will stimulate exchange and analysis of genetic material between
researchers in the region. It will also increase the access to the protocols of
genetic innovations and boost the adoption and knowledge of new varieties, among
other activities.
He said that in the last three years several research centres throughout Latin
America have been interviewing farmers, seed producers, small-scale businessmen
and scientists to identify national needs in the potato sector. This formed part
of the discussions between representatives at the Lima meeting.
Latinpapa will receive US$1.5 million over the next three years, funded equally
by Latin America's Regional Fund of Agricultural Technology (Fontagro), the National
Institute of Agrarian Research (INIA) of Spain, and the governments of the ten
member countries.
The network will be coordinated by the committee chaired by De Haan, consisting
of representatives from Bolivia, Colombia, Spain and Uruguay.
Source: SciDev.net
22 January 2008
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1.08 Wheat roundup in the UK
Gene x environment
Over the last 30 years, wheat has shown an average of 1% per year yield gain.
To date most selection for improved yield has been based on empirical selection
of observed phenotypes rather than for specific, desirable alleles. Traditionally
we think of yield as a trait determined by many genes of small effect acting together,
but this is an untested hypothesis, and John Snape of the John Innes Centre in
Norwich, UK and colleagues at Syngenta, Nickerson-Advanta, and the University
of Nottingham have set out to test whether there are particular quantitative trait
loci (QTL) with large effects. Separate analyses of populations grown over 3 seasons
in England, Scotland, France and Germany revealed QTL for yield performance showing
both general and stable effects, and the results are starting to give us a ‘physiological
handle’ on which traits are exhibiting significant variation that can be manipulated
by breeders either over environments or in specific environments.
Funding for this research was from the Syngenta/JIC Alliance, and a competitive
grant from the UK Department for the Environment, Food & Rural Affairs.
Publication: Dissecting gene x environmental effects on wheat yields via QTL and
physiological analysis. Snape, J. W. et al. (2007) Euphytica 154 401-408
Drought resistance
Because of unpredictable rainfall in the UK, droughts cannot be predicted, and
the most valuable traits for drought resistance will be those for which there
is no yield penalty in the absence of drought. Research involving John Snape and
colleagues at the John Innes Centre, Norwich, UK in collaboration with the University
of Nottingham and the Agricultural Development and Advisory Service, Boxworth,
has identified one trait showing a strong and clear correlation with maintenance
of yield under drought, which is green leaf area persistence. A screen for leaf
persistence including marker-assisted selection will have value in future breeding
programmes in the UK and world-wide.
Funding for this research was from a competitive grant from the UK Department
for the Environment, Food & Rural Affairs.
Publication: Identifying physiological traits associated with improved drought
resistance in winter wheat. Foulkes, M. J. et al. (2007) Field Crops Research
103 (1) 11-24
Adaptive winter wheat
Conventional UK wheat crops are monocultures of individual varieties selected
for production under high inputs; yield and quality shortfalls result under low
input, particularly organic, conditions. Taken together with predictions for increased
climate variation and rising input prices, varieties with more internal genetic
variability would help buffer environmental variation. In a Department for the
Environment, Food & Rural Affairs–funded Sustainable Arable LINK project,
the John Innes Centre (JIC), Norwich UK will collaborate with the Organic Research
Centre, UK (ORC) to test the concept of ‘evolutionary breeding’ using composite
cross populations (CCPs).
The new project is coordinated by the ORC, and JIC’s John Snape and colleagues
will provide genetic inputs into work to evaluate the performance of CCPs, determine
their processing capability and transfer the CCPs to farmers to facilitate commercial
evaluation of potential. JIC’s role will be to use molecular markers to
monitor the genetic evolution of CCPs to region, management and year. One of the
interesting outcomes should be a massive increase in diversity within the crop
which allows control of pests and weeds which should help to significantly reduce
agrochemical and physical inputs.
Contact information: john.snape@bbsrc.ac.uk
Tel +44 1603 455000 www.jic.ac.uk
Contributed by Catherine Reynolds
catherine.reynolds@BBSRC.AC.UK
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1.09 India may turn into a big producer of GM rice and
vegetables by 2010
Chennai, India
India has the potential to become a major producer of transgenic rice and several
genetically modified (GM) or engineered vegetables by 2010, according to a research
report by Rabo India Finance Ltd on the Indian agri-biotech sector. It has emerged
as one of the leading destinations for investment in biotechnology in the recent
years. It is also emerging as an important destination for both biomarkers and
validation services, the report said.
A biomarker is a substance used as an indicator of a biologic state. It is a characteristic
that is objectively measured and evaluated as an indicator of normal biologic
processes, pathogenic processes, or pharmacologic responses to a therapeutic intervention.
According to the report, there is an increasing use of molecular markers in crop
breeding and a growing realisation that some of these new technologies could lead
to future growth in the productivity and quality of crops such as rice, wheat,
eggplant (brinjal), tomato and okra (lady's finger).
Stating that alliances were becoming increasingly important in seed industry to
bridge the gap between field experience and emerging technologies, the report
said most research and development works in the country are being done in the
public sector. "These institutions are being generously funded by the Union Government,"
it said.
Research work on
Research work is being carried in 19 crops. They are rice, wheat, cotton, potato,
banana, tomato, rapeseed, mustard, coffee, tobacco, eggplant, cabbage, cauliflower,
melon, citrus fruit, black gram, groundnut, chickpea and pigeon pea.
Eight institutions, as per the report, are concentrating on two or more crops,
while others are concentrating on one each.
"Four kinds of tracts are being tackled: Resistance to attacks by insect pests,
viral and fungal diseases (biotic stress); drought tolerance, water logging and
salinity; and delayed ripening and increasing shelf life," the report said.
Referring to Bt cotton, it said over 60 per cent of the 62 lakh hectares under
hybrid seeds were GM strains, and a study had revealed gain to the tune of Rs
11,000 a hectare.
On Bt brinjal, the report said it could be the next important biotech crop with
several public institutions and private companies developing improved varieties
of drought tolerant ones. These plants are also being developed to resist shoot
and fruit borer, it said, adding that two private firms have developed strains
to control fruit and shoot borer.
While transgenic tomato is aimed at curbing damage from leaf curl virus and other
infections such as buck eye rot of fruits, septoria and early blight, transgenic
potato, being developed by public institutions, was yet to attract the private
sector's attention. "On the regulatory front, it is in the final stages of approval
(by the Genetic Engineering Approval Committee)," the report said.
GM strains
Stating that much attention was being paid to research on GM rice, Rabo India
said the aim was to develop saline and drought tolerant varieties, but no GM strain
had been commercially released. However, developments relating to the "Golden"
rice will have a significant impact on India, it said.
GM wheat was under development at the South Campus of the Delhi University, while
a host of other crops were being developed by public and private sector.
"The future of transgenic seeds will see many private companies entering into
the transgenic seed market in India. Many companies are developing agronomically
important crops. Some medium and large size seed companies with an annual turnover
of Rs 35 crore are developing transgenic seeds," it said.
On the challenges faced by the industry, the report said intellectual property
was one of the deterrents to growth of the biotech industry as foreign players
feel there was no sufficient patent protection and access to patent litigation
in the country. "However, this perception has recently changed to a great extent,"
it said.
On the biotech sector's growth, the Rabo India said during 2006-07, the agri-biotech
industry's revenue was Rs 926 crore, while it clocked an annual growth of 55 per
cent.
Source: The Hindu Business Line
SeedQuest.com
January 24, 2008
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1.10 Transgenic rice seeds still await the go-ahead in
China
Beijing, China
By Wu Jiao, China Daily via SEAMEO SEARCA
China strictly supervises its transgenic rice research and production,
and no such seed has been approved for the market, according to agriculture officials.
"Scientists are still conducting research on transgenic rice," Yang Xiongnian,
deputy director of the science, technology and education division under the Ministry
of Agriculture, said on Friday.
" We are at the last stage of safety evaluation."
Unlike some countries which promoted transgenic agricultural products mainly for
commercial reasons, food and environmental safety are top priorities for China,
Yang told China Daily.
Research has mainly been carried out in Hunan and Hubei provinces, with a variety
of transgenic rice seeds being tested, Yang said.
But he noted the benefits of transgenic rice have yet to be proved.
According to regulations, transgenic plants must undergo lab experiments, pilot
tests and production experiments before they get safety certificates for commercial
promotion.
But even after all of these steps are taken, market acceptance is a crucial factor.
Yang cited cases in the United States, where some transgenic wheat seeds, although
proven safe, were not accepted by consumers.
China has so far approved transgenic cotton, potato, miniento and morning glory
seeds, but only transgenic cotton seeds have proven popular with farmers.
China's annual cotton production exceeded 7 million tons last year.
Figures from the management office of Genetically Modified Organism (GMO) Biosafety
under the ministry show that - between 2002 and 2007 - it approved experiments
of 2,361 transgenic seeds of a variety of agriculture plants, with 1,109 receiving
safety certificates.
But no transgenic rice seeds have been approved for the market, said the office
director.
Huang Dafang, an expert in GMO research at the Chinese Academy of Agricultural
Sciences, said earlier that transgenic technology should be "bravely explored"
if it benefits people.
But Beijing resident Hu Xiao said he "wants more information on these new types
of food" to make free choices between transgenic and common products.
Source: SeedQuest.com
26 January 2008
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1.11 Uganda approves Bt cotton trials
Ochieng' Ogodo
Uganda has approved confined field trials of genetically modified (GM) cotton,
the second GM crop to be trialled in the country.
The country's National Biosafety Committee (NBC) gave the go ahead 'in principle'
for the trials of a Bt cotton variety, which is resistant to the bollworm pest,
in August 2007, so long as certain conditions were met.
Those measures are now being put in place, and the trials will begin in May, according
to Arthur Makara, senior science officer (Biosafety) and NBC secretary.
Bollworm is a devastating pest in Uganda, causing crop losses of up to 40 per
cent and wiping out an entire crop during "pest surges", Makara told SciDev.Net.
The move follows the approval in April 2006 of trials of bananas resistant to
Black Sigatoka, a bacterial disease that causes necrosis of leaves and low crop
yields.
The National Semi-Arid Resources Research Institute (NaSARRI), under the National
Agricultural Research Organisation, will carry out the Bt cotton trials in Uganda's
Kasese district.
Eemetai Areke, NaSARRI director and lead investigator of the project, said that
the trials will provide vital information for the development of a Bt cotton variety
suited to the Ugandan environment.
The study, says Makara, aims to prove that Bt cotton can address the problem of
bollworm damage in Uganda. "It is aimed at collecting data on the potential of
Bt cotton as a remedy to the bollworm problem," he says.
The trial sites will be isolated from other cotton sites by distances of no less
than 200 metres and will be fenced off with strong fencing material, as recommended
by the NBC. Entry will be restricted to the scientists working on the trials.
Makara says the trials signal that Uganda is taking further steps to increase
the capacity of its scientists to research, and understand, the principles and
practices of modern biotechnology.
"The data they will collect will inform policy decisions in case of a request
for commercialisation of Bt cotton in Uganda in the future, or in the case of
legal or illegal transboundary movements of Bt cotton through Uganda," he said.
Source: SciDev.net
8 February 2008
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1.12 First documented case of pest resistance to biotech
cotton
A pest insect known as bollworm is the first to evolve resistance in the field
to plants modified to produce an insecticide called Bt, according to a new research
report.
Bt-resistant populations of bollworm, Helicoverpa zea, were found in more than
a dozen crop fields in Mississippi and Arkansas between 2003 and 2006.
"What we're seeing is evolution in action," said lead researcher Bruce Tabashnik.
"This is the first documented case of field-evolved resistance to a Bt crop.”
Bt crops are so named because they have been genetically altered to produce Bt
toxins, which kill some insects. The toxins are produced in nature by the widespread
bacterium Bacillus thuringiensis, hence the abbreviation Bt.
The bollworm resistance to Bt cotton was discovered when a team of University
of Arizona entomologists analyzed published data from monitoring studies of six
major caterpillar pests of Bt crops in Australia, China, Spain and the U.S. The
data documenting bollworm resistance were first collected seven years after Bt
cotton was introduced in 1996.
"Resistance is a decrease in pest susceptibility that can be measured over human
experience," said Tabashnik, professor and head of UA's entomology department
and an expert in insect resistance to insecticides. "When you use an insecticide
to control a pest, some populations eventually evolves resistance."
The researchers write in their report that Bt cotton and Bt corn have been grown
on more than 162 million hectares (400 million acres) worldwide since 1996, “generating
one of the largest selections for insect resistance ever known."
Even so, the researchers found that most caterpillar pests of cotton and corn
remained susceptible to Bt crops.
"The resistance occurred in one particular pest in one part of the U.S.," Tabashnik
said. "The other major pests attacking Bt crops have not evolved resistance. And
even most bollworm populations have not evolved resistance."
The field outcomes refute some experts' worst-case scenarios that predicted pests
would become resistant to Bt crops in as few as three years, he said.
“The only other case of field-evolved resistance to Bt toxins involves resistance
to Bt sprays," Tabashnik said. He added that such sprays have been used for decades,
but now represent a small proportion of the Bt used against crop pests.
The bollworm is a major cotton pest in the southeastern U.S. and Texas, but not
in Arizona. The major caterpillar pest of cotton in Arizona is a different species
known as pink bollworm, Pectinophora gossypiella, which has remained susceptible
to the Bt toxin in biotech cotton.
Tabashnik and his colleagues' article, "Insect resistance to Bt crops: evidence
versus theory," will be published in the February issue of Nature Biotechnology.
His co-authors are Aaron J. Gassmann, a former UA postdoctoral fellow now an assistant
professor at Iowa State University; David W. Crowder, a UA doctoral student; and
Yves Carrière, a UA professor of entomology. Tabashnik and Carrière are members
of UA's BIO5 Institute.
The U.S. Department of Agriculture funded the research.
"Our research shows that in Arizona, Bt cotton reduces use of broad-spectrum insecticides
and increases yield," said Carrière. Such insecticides kill both pest insects
and beneficial insects.
To delay resistance, non-Bt crops are planted near Bt crops to provide "refuges"
for susceptible pests. Because resistant insects are rare, the only mates they
are likely to encounter would be susceptible insects from the refuges. The hybrid
offspring of such a mating generally would be susceptible to the toxin. In most
pests, offspring are resistant to Bt toxins only if both parents are resistant.
In bollworm, however, hybrid offspring produced by matings between susceptible
and resistant moths are resistant. Such a dominant inheritance of resistance was
predicted to make resistance evolve faster.
The UA researchers found that bollworm resistance evolved fastest in the states
with the lowest abundance of refuges.
The field outcomes documented by the global monitoring data fit the predictions
of the theory underlying the refuge strategy, Tabashnik said.
Although first-generation biotech cotton contained only one Bt toxin called Cry1Ac,
a new variety contains both Cry1Ac and a second Bt toxin, Cry2Ab. The combination
overcomes pests that are resistant to just one toxin.
The next steps, Tabashnik said, include conducting research to understand inheritance
of resistance to Cry2Ab and developing designer toxins to kill pests resistant
to Cry1Ac.
###
Bruce Tabashnik, brucet@ag.arizona.edu
Yves Carrière, ycarrier@ag.arizona.edu
Contact: Mari N. Jensen
mnjensen@email.arizona.edu
Source: EurekAlert.org
7 February 2008
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1.13 Plant DNA 'barcode' boosts biodiversity research
Katherine Nightingale
Researchers have found a section of plant DNA that could be used as the universal
'barcode' to identify flowering plants, aiding biodiversity research.
They also hope it can be used to track endangered plant species and check whether
they are being transported illegally.
The research team, led by Vincent Savolainen of the UK's Imperial College London
and Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew, published their findings this week (4 February)
in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.
While DNA barcoding the use of a particular region of DNA to distinguish
between species is already established in animals, no single, universal
section of DNA has yet been found for flowering plants.
Various DNA segments have been mooted. Savolainen and colleagues tested eight
of these segments on over 1,600 plant specimens, mainly orchids from Costa Rica
and other plants from the Kruger National Park in South Africa sites chosen
for their exceptional biodiversity.
They found that a specific section of a gene, matK, was easy to use and had a
suitable 'barcoding gap' it is different enough between species and similar
enough within species to make identifications.
"In the future we'd like to see this idea of reading plants' genetic barcodes
translated into a portable device that can be taken into any environment, which
can quickly and easily analyse any plant sample's matK DNA and compare it to a
vast database of information, allowing almost instantaneous identification," said
Savolainen in a press statement.
Eldredge Bermingham, senior scientist at the Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute
in Panama, is keen to see the scientific community adopt a barcode for plants.
"Plants are lagging far behind animals in DNA barcoding, simply because there's
been no consensus reached. If [the community] decide on matK, it will enhance
the botanical field and help it catch up."
This will particularly benefit developing countries with an interest in identifying
their natural heritage with DNA sequences, Bermingham told SciDev.Net.
Bermingham says that since DNA sequencing techniques have become so widespread,
a new one can easily be applied, even if matK turns out to be the wrong barcode.
Scientists are already building up collections of plants and their DNA.
But he points out that, in this study, matK was only used to identify "relatively
undiverse" plants.
"We need to know whether matK does a good job when you start applying it to the
vast tropical diversity I think that's an open question at the moment."
Reference: Proceedings of the National Academy of Science doi 10.31073/pnas.0709936105
Source: SciDev.net
6 February 2008
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1.14 USDA/ARS and Bioversity International partner with
the Global Crop Diversity Trust to develop a global plant genebank information
system
By Kim Kaplan
The Agricultural Research Service (ARS)
and Bioversity International are
partnering with the Global Crop Diversity
Trust to develop a powerful but easy-to-use, Internet-based information management
system for the world's plant genebanks.
The nucleus of the system will be ARS's existing Germplasm Resources Information
Network (GRIN), a database that already
houses information about the more than 480,000 accessions (distinct varieties
of plants) in ARS’s National Plant Germplasm System (NPGS). In addition to serving as the
information backbone of the NPGS, GRIN has been adopted by Canada’s national genebank
system as their information management system. ARS has a long-term commitment
to maintaining and enhancing GRIN, which it began developing more than 20 years
ago.
As more genetic and agricultural data are generated about the wide range of plants
preserved in genebanks around the world, the huge amount of information is increasingly
difficult to manage and make accessible. This is especially the case for smaller
genebanks in the developing world that may lack the capacity and resources to
develop their own information management systems.
Now, thanks to the partnership between the Global Crop Diversity Trust, ARS and
Bioversity, software upgrades will enable the GRIN system to be used by genebanks
of all sizes, making more information about more plants available to researchers.
The new system will help genebanks conserve and use precious genetic resources
more effectively, and also help researchers, farmers and producers make the best
possible use of information.
For example, ARS recently screened a key part of the U.S. wheat and barley collection
to find genes that provide resistance to a new rust fungus, Ug99, that could threaten
80 percent of the world's wheat. Ug99 first surfaced in Uganda in 1999, and has
since been found in Kenya and Ethiopia.
The Global Crop Diversity Trust will contribute a $1.4 million grant to support
this three-year project. ARS will contribute the equivalent of more than $900,000
in in-kind co-financing. Bioversity is providing its expertise in information
systems and its strong links with genebanks, particularly in the developing world.
ARS News Service
Agricultural Research Service, USDA
Source: SeedQuest.com
11 February 2008
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1.15 Thousands of crop varieties from the four corners of the world
depart for Arctic seed vault
Seeds contributed by global network of agricultural research centers considered
“crown jewels” of crop diversity
Mexico City, Mexico
At the end of January, more than 200,000 crop varieties from Asia, Africa, Latin
America and the Middle Eastdrawn from vast seed collections maintained by
the Consultative Group on International Agricultural Research
(CGIAR)will be shipped to a remote island near the Arctic Circle, where they
will be stored in the Svalbard Global Seed Vault (SGSV), a facility capable of
preserving their vitality for thousands of years.
The cornucopia of rice, wheat, beans, sorghum, sweet potatoes, lentils, chick
peas and a host of other food, forage and agroforestry plants is to be safeguarded
in the facility, which was created as a repository of last resort for humanity’s
agricultural heritage. The seeds will be shipped to the village of Longyearbyen
on Norway’s Svalbard archipelago, where the vault has been constructed on a mountain
deep inside the Arctic permafrost.
The vault was built by the Norwegian government as a service to the global community,
and a Rome-based international NGO, The Global
Crop Diversity Trust, will fund its operation. The vault will open on February
26, 2008.
This first installment from the CGIAR collections will contain duplicates from
international agricultural research centers based in Benin, Colombia, Ethiopia,
India, Kenya, Mexico, Nigeria, Peru, the Philippines and Syria. Collectively,
the CGIAR centers maintain 600,000 plant varieties in crop genebanks, which are
widely viewed as the foundation of global efforts to conserve agricultural biodiversity.
“Our ability to endow this facility with such an impressive array of diversity
is a powerful testament to the incredible work of scientists at our centers, who
have been so dedicated to ensuring the survival of the world’s most important
crop species,” said Emile Frison, Director General of Rome-based Bioversity International,
which coordinates CGIAR crop diversity initiatives.
“The CGIAR collections are the ‘crown jewels’ of international agriculture,” said
Cary Fowler, Executive Director of the Global Crop Diversity Trust, which will
cover the costs of preparing, packaging and transporting CGIAR seeds to the Arctic.
“They include the world’s largest and most diverse collections of rice, wheat,
maize and beans. Many traditional landraces of these crops would have been lost
had they not been collected and stored in the genebanks.”
For example, the wheat collection held just outside Mexico City by the CGIAR-supported
International Maize and Wheat Improvement Center (CIMMYT) contains 150,000 unique
samples of wheat and its relatives from more than 100 countries. It is the largest
unified collection in the world for a single crop. Overall, the maize collection
represents nearly 90 percent of maize diversity in the Americas, where the crop
originated. CIMMYT will continue to send yearly shipments of regenerated seed
until the entire collection of maize and wheat has been backed up at Svalbard.
Storage of these and all the other seeds at Svalbard is intended to ensure that
they will be available for bolstering food security should a manmade or natural
disaster threaten agricultural systems, or even the genebanks themselves, at any
point in the future.
“We need to understand that genebanks are not seed museums but the repositories
of vital, living resources that are used almost every day in the never-ending
battle against major threats to food production,” Bioversity International’s Frison
said. “We’re going to need this diversity to breed new varieties that can adapt
to climate change, new diseases and other rapidly emerging threats.”
Why are genebanks important?
The CGIAR collections are famous in plant breeding circles as a treasure trove
for plant breeders searching for traits to help them combat destructive crop diseases
and pests, such as the black sigatoka fungus, which is devastating banana production
in East Africa, and grain borer beetle, which is destroying maize in Kenya.
Just from January to August of 2007, CGIAR centers distributed almost 100,000
samples. The materials mainly go to researchers and plant breeders seeking genetic
traits to create new crop varieties that offer such benefits as higher yields,
improved nutritional value, resistance to pests and diseases, and the ability
to survive changing climatic conditions, which are expected to make floods and
drought more frequent.
In addition, these collections have often been used to help restore agricultural
systems after conflicts and natural disasters.
For example, among the 135,000 food and forage seeds maintained at the CGIAR-supported
International Center for Agricultural Research in the Dry Areas (ICARDA) in Aleppo,
Syria, 3,000 varieties are native to Afghanistan, and 1,000 are from Iraq. The
seeds preserved have been used to help revitalize crop diversity in these war-torn
regions.
“Svalbard will be able to help replenish genebanks if they’re hit,” said Cary
Fowler. Iraq’s genebank in the town of Abu Ghraib was ransacked by looters in
2003. Fortunately there was a safety duplicate at the CGIAR center in Syria. Typhoon
Xangsane seriously damaged the genebank of the Philippines national rice genebank
in 2006. “Unfortunately, these kinds of national genebank horror stories are fairly
common place,” said Fowler. “The Svalbard Global Seed Vault makes the CGIAR’s
genebank collections safer than ever.”
After the Asian tsunami disaster of 2004, the CGIAR-supported International Rice
Research Institute (IRRI) used its collections to provide farmers with rice varieties
suitable for growing in fields that had been inundated with salt water. The genebank
at the CGIAR-supported International Center for Tropical Agriculture (CIAT) in
Palmira, Colombia was instrumental in providing bean varieties to farmers in Honduras
and Nicaragua in the aftermath of Hurricane Mitch in 1998.
According to Geoff Hawtin, Acting Director General of CIAT and former executive
director of the Rome-based Global Crop Diversity Trust, “The shipments going to
Svalbard from the CGIAR genebanks are a vital measure for further safeguarding
the world’s crop collections. With coming climatic changes, higher food prices,
and expanding markets for biofuels, our best available options for progress, if
not survival, will be in what we have conserved and studied against all thinkable
predictions.”
Source: SeedQuest.com
23 January 2008
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1.16 University of Wisconsin-Madison scientists
hunt for the roots of the modern potato
More than 99 percent of all modern potato varieties planted today are the
direct descendents of varieties that once grew in the lowlands of south-central
Chile. How Chilean germplasm came to dominate the modern potato-which spread worldwide
from Europe-has been the subject of a long, contentious debate among scientists.
While some plant scientists have maintained that Chilean potatoes were the first
to be planted in Europe, a more widely accepted story holds that European potatoes
were originally descended from plants grown high in the Andes mountains between
eastern Venezuela and northern Argentina. According to this theory, Andean potatoes
were wiped out during the Great Irish Potato Famine, the 19th-century late-blight
epidemic that devastated potato fields across Europe, initiating the import of
Chilean varieties to re-establish the crop.
In a recent report in the American Journal of Botany (www.amjbot.org), UW-Madison researchers Mercedes
Ames and David Spooner say both theories are wrong. By analyzing the DNA of historical
potato specimens, the researchers found that both Chilean and Andean potatoes
were grown in Europe decades before and decades after the famine, the first direct
evidence that the potatoes were grown simultaneously in Europe.
“Basically, we found that the Andean potatoes got to Europe first, around 1700.
However, Chilean potatoes were starting to get popular there 34 years before the
late blight epidemic,” says Ames, a graduate student in UW-Madison’s plant breeding
and plant genetics program. The results also show that Andean potatoes grew as
late as 1892 in Europe, proving they weren’t polished off by the late blight epidemic-and
that they grew side by side with Chilean potatoes for many decades before the
Chilean types became dominant.
To start the project, which was funded by the National Science Foundation, Ames
visited herbaria throughout Europe in search of early potato specimens. She requested
hole-punch sized samples of dried leaf tissue from appropriate specimens be sent
to Madison for study, eventually ending up with material from 64 potato plants
grown between 1700 and 1910.
“Some of these samples were over 300 years old and not ideally preserved,” says
Spooner, a professor of horticulture and USDA researcher who is the paper’s corresponding
author. “It took considerable innovation for Mercedes to work out the correct
technique to get DNA from them.”
After successfully extracting DNA from 49 samples, Ames analyzed each using a
DNA marker that distinguishes between upland Andean and lowland Chilean potato
types. The result is a biochemical record of ancestry, which Spooner says adds
hard evidence to a debate often premised on guesswork.
“The problem with these two theories is that they rely on inferences based on
the morphology of old plant samples, as well as inferences based on historical
records about day-length adaptation, shipping routes, and the role of the late
blight epidemic,” he says. “Our work is the first direct evidence as opposed
to the inferential evidence used in prior studies on the origin of the European
potato because the herbarium specimens we used are like fossils.”
Spooner notes that this type of analysis could help set the record straight for
many other crop species. “Potato is one of the prominent stories in crop evolution
books,” says Spooner. “Because of Mercedes’s work, they‘re going to have to rewrite
the textbooks.”
Citation: Ames, M. and D.M. Spooner. 2008. DNA from herbarium specimens
settles a controversy about origins of the European potato. Am. J. Bot.
95: 252-257.
Written by Nicole Miller (nemiller2@wisc.edu) and contributed by Chad Kramer (cckramer@wisc.edu);
University of Wisconsin-Madison.
Source: www.cals.wisc.edu
30 January 2008
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1.17 Engineering fungal resistance in rice
Basel, Switzerland
A good agricultural harvest is not only dependent on favorable weather conditions,
but also on remaining unscathed by insects and disease. That is why the work of
three universities with rice could prove to be very beneficial.
Often a considerable amount of crop yield is lost due to infection from plant
pathogens. Fungi are the largest group of plant pathogens. They can infect almost
all crop varieties. One fungus responsible for extensive damage to rice crop is
Magnaporthe grisea. M. grisea causes the most devastating damage of rice crops
worldwide, Rice Blast.
However, using genetic engineering, Dr. Min
Shao and his collaborators at Nanjing Agricultural
University, Nanjing, China, North Carolina State University, Raleigh, USA
and Huazhong Agricultural University, Wuhan, China were successful in incorporating
genes into rice varieties that are responsible for triggering natural plant defense
mechanisms. The end result yielded a rice variety that effectively protects against
several plant pathogens. Their work is published in a recent issue of Plant
Biotechnology Journal.
Most of plant pathogens are constantly evolving, which makes the task of controlling
them a difficult one. Since researchers cannot predict how fast and when pathogens
will evolve, the process of developing resistant varieties can be a never ending
task with limited and short-term benefits.
With that in mind, the researchers were interested in finding a long term solution
that not only protected against Rice Blast, but other pathogens as well. Dr. Shao
and his group came upon the novel idea of developing a genetically modified rice
variety that possessed resistance to a wide range of existing and future plant
pathogens.
Bacteria to the rescue
Although bacteria also infect crops and cause severe damage to them, they also
produce Harpin, a protein capable of eliciting disease and insect resistance in
plants. Dr. Shao decided to exploit the potential of Harpin as a natural initiator
of the plants’s own defense systems against invading pathogens.
The researchers introduced the gene for harpin (hrf1) into the rice genome and
generated a genetically engineered rice variety with enhanced resistance against
M. grisea. Since M. grisea infects plants through the leaves, it was encouraging
to find that the amount of harpin increased in the leaves of transgenic rice during
the growing season. Thus, Dr. Shao’s transgenic rice is capable of protecting
itself against M. grisea infection.
It is good to see a strategy working, but what makes it all the more motivating
is to find out the reason behind it. The researchers found out that the presence
of the hrf1 gene in transgenic rice increases leaf silicon concentration. According
to them, this might be responsible for inhibition of specialized structures required
by fungus to penetrate rice leaves.
Fields vs Indoors
To realize the ultimate aim of developing transgenic rice for growing in open
fields, Dr. Shao’s group tested the ability of their transgenic rice under natural
environmental conditions and also in closed supervised nurseries. Unlike non-GM
rice, the GM rice grew successfully under both closed and open field conditions.
The researchers correlated the increase in resistance in transgenic rice with
the accumulation of harpin protein as plant mature. The researchers emphasize
that their present results have laid the groundwork for their future experiments,
which will assess the durability of this technique.
Dr. Ralph Dean, one of the authors of the study told Checkbiotech, “There are
many examples of transgenic crops being used successfully, but much more work
will have to be done before rice plants expressing harpin genes would ever be
ready for distribution.”
Dr. Dean went on to further explain that, “Harpin is a natural product produced
by bacteria and would not appear likely to be noxious, although again this would
have to be carefully tested.”
One question that is always raised when dealing with genetically modified crops
is the possibility of them crossing with wild varieties. “It is understandable
that the public may have concerns regarding transgenic crops, but rice generally
does not outcross, but it is possible to cross with wild-species such as red rice,”
said Dr. Dean, “However, the viability of these hybrids is likely to be poor,
otherwise the species would have crossed in the past and the hybrids would predominate
in nature.”
Despite his cautionary approach Dr. Dean is quite optimistic, “The beauty of harpin
is that it activates the plants own natural defense mechanisms. Thus, if harpin
is safe and other safeguards are in place, I believe this strategy has a lot of
potential for use against many pathogens and in other crops.”
Tanuja Rohatgi is a Science Writer for Checkbiotech in Basel, Switzerland.
Publication:
Shao M, Wang J, Dean RA, Lin Y, Gao X, Hu S.
Expression of a harpin-encoding gene in rice confers durable nonspecific resistance
to Magnaporthe grisea.
Plant Biotechnology Journal.
2008 Jan; 6(1):73-81
Copyright Checkbiotech 2008
By Tanuja Rohatgi, Checkbiotech
Source: SeedQuest.com|
8 February 2008
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1.18 Submergence-tolerant rice line now in the pipeline
The Philippines
“Teach rice how to swim and it will survive the floods,” rice experts say, which
is the same idea behind the development of IR64 Sub1, a submergence-tolerant rice
line.
Rice can withstand flooding, but not for long. The pursuit for a more resilient
plant has paved the way for the discovery of a “submergence gene” that enables
rice to survive complete submersion.
Usually, rice thrives in standing water, but complete submergence for more than
a few days can be highly damaging resulting in yield losses, says Dr. Norvie L.
Manigbas, a research fellow from PhilRice.
Containing the submergence tolerance (sub 1) gene IRRI line IR40931 came out after
IRRI and the University of California-Davis discovered the gene in an Indian variety
FR13A. The gene was then introduced to IR64, the most popular rice variety in
the Philippineshence, IR64 Sub1.
Dr. Manigbas said IR64 Sub1 is a non-genetically engineered rice plant that can
survive, grow, and develop even after 10 days of complete submergence to murky
and cloudy water.
The new rice line is not totally different from the original IR64 variety in terms
of morphological characteristics as plant height, tillering, and yield performance.
As explained by Dr. Nenita Desamero of the PhilRice Plant Breeding and Biotechnology
Division, with or without the submergence gene and planted under favorable condition,
IR64 will have the same yield performance. However, when both are submerged under
water for 7 to 10 days, IR64 Sub1 will survive and recover.
Normally, rice (without the sub1 gene) at tillering stage can survive for one
week under submergence condition while seedlings can only last for three to five
days.
As part of an IRRI’s project on the dissemination of its submergence tolerant
rice variety, PhilRice now leads the national on-farm testing of IR64 Sub1 starting
this year until 2009 with Dr. Desamero as the team leader and Dr. Manigbas as
the lead scientist. The target sites are rainfed and/or irrigated areas prone
to flash flooding for one to two weeks.
In July, pilot-testing in Bgy. Papaya, San Antonio, Nueva Ecija failed as the
crop was not submerged during the evaluation period. Nonetheless, IR64, with and
without sub1 gene, performed comparably with wet season yield of 4.5 tons per
hectare. Under muddy irrigation water, crops recovered up to five to eight days
of submergence, on-station results showed. The second on-station testing started
in October 2007 while on-farm experiments began this January still in Bgy. Papaya.
“On-farm tests may provide hope for farmers who took the risk of planting rice
during the rainy months, and whose fields are submergence-prone during the wet
season,” Dr. Manigbas said.
By Hanah Hazel Mavi M. Biag, PhilRice
Source: SeedQuest.com
25 January 2008
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1.19 A new hybrid rice group aims to increase rice yield in the tropics
An international research initiative, the Hybrid Rice Research and Development
Consortium (HRDC), aims to boost the research and development of hybrid rice in
the tropics. HRDC was established by the International Research Institute (IRRI)
to strengthen public-private sector partnership in hybrid rice technology. The
technology has helped China achieve food security but its potential has
not yet reached the tropics. The HRDC aims to fulfill the following objectives:
-Support research on developing new hybrids with enhanced yield, improved seed
production, multiple resistances to stresses, and grain quality.
-Support research on best management practices for rice hybrids.
-Improve information sharing, public awareness, and capacity building.
The HRDC will have a public-private sector advisory committee which will meet
annually to provide information to its members on new plant genetic resources
available or under development, review research on hybrid rice management, discuss
new research priorities, and make decisions on other consortium activities such
as capacity building for both the public and private sectors.
Read the press release at http://www.irri.org/media/press/press.asp?id=165
Source: CropBiotech Update 16 November 2007
Contributed by Margaret Smith
Dept. of Plant Breeding and Genetics
Cornell University
mes25@cornell.edu
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1.20 Indian and US Scientists develop
high protein rice
Indian and US scientists from the University of Missouri, Tamil Nadu Agricultural
University in India, and the Plant Genetics Research Unit, Agricultural Research
Service, U.S. Department of Agriculture have developed a high protein rice variety.
Ahmed Mahmoud, S. Sukumar, and Hari Krishnan report that "Interspecific rice hybrid
of Oryza sativa x Oryza nivara reveals a significant increase in seed protein
content" in the Journal of Agricultural and Food Chemistry.
The researchers created a hybrid by crossing a common rice species of the indica
group cultivar IR 64 with a wild species, Oryza nivara. They concluded
that the hybrid could serve as initial breeding material for new rice genotypes
that could combine types with superior cooking quality with those of high protein
content.
Co-author Hari Krishnan provides a PDF copy of the full article: http://pubs.acs.org/cgi-bin/sample.cgi/jafcau/asap/html/jf071776n.html
Source: CropBiotech Update 18 January 2008
Contributed by Margaret Smith
Dept. of Plant Breeding and Genetics
Cornell University
mes25@cornell.edu
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1.21 Breeding cotton to beat the heat
People expect a lot from cotton. Consumers want durable, comfortable fabrics.
Producers want easy-to-manufacture textiles. And growers want hardy, thriving
plants. Uniting these traits is the goal of Agricultural Research Service (ARS) cotton breeders at the U.S. Arid-Land
Agricultural Research Center in Maricopa, Ariz.
Plant geneticist Richard Percy,
now with the ARS Southern
Plains Agricultural Research Center in College Station, Texas, has bred new
cotton lines with qualities to please growers, fabric manufacturers and consumers.
Pimaan extra-long-staple cottonproduces long, strong fibers that are
suitable for high- quality products such as luxury bed sheets and sewing thread.
But pima plants have been historically susceptible to heat. They start exhibiting
symptoms of heat stress when their leaf canopy temperaturethe temperature
of a plant itself, as opposed to the air around itreaches about 82 degrees
Fahrenheit.
During the past five decades, Percy and his colleagues have bred and released
heat-tolerant and heat-avoidant pima lines, which the commercial seed industry
has used to create new varieties that can withstand extreme temperatures.
In 2003, Cotton Incorporated offered to partner with
Percy and ARS to improve heat tolerance and fiber quality in upland cotton, the
species that makes up the majority of the U.S. cotton crop. To ensure that the
new cotton lines would be productive and competitive throughout the Cotton Belt,
Percy enlisted ARS and university scientists in Georgia, South Carolina, Louisiana
and California in an across-the-cotton-belt breeding and evaluation program.
In 2006, as a result of their collaboration, ARS and Cotton Incorporated released
three upland cotton lines with superior fiber quality and heat tolerance. Those
lines have been picked up by about two dozen commercial seed companies and breeders
for further development.
Read more
about this research in the February 2008 issue of Agricultural Research
magazine.
By Laura McGinnis
Source: SeedQuest.com
5 February 2008
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1.22 Wild cassava relatives as source
of stress-resistance genes
Scientists from the Brazilian Agriculture Research Corporation (EMBRAPA) have
shown that wild cassava species harbor several stress and pathogen resistance
genes. A project, in collaboration with the International Center for Tropical
Agriculture (CIAT), now aims to transfer these genes to commercial cassava varieties.
Led by Alfredo Cunha Alves, the scientists have started to identify molecular
markers that will be used to transfer the resistance traits to high yielding cultivars.
They are also starting the cytogenic characterization of the wild varieties. New
stress-resistant cassava varieties are expected to be developed before the project
ends in 2010. Scientists from CIAT have previously obtained cassava varieties
resistant to the mealybug and whitefly by marker assisted selection.
Read the news article at http://www.embrapa.br/embrapa/imprensa/noticias/2007/dezembro/2a-semana/especies-silvestres-de-mandioca-sao-foco-de-pesquisa
Source: CropBiotech Update 21 December 2007
Contributed by Margaret Smith
Dept. of Plant Breeding and Genetics
Cornell University
mes25@cornell.edu
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1.23 Beans suited for the harsh Mediterranean
Common beans (Phaseolus vulgaris) are important source of dietary proteins.
In the Mediterranean, however, common beans are incapable of growing because of
poor soil and limited water. Researchers from the French National Institute for
Agricultural Research (INRA), International Center for Tropical Agriculture (CIAT)
and the University of Frankfurt, developed new bean lines capable of tolerating
the harsh Mediterranean environment.
Legumes can grow on poor soils even without the addition of nitrogen fertilizers,
with the help of symbiotic bacteria. The bacteria can transform atmospheric nitrogen
to ammonium, which the plants use in protein synthesis. The activity of these
bacteria, however, is limited in the Mediterranean because of the phosphorus deficient
soil. Fortunately, the scientists located the genes that can facilitate
efficient phosphorus absorption. Hence, just by crossing BEATS 477, a drought
tolerant variety harboring genes for efficient phosphorus absorption with the
bean mosaic virus-tolerant cultivar DR 304, the scientists were able to obtain
promising new hybrids. These new lines are expected to increase bean yield in
countries like Algeria, Egypt, Morocco and Tunisia.
Read more at http://www.inra.fr/presse/amelioration_haricot_sous_contraintes_mediterraneennes
Source: CropBiotech Update 16 November 2007
Contributed by Margaret Smith
Dept. of Plant Breeding and Genetics
Cornell University
mes25@cornell.edu
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1.24 Wheat landraces may hold promise
against rust
A new stem rust strain, Ug99, is on a worldwide march and the spores of the
deadly fungal disease could reach the United States sooner or later. That is why
scientists from the US Agricultural Research Service (ARS) are pushing a hot pursuit
of wheat varieties that harbor genes for resistance to stem rust. The possible
source of resistance genes: traditional varieties grown by village farmers on
the other side of the world, known to scientists as landraces.
Landraces are not as well studied as commonly cultivated wheat varieties.
These varieties may contain genes not only for rust resistance, but also for improved
agronomic traits like tolerance to salt and metal stress and drought. Initial
evaluation of landraces housed at the ARS Small Grains and Potato Germplasm Research
Unit showed promising results. Notable resistance in wheats from, among other
places, Chile, Ethiopia, Turkey, and Bosnia and Herzegovina where observed. The
scientists are now conducting field tests of selected specimens in Kenya and Ethiopia,
the heart of the rust epidemic.
For more information, vists http://www.ars.usda.gov/News/docs.htm?docid=1261
Source: CropBiotech Update 29 November 2007
Contributed by Margaret Smith
Dept. of Plant Breeding and Genetics
Cornell University
mes25@cornell.edu
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1.25 The power of three: wheat trigenomic chromosome
Scientists from the Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation
(CSIRO), Sydney University, and the International Maize and Wheat Improvement
Center (CIMMYT) have combined the resistance genes from three different grass
species to develop the first 'trigenomic' chromosome. The trigenomic chromosome
can now be used to breed disease-resistant wheat varieties.
Researchers have known that wild wheat relatives harbor a collection of valuable
genes that may confer resistance to various diseases and pests. But transferring
these genes, using conventional breeding approaches, remains troublesome. Most
of the genes are linked together, so introducing a gene of interest also means
introducing several undesirable genes. Furthermore, the linked genes tend to stay
together even after many generations of breeding.
The researchers have successfully recombined two gene blocks from two different
Thinopyrum species, a wild wheat relative. The recombined blocks carry resistance
genes for leaf rust and Barley Yellow Dwarf Virus (BYDV), two of the world's most
damaging wheat disease. It may also harbor resistance genes against the new stem
rust strain, which is currently on a worldwide march. The gene blocks contain
no problematic chromosomes which may affect the wheat's agronomic properties.
Scientists are now looking for ways to apply their discovery to other crops like
corn, rice and soybean.
Read the press release at http://www.csiro.au/news/DiseaseBeatingWheat.html
The abstract of the paper published by Theoretical and Applied Genetics is avaialable
at http://www.springerlink.com/content/6g14315t27732627/?p=2c1cba2797f14ab7a5ea7c61ef0eb551&pi=6
Source: CropBiotech Update 14 December 2007
Contributed by Margaret Smith
Dept. of Plant Breeding and Genetics
Cornell University
mes25@cornell.edu
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1.26 Researchers identify cause of watermelon
vine decline
Researchers from the US Department of Agriculture Agricultural Research Service
(USDA-ARS) have identified the organism that causes the disease called watermelon
vine decline (WVD). WVD, first seen in Florida in 2003, causes an estimated annual
yield loss of $25 to $ 50 million dollars. Yield losses totaled to more than $60
million in 2005. Symptoms of the disease include necrosis or browning of the fruit
rind, rapid vine collapse and death just before harvest.
Led by Scott Adkins, the group determined that the novel ipomovirus, squash vein
yellowing virus, is the WVD causel agent. The squash vein yellowing virus was
found to be limited to the Cucurbitaceae family, with the most dramatic symptoms
occurring on squash and watermelon. WVD is transmitted from plants to plants by
the silverleaf whitefly. So far, WVD has been limited to Florida, but growers
fear that it may spread to any place that watermelon is commercially grown. Screening
of watermelon germplasm for resistance to squash vein yellowing virus in greenhouse
trials yielded promising results.
Read more at http://www.ars.usda.gov/News/docs.htm?docid=1261
Source: CropBiotech Update 9 November 2007:
Contributed by Margaret Smith
Dept. of Plant Breeding and Genetics
Cornell University
mes25@cornell.edu
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1.27 Tolerance and response to iron deficiency
in plants
Most living organisms require iron for growth and development, and the iron
absorbed by plants represents a major source of iron in animal and human diet.
Iron is very much abundant in mineral soils; however it is sparingly soluble in
aerobic conditions and high pH. Scientists have known that plants induce iron
utilization systems under iron deficiency. The exact molecular mechanism of the
systems, however, remains unknown.
Scientists from the Tokyo University have discovered a transcription factor, IDEF1,
that binds to a specific DNA sequence previously shown to respond during conditions
of low iron availability. Transcription factors (TF) are proteins that bind specific
regions of the DNA. TF binding can either promote or inhibit the expression of
certain genes. When the gene coding for IDEF1 was introduced to rice, the transgenic
lines exhibited substantial tolerance to iron deficiency. IDEF1 expression was
also found to promote the activation of related iron deficiency-responsive proteins,
suggesting the presence of a sequential gene regulatory network. Manipulation
of IDEF1 can provide approaches to produce crops tolerant to conditions of low
iron availability, as in calcareous soil.
The abstract of the paper published by PNAS is available at http://www.pnas.org/cgi/content/abstract/104/48/19150
Subcribers can access the full paper at http://www.pnas.org/cgi/reprint/104/48/19150
Source: CropBiotech Update 29 November 2007
Contributed by Margaret Smith
Dept. of Plant Breeding and Genetics
Cornell University
mes25@cornell.edu
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1.28 Resistance to selenium toxicity
Selenium (Se) is a naturally occurring element commonly found in sedimentary
rocks. Although there is no concrete evidence that selenium is essential for survival
of plants, several studies have shown that it is a beneficial element especially
for certain species. Like other nutrients, however, excessively high levels of
Se are toxic for most plants. A group of scientists from the US and Japan has
determined the mechanism by which plants regulate selenite resistance.
Because of its similarity with sulfur, selenium is metabolized by sulfur metabolic
pathways. When plants are exposed to high levels of Se, protein synthesis is adversely
affected. Se, instead of sulfur, is attached to the amino acids cysteine and methionine
(sulfur-containing amino acids). The scientists discovered that the phytohormones
ethylene and jasmonic acid play important roles in regulating selenite resistance.
Reactive oxygen species (ROS) were also found to be increased by selenium. Knowing
more about factors limiting plant Se accumulation and resistance may have applications
for breeding Se-fortified foods, or for phytoremediation.
The abstract of the paper and links to the full article are available at http://www.plantphysiol.org/cgi/content/abstract/pp.107.110742v1
Source: CropBiotech Update 11 January 2008
Contributed by Margaret Smith
Dept. of Plant Breeding and Genetics
Cornell University
mes25@cornell.edu
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1.29 Scientists discover plant compound
that improves iron absorption
Scientists from the US Agricultural Research Service and Cornell University
have discovered that inulin, a carbohydrate present in plants like onion, chicory,
artichoke and garlic, may help people absorb more iron from fruits, grains and
vegetables. Pigs supplied with inulin in their diet exhibited improved iron absorption
and increased blood hemoglobin levels compared to those consuming inulin-free
feed. The scientists used young pigs in their study because their gastrointestinal
tract anatomy and digestive physiology is very much similar to human anatomy and
physiological processes.
Inulin is a complex polysaccharide that resists digestion in the upper intestinal
tract. Without this compound, the colon absorbs very little iron from grains and
fruits because of the presence of phytic acid that inhibits iron absorption. Fermentation
of inulin by bacteria in the colon produces short-chain fatty acids, resulting
to increased acidity in the colon. Increased digestive acidity causes the iron
to be more soluble. It can also help in the proliferation of mucosal cells, on
which iron absorption can occur. The finding could provide a key support in the
worldwide fight against iron deficiency.
Read more at http://www.ars.usda.gov/is/AR/archive/jan08/inulin0108.htm
Source: CropBiotech Update 4 January 2008
Contributed by Margaret Smith
Dept. of Plant Breeding and Genetics
Cornell University
mes25@cornell.edu
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1.30 New cranberry variety with increased
antioxidants
Scientists from the US Department of Agriculture's Agricultural Research Service
(ARS) have developed a new cranberry variety with higher anthocyanins levels compared
to ordinary cultivars. Anthocyanins are plant pigments much studied for their
purported health benefits, including their roles as antioxidants. Recent studies
implicated anthocyanins in stalling the growth of cancer cells in humans. In addition
to anthocyanins, the new variety was also found to have significantly higher levels
of proanthocyanidins, compounds known to inhibit the adhesion of harmful bacteria
in the urinary tract.
The new variety was obtained by crossing two related cranberry species. Unlike
common commercial cultivars, the anthocyanins in the new variety are glucose-linked.
Anthocyanins bound to glucose are relatively high in antioxidant capacity and
are well absorbed in human gut, in contrast to those linked to other sugars
like arabinose and galactose. By backcrossing, the scientists have now cranberry
lines with good productivity, adaptation and vigor. The next step is to produce
a commercially acceptable cultivar for growers to use.
Read more at http://www.ars.usda.gov/is/pr/2008/080108.htm
Source: CropBiotech Update 11 January 2008
Contributed by Margaret Smith
Dept. of Plant Breeding and Genetics
Cornell University
mes25@cornell.edu
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1.31 New banana and plantain varieties
for Africa
The International Institute of Tropical Agriculture (IITA) has concluded the
five year project to develop new banana and plantain varieties with increased
yield and resistance to fungal pathogens and nematodes for farmers in sub-Saharan
Africa. Scientists from the IITA also developed new methods for deploying the
new cultivars in a way that preserves traditional varieties. The US $4 million
project was funded by the Consultative Group on International Agricultural Research
and the Belgian government.
Banana and plantain production has suffered significant decline in sub-Saharan
Africa, in part because of the Black Sigatoka, a fungal pathogen. The scientists
are confident that the new varieties will contribute much on the poverty reduction
and income generation efforts in the region. The new cultivars have also been
shown to produce superior fruits with high-post-harvest value. IITA now stressed
the need for further human resource development and support of national institutions
to ensure the availability of plant stock and adoption by banana and plantain
farmers.
Read the press release at http://www.iita.org/cms/details/news_details.aspx?articleid=1392&zoneid=81
Source: CropBiotech Update 18 January 2008
Contributed by Margaret Smith
Dept. of Plant Breeding and Genetics
Cornell University
mes25@cornell.edu
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1.32 Three Striga resistant cowpea varieties available for Africa
Striga (S. gesneroides), a plant parasitic weed or witchweed
is the cause of more than 40% loss in annual cowpea yield in sub-Saharan Africa.
In Nigeria for example cowpea yield was reduced annually from 2-3 tonnes to 0.37
tonnes per hectare, with a total loss of $200 million annually in sub-Saharan
Africa. A three-year study by the International Institute of Tropical Agriculture
(IITA) resulted in the development of three new cowpea varieties with genetic
resistance to Striga.
The research supported by the International Crops Research Institute for the
Semi-Arid Tropics (ICRISAT) and the Generation Challenge Program (GCP) of The
Consultative Group on International Agricultural Research (CGIAR) and the Bill
and Melinda Gates Foundation, USA is a longstanding effort to alleviate infestations
of cowpea by the parasite. The three new cowpea varieties and those which are
under development will benefit the sub-Saharan countries Senegal, Mali,
Burkina Faso, Niger, Benin, and Cameroun.
For details of the press release, see: http://www.iita.org/cms/details/news_details.aspx?articleid=1404&zoneid=81
Source: CropBiotech Update 18 January 2008
Contributed by Margaret Smith
Dept. of Plant Breeding and Genetics
Cornell University
mes25@cornell.edu
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1.33 Unlocking the genetic basis of pine
tree defense
Scientists from the University of British Colombia have made an interesting
discovery on the genetic secrets that enable conifers (pine trees and spruce)
to ward off herbivores and pathogens. By comparing the structure and sequence
of enzymes that produce terpenoids in plants, the researchers were able to show
how they produce complex mixtures of chemical compounds that continuously evolve
to protect them from diseases and pathogens. Terpenoids are a vast group of aromatic
compounds that play an important role in mediating various plant-herbivore, plant-pollinator,
and plant-pathogen interactions.
The scientists demonstrated how neofunctionalization can result from relatively
minor changes in protein sequence to increasing the diversity of plant compounds.
The neofunctionalization hypothesis asserts that after gene duplication, one gene
retains the ancestral function whereas the other acquires a new function, therefore
leading to increase in diversity of products. The discovery made by the researchers
may open the way to developing new trees that can fight insects like the mountain
pine beetles, which has caused billions of dollars losses in conifer-based forest
economies.
The abstract of the paper published by PNAS is available at http://www.pnas.org/cgi/content/abstract/0709466105v1
Source: CropBiotech Update 18 January 2008
Contributed by Margaret Smith
Dept. of Plant Breeding and Genetics
Cornell University
mes25@cornell.edu
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1.34 Kansas State University researchers
move one step closer to curbing pests´ appetite for crops
Manhattan, Kansas
Scientists at Kansas State University have discovered
that the salivary glands of a tiny insect may hold a key
to developing pest resistance in plants.
A team of K-State researchers found that by using technology to silence a gene
in the salivary glands of pea aphids, the insect´s lifespan was cut by more than
50 percent.
"What we found is that when we silenced the most abundant transcript (gene), the
aphids died in a few days," said K-State professor of entomology John Reese.
The findings could lead to new ways to control insects in plants, including such
important crops as wheat, alfalfa, soybeans, corn and sorghum, Reese said.
Finding ways to develop insect-resistant crops also brings scientists closer to
finding ways to reduce agricultural producers´ dependence on pesticides. That
helps the environment and lowers growers´ input costs.
"If we can figure out how to get a plant to prevent the functioning of an insect
pest's gene, we can turn that plant into a non-host for that pest," Reese said.
Reese was part of a research team that included assistant professor of entomology
Yoonseong Park and former graduate student Navdeep Mutti, as well as molecular
geneticists.
In the study, which was published in the Journal of Insect Science, the researchers
injected siRNA into the salivary glands of adult pea aphids, a pest that can be
particularly damaging to alfalfa yields. Aphids treated in this way could not
survive more than a few days on plants.
Saliva is important in the interaction between aphids and host plants, Reese said.
Proteins, including enzymes of aphid saliva, are thought to play several roles
- some of which may overcome a plant´s defenses and possibly stimulate plant defenses
in non-host plants.
At stake are billions of dollars worth of crops grown every year in the United
States and around the world. For example, a study first published by Iowa State
University in 2005 found that soybean aphids alone had the potential to cause
approximately 3 million acres to be sprayed - an economic toll on its own - and
to cause yield losses of more than 55 million bushels, meaning an economic impact
of more than $250 million in an outbreak year.
Information on the Iowa State study can be found at http://www.ipm.iastate.edu/ipm/icm/node/53.
The K-State research was supported by a U.S. Department of Agriculture grant and
by the Kansas Agricultural Experiment Station.
Source: SeedQuest.com
11 February 2008
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1.35 Root or shoot? EAR calls the shots
La Jolla, CA Controlled by a tightly regulated choreography that determines
what should go up and what should go down, plants develop along a polar axis with
a root on one end and a shoot on the other.
While studying why a defective TOPLESS gene causes plant embryos to develop into
a seedling topped with a second root instead of a stem with leaves, researchers
at the Salk Institute for Biological Studies hit upon the linchpin that ensures
that plants are neither all root nor all shoot.
Turns out the question, “Root or shoot"” literally hinges on the EAR domain, a
short protein sequence only six amino acids long.
The Salk researchers’ findings, published in the February 7 issue of Science Express,
explain how mutations in TOPLESS can switch a plant cell’s fate from shoot to
root and in the process clarify the purpose of the so-called EAR motif, a protein
domain whose function has puzzled plant scientists for several years.
“We’ve known for a while that the EAR domain can turn off transcription, but how
it did this was an open question,” says the study’s lead author, Jeffrey A. Long,
Ph.D., an assistant professor in the Plant Molecular and Cellular Biology Laboratory.
“We didn’t set out to fish for molecules that bind to the EAR domain, but when
we used TOPLESS as a bait, that’s what we found.”
Scientists and home gardeners alike have been messing with plants’ basic architecture
for years: Permanently switch on a gene called BODENLOS (or bottomless) and plants
forgo root development altogether. Dip plant cuttings into hormone rooting powder
and roots start to sprout where none have been. The active ingredient, a synthetic
version of the plant hormone auxin that regulates root growth in plants, overrides
the molecular switch that keeps auxin-responsive genes turned off in parts of
the plant that are above ground.
In an earlier study, Long and his team had discovered that the switch is none
other than TOPLESS, the protein encoded by the TOPLESS gene. It had become clear
that TOPLESS functions as a so-called co-repressor, which regulate gene expression
by inhibiting the activity of transcription factors. Transcription factors control
gene activity by binding to DNA sequences adjacent to a gene. But exactly how
TOPLESS silences genes necessary for root development has remained unclear.
Hoping to gain insight into how TOPLESS functions by looking at the company it
keeps, lead author Heidi Szemenyei, a former graduate student in Long’s lab and
now a postdoctoral researcher at UC Berkeley, searched for interacting partners
in the plant Arabidopsis thaliana. This wee weed was the first flowering plant
to have its genome unlocked and is loved by plant biologists for its short generation
time.
She discovered that BODENLOS, a transcriptional repressor that silences auxin-responsive
genes, relies on its EAR domain to recruit the co-repressor TOPLESS to help with
the job. While auxins are found throughout the whole plant, BODENLOS is only active
in the shoot, ensuring that no accidental roots sprout above ground.
“The coupling of TOPLESS to BODENLOS provides an elegant mechanism for the plant
to control the activity of auxin-responsive genes,” says Long.
###
Mike Hannon, a graduate student in Long’s lab also contributed to the study.
The Salk Institute for Biological Studies in La Jolla, California, is an independent
nonprofit organization dedicated to fundamental discoveries in the life sciences,
the improvement of human health and the training of future generations of researchers.
Jonas Salk, M.D., whose polio vaccine all but eradicated the crippling disease
poliomyelitis in 1955, opened the Institute in 1965 with a gift of land from the
City of San Diego and the financial support of the March of Dimes.
Contact: Gina Kirchweger
kirchweger@salk.edu
Source: EurekAlert.org
7 February 2008
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1.36 A guardian of grasses: Specific origin and conservation
of a unique disease-resistance gene in the grass lineage
Anoop Sindhu, Satya Chintamanani, Amanda S. Brandt, Michael Zanis, Steven
R. Scofield, and Gurmukh S. Johal
ABSTRACT
The maize Hm1 gene provides protection against a lethal leaf blight and ear mold
disease caused by Cochliobolus carbonum race 1 (CCR1). Although it was the first
disease-resistance (DR) gene to be cloned, it remains a novelty because, instead
of participating in the plant recognition and response system as most DR genes
do, Hm1 disarms the pathogen directly. It does so by encoding an NADPH-dependent
reductase, whose function is to inactivate Helminthosporium carbonum (HC) toxin,
an epoxide-containing cyclic tetrapeptide, which the pathogen produces as a key
virulence factor to colonize maize. Although CCR1 is strictly a pathogen of maize,
orthologs of Hm1 and the HC-toxin reductase activity are present in the grass
family, suggesting an ancient and evolutionarily conserved role of this DR trait
in plants. Here, we provide proof for such a role by demonstrating its involvement
in nonhost resistance of barley to CCR1. Barley leaves in which expression of
the Hm1 homologue was silenced became susceptible to infection by CCR1, but only
if the pathogen was able to produce HC toxin. Phylogenetic analysis indicated
that Hm1 evolved exclusively and early in the grass lineage. Given the devastating
ability of CCR1 to kill maize, these findings imply that the evolution and/or
geographical distribution of grasses may have been constrained if Hm1 did not
emerge.
Open access article: http://www.pnas.org/cgi/reprint/0711406105v1.pdf
Source: Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences
of the United States of America via SeedQuest.com
January, 2008
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1.37 How plants cope with excess light
Photosynthesis relies on efficient absorption of sunlight . However in cases
of extreme sunlight, plants are forced to absorb light energy in excess of what
is needed in photosynthesis. The excess light energy can cause serious damages,
such as bleaching in leaves. To protect themselves from damages, plants employ
a mechanism wherein the excess light energy is converted to heat which is harmlessly
released. The process is called photoprotection.
A group of researchers from the Netherlands, France and United Kingdom has
discovered the exact molecular mechanisms of photoprotection. They were able to
demonstrate how the light-harvesting antenna pigments in the leaves change in
conformation upon absorption of excess sunlight. The molecules then convert the
excess light energy into heat in a process that occurs in less than a billionth
of a second. The switch between the conformational changes of the light-harvesting
molecule dictates the flow of energy in the leaves, controlling the balance between
gathering light energy for photosynthesis and its dissipation as heat. Scientists
are now conducting studies on how to use the discovery in developing plants with
improved photoprotective mechanisms that can cope with climate change.
The abstract of the paper published by Nature is available at http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v450/n7169/abs/nature06262.html
Source: CropBiotech Update 23 November 2007
Contributed by Margaret Smith
Dept. of Plant Breeding and Genetics
Cornell University
mes25@cornell.edu
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1.38 Genetic map should speed development of snow mold-resistant
wheat
Pulman, Washington
A blanket of snow protects winter wheat from freezing, but significant snow cover
for too long on unfrozen ground can lead to a disease problem that farmers don’t
want: snow mold.
Snow mold is a fungus-caused disease of wheat and other grasses, including lawns.
The disease can cut wheat yields by 20 percent to 40 percent when severe. The
fungus destroys the leaves and crown beneath the snow, according to Tim Murray,
chair of the plant pathology department at Washington State University.
In Washington, snow mold shows up during severe winters in north central Washington
– Chelan, Douglas, Lincoln, Okanogan and Stevens counties. It’s not normally a
problem in the Palouse because snow cover does not persist long enough.
“We normally need about 100 days of snow cover with unfrozen soil for speckled
snow mold to be a problem,” Murray said. “We’re approaching that in our snow mold
area.”
Based on one report from a grower north of Wilbur, there’s anywhere from two-
to six-feet of snow that’s approaching 90 days of cover,” Murray said. “There
was some frozen soil underneath, so it’s hard to say how severe the disease will
be.”
Many different fungi are capable of causing snow mold disease, but not all are
found in Washington. “The three we have in Washington like soil that is not frozen
under the snow, or if the soil is frozen, not frozen too firmly and will defrost
under the snow.
Signs of the disease appear just after snowmelt. “Within a day of snow melt, plants
will be covered with a mildew or sort of a light colored cobweb,” Murray said.
“After a few days, the plants will be gray colored and look dead if the disease
is severe. If it is less severe, some green leaves may be seen. As the plants
dry after snow melt, small black structures that cause a speckled appearance become
visible.
Fall-applied fungicides can control the disease, but are not cost-effective for
wheat growers because of the relative low value of the crop and uncertainty of
the occurrence of the disease, Murray said. Bred-in genetic resistance is regarded
as the best option.
Some current wheat varieties, including Eltan and Bruehl, have snow mold resistance,
“but we’re always looking to make improvements,” Murray said.
For the past 10 years, he has been collaborating with scientists at Japan’s National
Agricultural Research Center for Hokkaido to develop what varieties that have
improved resistance to snow mold.
Murray and his Japanese collaborators have been testing wheat lines for snow mold
resistance in plots near Waterville and Mansfield and on the island of Hokkaido
near Sapporo, where snow mold is a significant program. The lines they have tested
in the field are the most promising graduates of earlier tests in growth chambers
at WSU’s Plant Growth Facility in Pullman, where winter conditions can be simulated
inside.
Zenta Nishio, one of the Japanese researchers, developed a set of PCR primers
that are used in the lab to evaluate snow mold resistance. PCR is a laboratory
technique that allows scientists to detect DNA specific sequences of an organism’s
genes.
The scientists have evaluated 100 progeny lines from a cross of highly resistant
wheat from Switzerland and very susceptible wheat from The Netherlands and are
now developing a genetic map that should help wheat breeders identify resistant
plants more quickly.
“It could save breeders years,” Murray said. “You can’t count on getting a field
test every year, especially in Washington. That’s part of the reason we send our
lines to be field-tested in Japan. They get the disease more frequently. Even
so, it takes 12 months to go through one round of testing. With our controlled
environment tests and markers, we can do multiple rounds of testing in a year.”
The research has been funded by the Washington Wheat Commission
Source: SeedQuest.com
4 February 2008
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1.39
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2 PUBLICATIONS
2.01 Introducing ‘African Journal of Agricultural
Research (AJAR)’
The African Journal of Agricultural Research (AJAR) publishes high-quality
solicited and unsolicited articles, in English, in all areas of agriculture including
arid soil research and rehabilitation, agricultural genomics, stored products
research, tree fruit production, pesticide science, post harvest biology and technology,
seed science research, irrigation, agricultural engineering, water resources management,
marine sciences, agronomy, animal science, physiology and morphology, aquaculture,
crop science, dairy science, entomology, fish and fisheries, forestry, freshwater
science, horticulture, poultry science, soil science, systematic biology, veterinary,
virology, viticulture, weed biology, agricultural economics and agribusiness.
The following types of papers are considered for publication:
· Original articles in basic and
applied research.
· Critical reviews, surveys, opinions,
commentaries and essays.
Our objective is to inform authors of the decision on their manuscript(s) within
four weeks of submission. Following acceptance, a paper will normally be published
in the next issue.
Instruction for authors and other details are available on our website www.academicjournals.org/AJAR.
Prospective authors should send their manuscript(s) to ajar@academicjournals.org
Open Access
One key request of researchers across the world is unrestricted access to
research publications. AJAR is fully committed Open Access Initiative by providing
free access to all articles (both abstract and full PDF text) as soon as they
are published. We ask you to support this initiative by publishing your papers
in this journal.
Invitation to Review
AJAR is seeking for qualified reviewers as members of the review board
team. AJAR serves as a great resource for researchers and students across the
globe. We ask you to support this initiative by joining our reviewer’s team. If
you are interested in serving as a reviewer, kindly send us your resume to