PLANT BREEDING NEWS
EDITION
174
8 January 2007
An Electronic Newsletter of Applied Plant
Breeding
Sponsored by FAO and Cornell University
Clair H. Hershey,
Editor
chh23@cornell.edu
Archived issues available at: FAO Plant Breeding
Newsletter.
CONTENTS
1. NEWS, ANNOUNCEMENTS AND RESEARCH NOTES
1.01 A future powered by fuel from
plants
1.02 Ethanol or fiberboard – the fate of soybean plants
1.03 USDA/ARS geneticist Dr. Jerry Miller receives
ASTA's Plant Breeding Award
1.04 Vietnam accedes to the UPOV
Convention
1.05 Network set to boost plant breeding technique
1.06 CGIAR climate change research:
Breeding climate-resilient crops
1.07 Public breeding produces new maize varieties for
Kenyan farmers
1.08 Commercial release of Striga resistant maize
in Kenya
1.09 New
vegetables to boost African development
1.10 WARDA, The Africa Rice Center, wins 2006 United
Nations Award in recognition of its New Rice for Africa (NERICA) initiative
1.11 Birth of the National Seed Association of Sierra
Leone
1.12 ICRISAT and DBT partner
to establish a center of excellence in genomics
1.13 India issues new regulations to
protect plant varieties and farmers' rights
1.14 USA Rice Federation issues action
plan to eliminate genetically engineered traits from U.S. rice supply
1.15 Brazilian gene
bank becomes world's seventh largest
1.16 Is native maize diversity being
lost in Mexico?
1.17 Crop Diversity Topics from the Global Crop Diversity Trust:
Crops in Collision
1.18 Crop Diversity Topics from the Global Crop Diversity Trust:
Mud, Blood, and Genes
1.19 Global
Crop Diversity Trust and the GCP Sign Memorandum of
Understanding, Commit to Align Research Portfolios
1.20 Factors affecting kernel yield in
maize
1.21 New
life for old varieties
1.22 Harvesting corn and stover in a single pass
1.23 New soybean pulls
nitrogen from soil, not air
1.24 ARS develops low-phytate wheat
1.25 A wheat gene for better
nutrition
1.26 New hybrid rice for Malaysia
1.27 Iowa develops soybean varieties with healthy oils
1.28 Found -- the apple
gene for red
1.29 Counter defense strategy of virus
1.30 Gene discovery may improve wheat varieties - Newly cloned
gene key to more adaptable wheat varieties
1.31 Scientists develop method to find
genetic basis for plant variation
1.32 Plant biologist seeks molecular differences between rice
and its mimic
1.33 John Innes
Centre scientists develop revolutionary tool to predict heterosis in hybrid crops
1.34 RAPD markers associated with blackleg resistance in
Brassica
1.35 CSIRO identifies markers for wheat rust resistance
1.36 Cultivated potato cpDNA sequenced
1.37 Elusive rust resistance genes located
1.38 Update 8-2006 of FAO-Biotech News
1.39 Selected
Articles from Checkbiotech
2. PUBLICATIONS
2.01 INTSORMIL
publishes Atlas of Sorghum
2.02 The Man Who Fed the World: Nobel Peace Prize Luareate Norman Borlaug and his Battle to End World Hunger
2.03 The Physiology of Crop Yield,
Second Edition
2.04 The Plant
Genome: a supplement to Crop Science
2.05 Proceedings of the First
International Meeting on Cassava Plant Breeding
2.06 Editors Bradford & Nonogaki
announce new seed book
3. WEB
RESOURCES
3.01 Agricultural
Biodiversity Weblog
3.02 Canola Performance On-line Database (POD)
4 GRANTS AVAILABLE
4.01 Call opened for Generation Challenge Programme
(GCP) fellowship grants
4.02 Biotechnology Risk Assessment RFA
4.03 Norman Bourlag
fellowships
4.04 USDA National Needs Graduate
Fellowships
5 POSITION
ANNOUNCEMENTS
5.01 Executive
Director, UC Davis Seed Biotechnology Center
5.02 Molecular Fruit
Tree Breeder
5.03 Program Specialist (Plant Science)
5.04 Rice breeding and hybrid
development manager
6 MEETINGS, COURSES AND WORKSHOPS
7 EDITOR'S
NOTES
=========================
1. NEWS,
ANNOUNCEMENTS AND RESEARCH NOTES
1.01 A future powered by fuel from plants
The notion of
living plants as solar cells intended to capture the infinite energy of the Sun
seems ideal; the problem is, plants are not as efficient as solar cells in
storing a watt or two of electricity. But plants make up for that inefficiency
with their low cost and their benefits to the environment. Plants use up carbon
dioxide throughout their development and convert the carbon, along with the Suns
energy, into stable organic compounds. This means that the Sun's energy is made
available at a later date when the Sun isn't shining. Although plants may never
be the total answer to our global energy problems, they have substantial
potential as a source of carbon-neutral fuel for the transportation
sector.
The scientific journal Nature is devoting this weeks Business
Feature to biofuels, to explore their contribution to global energy needs in
three different areas. Emma Marris examines a biofuel success: the Brazilian
sugar-cane ethanol industry in Sugar cane and ethanol: Drink the best and drive
the rest. The second feature, US biofuels: A field in ferment by Katharine
Sanderson explores the role of other widely untapped sources of cellulose such
as farm waste and poplar plantations that can also be utilized for the
production of ethanol and other alcohols. In the third feature Liquid fuel
synthesis: Making it up as you go along, Heidi Ledford analyses a different
approach to biofuels the thermochemical route to produce fuel from biomass, and
specifically, liquid hydocarbons from solid coal.
Subscribers
can access the articles at
http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v444/n7120/index.html#bnf
Source:
CropBiotech Update 8 December 2006:
Contributed by Margaret E.
Smith
Dept. of Plant Breeding & Genetics
Cornell University
mes25@cornell.edu
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++++++++++++++++++++++
1.02 Ethanol or fiberboard – the fate of
soybean plants
It would seem like a tall story, but this soybean
line has a rare ability to stand up straight all season, despite their unusual
height of up to 7 feet. Soybean plants often lodge-fall down-as they grow
taller. Scientists at the Agricultural Research Service (ARS) of the United
States Department of Agriculture believe these soybean plants can be utilized as
fiberboard and other wood-substitute products.
Thomas Devine, an ARS
geneticist, suspected one reason the experimental line of soybeans stood so
straight all season was the unusually strong cellulose fibers in their
sapling-like stalks. The difference between plants with strong cellulose and
those with weak cellulose fibers is where they ultimately end up - the former in
briquettes and wood substitutes, while the latter in cellulosic ethanol
production.
ARS chemical engineer Justin Barone hopes to design a test
that plant breeders can use to determine the strength or weakness of a plant's
cellulose. Giving breeders a test for cellulose strength would allow them
to distinguish between plants apt for use as fiberboard and those suitable for
ethanol production.
The complete news release is available at http://www.ars.usda.gov/is/pr/2006/061122.htm.
From
CropBiotech Update 24 November 2006:
Contributed by Margaret E.
Smith
Dept. of Plant Breeding & Genetics
Cornell University
mes25@cornell.edu
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++++++++++++++++++++++++
1.03 USDA/ARS geneticist Dr. Jerry Miller receives
ASTA's Plant Breeding Award
Alexandria,
Virginia
Dr. Jerry Miller received the Genetics and Plant Breeding Award at
the American Seed Trade Association (ASTA)
meeting held in Chicago, Illinois, December 6-8.
Dr. Miller is a
Research Geneticist in the Sunflower Research Unit, USDA Agricultural Research Service, in Fargo,
N.D.
Miller was cited for his many contributions to sunflower
improvement during his 31- year career with the USDA. His achievements include a
key role in the successful conversion by the U.S. sunflower industry from a
highly polyunsaturated sunflower oil to a highly monounsaturated oil called
NuSun(TM). Miller was also recognized for his development and release of the
first herbicide- resistant sunflower germplasm, and for numerous sunflower lines
with enhanced disease resistance.
The award, sponsored by the National Council of Commercial Plant Breeders
(NCCPB), honors a plant breeder who has made outstanding basic contributions to
the advancement of plant breeding and genetics in the public
sector.
Source: American Seed Trade
Association e-News via SeedQuest.com
22 December 2006
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++++++++++++++++++++++
1.04 Vietnam accedes to the UPOV
Convention
Geneva, Switzerland
Today Vietnam became the
sixty-third member of the International Union for
the Protection of New Varieties of Plants (UPOV).
The purpose of the
UPOV Convention is to encourage the development of new varieties of plants by
granting breeders an intellectual property right on the basis of a set of
clearly defined principles. To be eligible for protection, varieties need to
satisfy certain conditions, such as being distinct from existing, commonly known
varieties and sufficiently uniform and stable. New varieties of plants are one
of the most powerful tools to enhance food production in a sustainable way, to
increase income in the agricultural sector and to contribute to overall
development.
The Secretary-General of UPOV, Dr. Kamil Idris, welcomed
the deposit of the instrument of accession of Viet Nam to the UPOV Convention
(1991 Act) and expressed his satisfaction that UPOV has now reached 63 members.
As of December 24, 2006, the members of UPOV are:
Albania,
Argentina, Australia, Austria, Azerbaijan, Belarus, Belgium, Bolivia, Brazil,
Bulgaria, Canada, Chile, China, Colombia, Croatia, Czech Republic, Denmark,
Ecuador, Estonia, European Community, Finland, France, Germany, Hungary,
Iceland, Ireland, Israel, Italy, Japan, Jordan, Kenya, Kyrgyzstan, Latvia,
Lithuania, Mexico, Morocco, Netherlands, New Zealand, Nicaragua, Norway, Panama,
Paraguay, Poland, Portugal, Republic of Korea, Republic of Moldova, Romania,
Russian Federation, Singapore, Slovakia, Slovenia, South Africa, Spain, Sweden,
Switzerland, Trinidad and Tobago, Tunisia, Ukraine, United Kingdom, United
States of America, Uruguay, Uzbekistan and Viet Nam.
UPOV is an
intergovernmental organization based in Geneva, Switzerland.
Source:
SeedQuest.com
24 November 2006
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Contents)
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1.05 Network set to boost plant breeding
technique
BUJUMBURA
Public and private agricultural research
centres in ten East and Central African countries will form a network to promote
the rapid adoption of a plant breeding method in the region.
Plant tissue
culture (TC) uses plant cells or tissue from a healthy mother plant to grow
thousands of young plants. The method reduces the risk of disease and produces
more uniform crops that grow at the same rate.
The network was agreed at
a workshop in Bujumbura, Burundi last week (29 November – 1 December), organised
by the Uganda-based Association for Strengthening Agricultural Research in
Eastern and Central Africa (ASARECA).
The association comprises research
institutes in Burundi, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Eritrea, Ethiopia,
Kenya, Madagascar, Rwanda, Sudan, Tanzania and Uganda.
Participants, who
included farmers, plant scientists and private entrepreneurs, asked the
association to create a database to produce and store data on crop-diseases.
This would help identify which diseases should be tackled first and how many
young plants should be grown using TC in the sub-Sahara region.
The
network, whose office is expected to be in Kenya or Uganda, would enable
researchers, farmers and businesses involved in TC to meet regularly.
ASARECA also pledged to help scientists improve their business skills,
and develop intellectual property policies for researchers to enable them to
make full use of new agricultural technologies.
The public sector has a
duty to empower farmers and support private sector services, said Tilahun
Zeweldu, a regional coordinator for the international Agricultural Biotechnology
Support Project II.
But John Bahana of AgroSystems Consulting Centre in
Uganda, warned that involving public institutions in the network will create
conflicts of interest and limit the desired rapid transfer of
technology.
Delegates also called for the establishment of gene banks and
urged public bodies to better cooperate with the private sector. Adequate public
support is key for the success of private firms in TC they said, for instance to
deliver orders on time for farmers.
The workshop was funded by the United
States Agency for International Development.
Peter
Wamboga-Mugirya
Source: SciDev.Net
5 December 2006
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++++++++++++++++++++++++
1.06 CGIAR climate change research:
Breeding climate-resilient crops
Reducing plants' thirst at the
molecular level
Drought reduces annual worldwide maize yields by as
much as 15 percent, representing losses of in excess of 20 million tons of
grain. The International Maize and Wheat Improvement Center (CIMMYT) is using
conventional breeding to develop maize for small farmers in Southern Africa that
withstands drought and infertile soils and produces yields 30 to 50 percent
greater than traditional varieties. CIMMYT scientists are working to achieve
even greater gains by using tools from molecular biology. With the aid of a
genomic map that combines data for different types of tropical maize in diverse
environments, they are identifying genetic "hot spots" in maize, that is, areas
of the crop's chromosomes that confer drought tolerance. This work is critical
in light of a recent study that says climate change could inflict a 10 percent
reduction in maize yields in Africa and Latin America during the coming decades.
Contact: Jean-Marcel Ribault and Jonathan Crouch,
International Maize
and Wheat Improvement Center
New technology helps scientists
identify "stay-green" genes to help sorghum cheat the heat
Crops
such as sorghum and milletstaple cereal grains and fodder crop grown by
subsistence farmers in the hottest, driest regions of sub-Saharan Africa and the
Indian subcontinentare the most heat- and drought-hardy crops addressed by
CGIAR breeders. Their treasure chest of stress tolerance genes may someday be
unlocked to benefit other crops, through the marvel of "comparative genomics"
research underway within the CGIAR's Generation Challenge Programme. For this
dream to be realized, the valuable genes have to be mapped and their functions
understood. Researchers at the International Crops Research Institute for the
Semi-Arid Tropics (ICRISAT) are using a technique known as marker-assisted
selection (MAS) to identify and isolate genes in sorghum that display the
"stay-green" characteristics that allow the plant to mature normally in
low-moisture, high-heat areas. MAS accelerates classical breeding by locating
desired genetic traits on the chromosomes, setting the stage for plant breeders
to transfer those genes into popular but drought-susceptible varieties or,
eventually, into other cereal crops. "Stay-green" genes delay the premature
death of leaves and plants, help the normal grain filling, and reduce the
incidence of plants "lodging," or falling over on the ground.
Contact: Mark
Winslow,
International Crops Research Institute for the Semi-Arid Tropics
Boosting rice's photosynthesis
As climate change
continues to shrink the area suitable for rice production, and population growth
continues apace, researchers at the International Rice Research Institute (IRRI)
have turned their attention to a radical new way to increase yields that
involves completely refiguring what's known as the engine of rice production:
photosynthesis. Armed with new knowledge from the rice genome, the researchers'
aim is to enable the plant to capture solar energy more efficiently so that it
can, in turn, produce greater yields. Photosynthetically, rice and other
so-called C3 plants like wheat, are underachievers because as much as 40 percent
of the atmospheric carbon dioxide they work to convert to sugar is lost by
respiration in daylightreleasing carbon dioxide into the atmospherea
wasteful process called "photorespiration." To create a more efficient and thus
higher yielding rice plant, researchers would convert the grain to a C4 plant
(where "C" stands for the number of carbon molecules captured by photosynthesis
for growth) that has evolved biochemical "carbon dioxide pumps" to concentrate
atmospheric carbon dioxide in the leaf, thus overcoming photorespiration. These
plants are up to 50 percent more efficient in converting solar energy into
biomass and are fast growing, efficient users of water and soil nutrients.
Contact: John Sheehy, International Rice Research Institute
Fine-tuning a plant's internal clock
Sorghum and
millet breeders at the International Crops Research Institute for the Semi-Arid
Tropics (ICRISAT) are focusing new attention on photoperiod-sensitive breeding
stocks that give farmers an added tool to adapt to rainfall variability. Plants,
like humans and other organisms, have internal clocks that tell them when to
flower by taking cues from the length of daylight. During the Green Revolution,
breeders of many grains eliminated photoperiod sensitivity so that plants could
be grown anywhere, anytime. The catch was that these non-photoperiod-sensitive
plants required ideal growing conditionssufficient water and the right
temperature. In many sorghum-growing regions, the onset of the rainy
seasonalways unpredictablemay become even more so as the climate
changes. So breeders have had to "program" the crop to mature at the time of
year when conditions are most likely to be favorable for grain development,
regardless of when they are planted. Photoperiod-sensitive sorghum and millet
will catch up or slow down so their flowering and grain filling occurs at a
roughly constant calendar date, which tends to be the period when the rains are
winding down but there is still enough water in the soil to complete grain
development.
Contact: Mark Winslow,
International Crops Research
Institute for the Semi-Arid Tropics
"Waterproof" rice to protect
farmers from devastating floods
The risk of flooding in southern
Asia's low-lying, rice-growing regions will continue to increase as climate
change leads to greater precipitation in this and many other regions. In
Southeast Asia alone, annual flood-related losses surpass USD$1 billion, placing
millions of lives at risk of hunger. Rice supplies the majority of calories for
more than 3 billion people worldwide and is the only cereal crop that can
withstand any submergence. Yet even rice will die if fully submerged for too
long. Taking advantage of the recently sequenced rice gene, researchers at the
International Rice Research Institute (IRRI) and the University of California at
Davis have identified a gene, called Sub1A, found in a little-used variety of
rice, which allows the plant to survive completely submerged for up to two
weeks. When the plant is covered with water, its oxygen and carbon dioxide
supplies are reduced, which interferes with photosynthesis and
respirationin which the plant converts sugars into energy for growth.
Lacking air and sunlight, growth is inhibited, and most plants die after three
days. The Sub1A gene, when overexpressed, or hyperactivated, essentially
waterproofs the plant. The flood-tolerant trait has already been transferred
into a variety of rice, called Swarna, widely grown in Bangladesh, which has
benefited farmers by withstanding floods without sacrificing its high yield,
acceptable taste, or adaptation to regional growing conditions.
Contact:
David Mackill, International Rice Research Institute
Source:
EurekAlert.org
4 December 2006
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1.07 Public breeding produces new maize varieties for Kenyan
farmers
Nairobi, Kenya
By Jane Ininda, Kenya Agricultural Research Institute (KARI)
Scientists working within the Maize Breeders Network (MBNET)
and based at the Kenya Agricultural Research
Institute have been undertaking plant breeding with the goal of
improving farmers’ livelihoods through development and deployment of improved
maize varieties. Every year public and private breeders in Kenya evaluate
new crop varieties in National Performance trials conducted in diverse maize
growing ecologies of Kenya for adaptation. During a recently convened
National Performance Trial meeting in Nairobi, Kenya (November, 2006), ten (10)
improved maize varieties bred by Kenya Agricultural Research Institute were
recommended for pre-release or full release (see below for characteristics of
each maize variety). This paves way for the process of commercialization and
delivery of new technology (new varieties) to farmers by the development
organizations and the private sector.
The varieties released
include:
Four Open Pollinated Varieties (OPVs) were recommended for release
in the Dryland areas of Kenya (1200 masl)
Two High Yielding Maize Streak
Virus resistant Hybrids were recommended for pre-release in the Mid
-Altitude areas (1600-1800 masl) of Kenya
One Open Pollinated Variety (OPV)
with stem borer resistance was released for the Mid- Altitude areas of Kenya
(1600-1800 masl)
One Hybrid was pre-released for the High Altitude areas of
Kenya (1800-2200 masl)
One Open Pollinated Variety (OPV) for frost prone
areas of Kenya (>2400 masl)
The varieties produce higher yields than
those currently grown by farmers, are tolerant to drought and also resistant to
maize streak virus disease, stem borer damage, and turcicum leaf blight and gray
leaf spot. The varieties are available for commercialization in
dryland, mid-altitude and highland ecologies of Kenya.
The
complete description of the Maize Breeders Network (MBNET) is available at http://www.africancrops.net/maizenetwork/index.htm.
Source: Africancrops.net via
SeedQuest.com
December 2006
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+++++++++++++++++++++++
1.08 Commercial
release of Striga resistant maize in
Kenya
Nairobi, Kenya
The
Partnership to Control Striga in Kenya has organized an event
in Kisumu City, Kenya on 13-15 December 2006 to facilitate the commercial
release of Striga-resistant maize, locally known as Ua Kayongo.
The commercial release is led by Western Seed Company and follows
extensive tests, farm trials and awareness activities conducted in the last two
years involving Ua Kayongo maize and other Striga eradication
options for over 10,000 small scale farmers in western Kenya. These activities
were aimed at confining, reducing and eliminating Striga infestation in
order to improve maize yields, food security and wellbeing of the rural poor.
The Partnership is led by Agricultural Technology Foundation, BASF,
CIMMYT and FORMAT in collaboration with a network of NGOs, seed companies, Kenya
Agricultural Research Institute and farmer associations in Kenya. Striga
hermonthica has infested approximately 200,000 ha in Nyanza and Western
Provinces of Kenya and resulted in crop losses estimated at $80 million per
year.
The new herbicide-resistant maize hybrid and seed coated
herbicide technology is based upon inherited resistance of maize to a systemic
herbicide (imazapyr), a mechanism widely recognized as imazapyr-resistance
(I-R). When I-R maize seed is coated with the herbicide, Striga attempting to parasitize the resulting plant are destroyed. Imazapyr is
marketed to Kenyan seed companies producing I-R Ua Kayongo maize (mixed
vernacular for Striga killer) under the trade name Strigaway®.
More information about the event and Striga control in Kenya is
available at www.africancrops.net/striga.
Inquiries can be directed to Canon Savala (FORMAT), email: format@wananchi.com, Nancy Muchiri
(AATF), email: n.muchiri@aatf-africa.org) and Fred
Kanampiu (CIMMYT), email: f.kanampiu@cgiar.org.
Comments
about this news article can be posted and shared through the Maize Forum of the
African Crops Message and
Discussion Board or by email to: africancrops@wananchi.com.
Source: Africancrops.net via
SeedQuest.com
December 2006
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1.09 New
vegetables to boost African development
AVRDC – The World Vegetable
Center and the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation are combining forces to give
Africa’s vegetable sector a new future
Tainan,
Taiwan
Agriculture, Africa’s economic key sector will receive a major boost
through joint efforts between AVRDC – The World
Vegetable Center and the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation. The Foundation will support the World Vegetable
Center’s program to produce adapted vegetable varieties and establish vegetable
seed sectors in sub-Saharan Africa. With an initial budget of over $12 million
the first phase of the project begins in December 2006.
Sub-Saharan
Africa is the only major region in the world where poverty is increasing rather
than decreasing, and where human development indicators are worsening. A major
need is to improve incomes and options in agriculture which accounts for 30 to
40% of the gross domestic product (GDP) in most African countries, and provides
livelihoods to around 80-90% of the African population.
Investments in
agriculture can bring improvements in the livelihoods of the poor in Africa’s
rural, peri-urban and urban areas. “Vegetables have the highest potential for
creating jobs and additional income among the various types of food crops, and
can foster rural development”, says Thomas Lumpkin, the Center’s Director
General. “The enhanced consumption of vegetables and the greater dietary
diversity they provide can also help to alleviate micronutrient malnutrition
that is a cause of chronic diseases, blindness and weakened immune systems
particularly among children and mothers. Vegetables are one of the most
cost-effective and sustainable solutions to micronutrient deficiencies which
affect far more people than hunger alone.” This is crucial in most of
sub-Saharan Africa, where per capita vegetable consumption is well below the
minimum level of 200 g/day recommended by the World Health Organization (WHO)
and the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO).
African vegetable production continues to rely on old or imported
European varieties which are often unsuited to the disease and climatic stresses
encountered in Africa. The project will deliver 150 new vegetable varieties in
cooperation with African seed companies. Work will be centered in Tanzania,
Madagascar, Cameroon and Mali to reach the different key agro-climatic zones of
Africa.
The World Vegetable Center was founded in 1971 as the Asian
Vegetable Research and Development Center (AVRDC). Headquartered in Taiwan, it
has major regional centers in Tanzania, India and Thailand and program offices
in five other developing countries. It is the world’s leading vegetable research
and development center.
Source: SeedQuest.com
5 December
2006
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1.10 WARDA, The
Africa Rice Center, wins 2006 United Nations Award in recognition of its New
Rice for Africa (NERICA) initiative
Cotonou,
Benin
The Africa Rice Center (WARDA) has
been selected to receive the 2006 United Nations Award for South-South
Triangular Partnership in recognition of its New Rice for
Africa (NERICA) initiative.
The announcement was made by His
Excellency Eladio Loizaga, Permanent Representative of Paraguay to the United
Nations in his capacity as President, High-level Committee of South-South
Cooperation of the United Nations General Assembly.
The UN South-South
Partnership Award is presented to individuals or institutions for "spearheading,
transforming, empowering, mobilizing and/or expanding the South-South agenda by
increasing human and financial resources of the South through partnership for
development."
"WARDA is receiving this award because of its pioneering
efforts in brokering North-South partnerships in order to create hybridized
varieties of rice applicable to conditions in the South," the President said.
"The success of the NERICA initiative can inspire others to follow the
WARDA example in implementing triangular cooperation," he added. "This is of
particular importance to the General Assembly and to the countries of Africa,
Asia, Latin America and the Caribbean, which are seeking to promote their
economic and social advancement through South-South Cooperation."
The
groundbreaking work on the NERICAs was carried out by an international research
team led by Dr Monty Jones, then a WARDA scientist. This earned him the 2004
World Food Prize, the first-ever won by an African. Dr Jones is currently the
Executive Secretary of the Forum for Agricultural Research in Africa
(FARA).
Hearing the news of the UN Award, WARDA's new Director General
and former Chair of FARA, Dr Papa Abdoulaye Seck, said that he was very happy
for WARDA and for Africa.
"We are greatly honored by this important
award, which is a tribute not only to WARDA but to all the partners who have
been involved in the NERICA development and dissemination, particularly through
the Interspecific Hybridization Project (IHP)," he said.
IHP was
launched by WARDA to bring together the pool of expertise from advanced research
institutes to African national programs through collaborative networks linking
individual experts and institutions around the world. It was supported by Japan,
United Nations Development Programme (UNDP), and Rockefeller and Gatsby
Foundations. IHP is continuing to advance further the research and development
work on the NERICAs in Africa.
The IHP research and development partners
include the International Rice Research Institute (IRRI); Centro Internacional
de Agricultura Tropical (CIAT); Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA);
Japan International Research Center for Agricultural Sciences (JIRCAS); Institut
de recherche pour le développement (IRD); Cornell, Tokyo and Yunnan
Universities; and the national programs of African countries.
The
research on NERICAs has also been sponsored right from the beginning by the
Consultative Group on International Agricultural Research (CGIAR), which
supports WARDA.
Congratulating WARDA on this "additional major
recognition", Dr Francisco Reifschneider, CGIAR Director, remarked, "This will
serve as an inspiration to others inside and outside the agricultural sector.
South-South Triangular Partnerships are more critical today than ever, and WARDA
is a wonderful example of this productive collaboration."
The formal
award ceremony will take place on 19 December 2006 at UN Headquarters to mark
the Third UN Day for South-South Cooperation. His Excellency Mr Kenzo Oshima,
Permanent Representative of Japan to the UN, has been invited to present the
award.
Invited speakers include UN Secreatry General Kofi Annan, Mr
Kemal Dervis, UNDP Administrator and former United States President Bill
Clinton, the Secretary General's Special Envoy for Tsunami Recovery.
Dr
Seck, who will receive the UN Award on behalf of WARDA, expressed his deep
gratitude to IHP donors and partners, particularly UNDP, Japan, and the
Rockefeller Foundation.
Dr Seck also thanked the CGIAR, the World Bank
and other NERICA champions for their strong support to WARDA that has enabled
the Center and its partners to sustain vital research activities.
He
recognized the valuable contribution from WARDA member countries including the
national programs, advanced research institutes, nongovernmental organizations
and CGIAR Alliance Centers.
"This prestigious award gives us additional
encouragement and inspiration to serve Africa better by harnessing the best of
science and technology through productive partnership," Dr Seck
said.
Link: http://www.warda.org/warda/newsrel-UNAward-dec06.asp
Version française <
http://www.warda.org/warda/adrao/newsrel-UNAward-dec06.asp>
Africa Rice Center (WARDA) is an
autonomous inter-governmental research association of African member states.
WARDA is also one of the 15 international agricultural research Centers
supported by the Consultative Group on
International Agricultural Research (CGIAR).
The 'New Rice for
Africa' (NERICA), which is bringing hope to millions of poor people in
Africa, was developed by WARDA and its partners. The success of the NERICAs has
helped shape the Center's future direction, extending its horizon beyond West
and Central Africa into Eastern and Southern Africa.
Since January 2005,
the Center has been working from Cotonou, Benin, having relocated from its
headquarters in Bouaké, Côte d'Ivoire, because of the civil conflicts in the
country. It has regional research stations near St Louis, Senegal and at the
International Institute of Tropical Agriculture (IITA) in Ibadan,
Nigeria.
Source: SeedQuest.com
4 December 2006
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1.11 Birth of the National Seed Association of Sierra
Leone
Key people in the seed sector of Sierra Leone have been in
contact with the secretariat of the African Seed
Trade Association (AFSTA) since December 2005 to discuss the setting up of a
national seed trade association. After several meetings of the seed
stakeholders, they decided to establish the Seed Trade Association of Sierra
Leone (STASL).
The launching workshop was held on 29 November 2006 in
Freetown in which about fifty seed people from several parts of Sierra Leone
actively participated. The opening ceremony was graced by Honorable John Abdulai
Karim- Sesay, Deputy Minister of Agriculture, Forestry and Food Security who
stated that in line with the ongoing privatization policy of the government, it
is important that Sierra Leone puts in place a national seed trade association,
which will be a platform of discussion to exchange views among themselves and
will work in partnership with the public sector. He also emphasized the crucial
role of quality seeds in improving agricultural productivity and assured the
participants the support of the Ministry.
The Secretary General of the
African Seed Trade Association (AFSTA) who was also present at this workshop
laid the stress on the key elements for the good functioning of seed trade
association and gave practical advice for its management. He encouraged, among
others, the establishment of an Executive Secretariat for the association, which
is crucial for the success of the associations. He also states that the
association should defend the interests of its members and they should strictly
respect the Constitution and Bylaws.
This workshop was also an
opportunity for the participants to ask the Secretary General of AFSTA various
questions about AFSTA and about seed associations in the other African countries
to which he satisfactorily answered. The Assistant Secretary General of National
Association of farmers of Sierra Leone (NAFSL), Mr. Andrew R. Conteh, presented
the vision and objectives of the STASL, which can be
summarized as to
encourage seed actors to harmonize efforts in promoting the seed industry.
After a thorough review of the Constitution and Bylaws of STASL, they
were adopted and the interim Board composed by 9 members and chaired by Mr.
Alfred B. Kargbo, was elected. He presented the overall strategy of seed sector
of Sierra Leone in which the private sector is expected to play an active role
since the government gradually plans to withdraw from commercial productions of
seeds. He also mentioned that “until July 2006, Sierra Leone has no documented
Seed Policy although several political statements exist, which impinge on the
seed sector. Today, a National Seed Policy exists representing the views of all
seed industry stakeholders to ensure that our seed industry efforts are
adequately guided into the distant future”.
The association was created
at the right time to help the harmonization process of seed policy and
regulations initiated by the Economic Community of West Africa States (ECOWAS)
in the sub-region. It will closely collaborate with the public sector to
implement the technical standards adopted by the sub-region.
The
association is planning to join AFSTA to receive information on seeds and to
actively participate in AFSTA activities.
The workshop was funded by the
Ministry of Foreign Affairs of France through AFSTA. The Secretary General of
AFSTA thanked the French support to the African seed industry during his opening
speech.
By Mr. Justin Rakotoarisaona, Secretary General of AFSTA
Newsletter: http://www.seedquest.com/seed/associations/international/afsta/newsletters/pdf/06dec_e.pdf
Source: SeedQuest.com
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1.12 ICRISAT
and DBT partner to establish a center of excellence in genomics
The India-based International Crops Research Institute for the Semi-Arid
Tropics (ICRISAT) and India's Department of Biotechnology (DBT) have agreed to
create a new Center of Excellence in Genomics (CEG), expected to become fully
operational in 2007. DBT will provide financial support for the center, which
will be located at ICRISAT. The new center will provide: 1) high-throughput,
low-cost allele detection platforms, to strengthen ICRISAT's existing facilities
for molecular marker assisted selection and breeding; 2) access to "large scale
field screening" for abiotic stresses such as drought and salinity; 3)
biometrics (agricultural statistics) and bioinformatics support; and 4)
fellowships and training in the use of high-throughput methods of plant breeding
and research. The center's facilities will be available to ICRISAT researchers
and to researchers from other agricultural research institutes. The press
release can be viewed online at the link below.
http://www.checkbiotech.org/root/index.cfm?fuseaction=news&doc_id=14071&start=11&control=200&page_start=1&page_nr=101&pg=1
Source: Generation Challenge Programme (GCP) Latest News Alerts
11-22
December 2006
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1.13 India
issues new regulations to protect plant varieties and farmers'
rights
New Delhi, India
India’s Ministry of Agriculture has issued
a new set of regulations aiming to protect plant varieties and farmers' rights.
This is part of an effort to expedite the implementation of the Protection of
Plant Varieties and Farmers' Rights Act 2001. The new regulations came into
force on December 7, 2006, immediately after the notification by the Ministry of
Agriculture through an official gazette.
The new regulations stipulated
the duties and jurisdiction of the registrar, gave criteria and detailed
guidelines for registration of plant varieties and essentially derived
varieties, mechanism of seed deposit, and also provided sample authorization and
application forms.
Regulations in PDF format: http://www.plantauthority.in/PDFile/Indgazette.pdf
CropBiotech Update via SeedQuest.com
5
January 2007
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1.14 USA Rice Federation issues action plan to eliminate genetically
engineered traits from U.S. rice supply
Arlington, Virginia
The USA Rice Federation today released a recommended
plan of action to remove genetically engineered rice from the U.S. supply to
re-establish a marketable supply of U.S. rice.
Following U.S. Department
of Agriculture (USDA) Secretary Mike Johanns’ August 18, 2006, announcement of
the trace presence of genetically engineered (GE) rice in the commercial supply,
the USA Rice Federation has worked with industry and government officials to
identify the Bayer CropScience Liberty Link traits and to mitigate their market
effects.
“The action plan released today proposes urgent, concrete steps
to be taken to restore market confidence,” declared Al Montna, a California rice
producer and chairman of the USA Rice Federation. “We are requesting that state
authorities take specific actions to ensure that commercial seed supplies for
the 2007 crop have tested negative for the presence of Liberty Link (LL)
genetically engineered traits. The plan also makes recommendations to all
segments of the rice industry to further ensure that Liberty Link traits do not
appear in the rice supply from 2007 forward,” Montna said.
“A specially
appointed USA Rice Federation committee headed by Brian King, chairman of the
USA Rice Merchants Association developed the plan,” Montna said. “The committee
included individuals from all segments of the rice industry over the last month,
and we encourage in the strongest terms that the industry and appropriate
state authorities take action so we may achieve the goal of removing all
genetically engineered traits from the 2007 crop,” Montna said.
These
actions are recommended despite statements by the U.S. Food and Drug
Administration and the food safety organizations in foreign markets that the GE
rice at issue is safe for human consumption.
The closure of Europe and
other markets to U.S. long-grain rice, and the imminent threat of closure or
onerous testing in other markets, makes the promulgation of this action plan an
immediate and necessary act of leadership, Montna said. “This is a plan for rice
only, and it is ambitious so that our industry can get back to doing what it
does best growing and marketing rice rather than engaging us and our
customers in endless testing.”
“The economic viability of all segments
of the rice industry are in jeopardy,” said USA Rice Producers Group Chairman
Paul T. Combs. “We must show leadership and act decisively to solve this problem
and restore stability in the marketplace,”
“Producers continue to be
burdened as a result of the genetically engineered rice discovery, and it is
imperative that we do everything in our power to stop GE rice production until
such time as there is widespread regulatory approval and consumer acceptance in
markets,” Combs continued. “But let’s clearly understand that all industry
segments continue to share a financial burden resulting from the LL presence in
long-grain rice.”
The Task Group recommendations call for:
-A
standard seed-testing protocol for the detection of the presence of Liberty Link
(LL) traits for all head row / breeder and foundation seed with test samples
pulled by state certifying agencies using state-approved methods
-Each
seed processor to agree to submit samples with a state seed-certifying agency
number to one of the Bayer-approved and U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA)
Grain Inspection, Packers and Stockyard Administration (GIPSA)
proficiency-tested labs.
-No Cheniere rice seed to be sold for rice
production in 2007 and no 2007 crop-year Cheniere to be accepted at the first
point of delivery; the allowance that buyers may accept 2006 crop-year Cheniere
until July 31, 2007
-An allowance for an increase of Cheniere rice seed
production in 2007 for 2008 and 2009 seed stocks provided that all such seed
stocks are certified negative for LL traits
-State agencies to notify all
seed processors, growers and dealers of these requirements and the need for
certification
-Growers to provide, and first points of delivery to receive,
documentation certifying GMO-negative results, with the Association of Official
Seed Certification Agents to provide all LL-negative certification for
commercial seed and USDA-GIPSA to certify that the process was completed under
accepted protocols.
“The action plan we are proposing here is a living
document,” Montna explained. “As a the industry learns more from the USDA
investigation, scientists, customers and other industry experts, we will amend
the recommendations as necessary and communicate those adjustments to the
industry.”
Document detailing the recommendations summarized above: http://www.usarice.com/industry/communication/SeedRecs.pdf.
USA Rice Federation is the national advocate for all segments of the
rice industry, conducting activities to influence government programs,
developing and initiating programs to increase worldwide demand for U.S. rice,
and providing other services to increase profitability for all industry
segments.
Source: SeedQuest.com
30 November 2006
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1.15 Brazilian gene bank becomes world's
seventh largest
RIO DE JANEIRO
A Brazilian gene bank of plant
seeds has become the world's seventh largest, behind banks in United States,
China, Germany, Japan, India and South Korea.
Gene banks store genetic
material from plants or animals such as seeds, spores or eggs frozen
in cold chambers at minus 20 degrees Celsius, keeping it intact for over 100
years for later use.
Last week, the number of seed samples stored in the
gene bank managed by the Brazilian Agricultural Research Corporation (Embrapa)
reached 102,000, representing genetic material collected from 500 different
plant species.
Magaly Wetzel, a coordinating manager of the 30-year-old
gene bank, said that conserving a rich variety of seeds is essential for a
country with a strong agribusiness sector like Brazil.
"The seeds
provide a wide range of genes that can be used to develop more suitable crops
for every Brazilian region. With genetic improvement it's possible to originate
plants with resistance to diseases or to dryness," said Wetzel, who is a
researcher at the Genetic Resources and Biotechnology Unit of
Embrapa.
Gene banks can also help prevent species extinction. If the
seeds are stored, plants that no longer sprout naturally can be reintegrated
into agriculture.
This has been done by several indigenous communities such as the Krahô, Guarani and Indian tribes from the Xingu river basin in
Brazil that approached Embrapa asking for primitive plants seeds that no
longer germinate. The species were important not only to their agricultural
system but also to their cultural rituals.
Samples with commercial value especially soybean, rice, beans and corn are conserved, as well as
primitive ones like cotton and cassava.
Wetzel says four new cold
chambers will open this month, doubling the bank's capacity to 240,000 samples.
"Now we have to work to fill them. Agriculture sustains men, but only
genetic resources can ensure a sustainable agriculture," she told SciDev.Net.
New seeds are constantly added to the bank from international exchanges
and field collections. Regular tests evaluate their germination ability.
The world's largest seed bank is managed by the Agriculture Research
Service of the United States Department of Agriculture. It holds more than
460,000 seed samples and has the capacity to store up to 1
million.
Marina Ramalho
Source: SciDev.net
6 December
2006
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1.16 Is native maize diversity being lost in Mexico?
El
Batán, Mexico
Evidence from CIMMYT
suggests that maize landraces in a major farming zone in the southeastern
Mexican state of Chiapas have been replaced by hybrids and other improved
varieties, as a result of state programs to promote modern, more productive
agriculture.
“Maize landraces have virtually disappeared in La
Frailesca,” says research assistant Dagoberto Flores, referring to a large,
commercial farming region in southern Chiapas state, southeastern Mexico. “In
2000, 90% of the area was sown to improved open-pollinated maize varieties and
landraces; now the breakdown is probably 90% hybrids, 5% landraces, and 5% OPVs.
The traditional practice of exchanging seed has almost disappeared.”
Flores, who has interviewed hundreds of Mexican farmers in his 23 or so
years at CIMMYT, is now assisting PhD student Joost van Heerwaarden in a
detailed study of gene flow among maize varieties in La Frailesca and several
other areas of southeastern Mexico. The work combines geographic information
system mapping, extensive interviews with farmers about the maize types they and
their neighbors grow, genetic analysis of seed of those maize types using DNA
markers, and intricate computer models of probable movements of pollen among
neighboring fields.
The purpose? To understand what happens when hybrids
or improved, open-pollinated varieties (OPVs) are introduced into areas where
landraces are grown. “We’re trying to bring some precision to the discussions on
diversity,” says van Heerwaarden. “You can have diversitythat is, two
things that are differentbut to what degree do they differ, and how
significant or useful is the difference? If the diversity present is the result
of thousands of years of farmer selection, then losing it will be more
significant than losing something brought in more recently.”
CIMMYT has
studied maize diversity and farmer seed management extensively in this region,
but both appear to be changing along with demography, policy, and the economy.
La Frailesca furnishes a sort of “laboratory” where many such changes are
occurring especially fast. Near the mountainous countryside that bred the
Zapatista uprising and a gateway for undocumented immigrants from Central
America, La Frailesca is dominated by cattle and coffee, but maize provides food
and extra income through sale of grain. Poverty still pervades local
communities, and many working-age men migrate to the USA, often leaving women
and the elderly to tend fields.
Until recently farmers grew mostly
locally-bred landrace varieties, which gave a better grain type for tortillas
and other preferred foods, but relatively low yields. A little more than a
decade ago, many switched to improved, hybrid maize, through a state-sponsored
program that offers seed plus other inputs (e.g. fertilizer and pesticides) and
services (such as technical advice and crop loss insurance) on credit, to be
repaid at harvest. The use of hybrids varies radically from season to season.
Risk is a significant factor for farmers, says Flores: “In a good year, it’s
worth it to grow the hybridthe average profit is 80% more than with a
landrace. The problem is when you have a bad year, like recent ones with
hurricanes or droughts. The investment in seed and other inputs exposes farmers
to potential losses many cannot afford.”
An important factor is that
farmers can save and replant OPV seedeither improved or
landracewithout losing yield or other qualities, whereas with hybrids they
must purchase fresh seed each season to obtain high yields. Landraces are found
more often at higher elevations and among people of indigenous background. Men
and women also differ in the maize types they prefer, says Flores: “For men
yield is important, but women value quality traits, such as better
tortilla-making quality or requiring less fuel to cook.”
Flores and van
Heerwaarden have found that farmers often grow several different maize
typeshybrids, landraces, and improved OPVsin their fields, and these
may be surrounded by other varieties or hybrids in neighboring farmers’ fields.
There is probably considerable gene flow among these different types, according
to van Heerwaarden: “Many of the varieties that farmers call landraces or manage
like landraces are actually recycled improved varieties.”
Van
Heerwaarden expects to wrap up his study by January 2007. Changing circumstances
in southeastern Mexico, the relative unprofitability of maize farming, and the
migration of youth from the region could portend profound changes in maize
genetic diversity in farmers’ fields. In lowland areas, according to Flores,
some farmers have abandoned maize altogether and use subsidies to underwrite
cattle raising. The results of van Heerwaarden’s research should provide a
better idea of the status of maize diversity and the costs of maintaining it, as
rural inhabitants seek to escape poverty via improved varieties, diversified
agriculture, or alternative livelihoods.
For more information, contact
Jonathan Hellin, Poverty Specialist, (j.hellin@cgiar.org)
Source: : CIMMYT E-News, vol
3 no. 11, November 2006 via SeedQuest.com
November 2006
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1.17 Crop diversity topics from the Global Crop Diversity
Trust: crops in collision
According to a recent
article in the Global Crop Diversity Trust's Crop Diversity Topics, there are
three imminent threats that the agricultural world should be taking very
seriously: climate change, water use, and energy shortage. For this reason, the
article contends, guarding crop diversity is more important than ever if the
world is to continue producing the food needed to maintain its
inhabitants.
Read
the full article.
Source: Generation Challenge Programme (GCP) Latest
News Alerts GCP Home Page
17
November-11 December 2006
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1.18 Crop
diversity topics from the Global Crop Diversity Trust: mud, blood, and genes
A recent article from Crop Diversity Topics outlined the dangers of losing
invaluable plant genetic resources due to human and natural disasters. Typhoons,
wars, and political unrest have all been recent causes of damage to some of the
world's important genebanks, leading to the question, "What can we do to better
protect global biodiversity?"
Read the full text here.
Source:
Generation Challenge Programme (GCP) Latest News
Alerts GCP Home Page
17 November-11
December 2006
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1.19 Global
Crop Diversity Trust and the GCP Sign Memorandum of
Understanding, Commit to Align Research Portfolios
On 5 December 2006
at the CGIAR Annual General Meeting, Cary Fowler, executive secretary of the
Global Crop Diversity Trust (‘the Trust’), and Jean-Marcel Ribaut, GCP director,
signed a memorandum of understanding (MOU), formally initiating collaboration
between the two organizations. The Trust’s mission is to ensure the conservation
and availability of crop diversity for food security worldwide, and the GCP is
creating a public platform for exploring and applying crop diversity in plant
breeding programmes. “Our organizations have complimentary mandates, and
together we can work more efficiently and toward greater impact,” commented
Jean-Marcel Ribaut at the signing of the MOU.
The Trust and the GCP
agreed to explore opportunities for collaborative research within their existing
portfolios and look for new opportunities to work together.
For more
information about the Trust, please contact Julian Laird, Director of
Development for the Trust: julian.laird@croptrust.org .
Source: Generation Challenge Programme (GCP) Latest News Alerts
11-22
December 2006
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1.20 Factors affecting kernel yield in
maize
Understanding nitrogen metabolism is of critical importance to
crop management, as nitrogen availability is one of the major factors limiting
crop growth and yield. All of the nitrogen in a plant, whether derived initially
from nitrate, nitrogen fixation, or ammonium ions, is converted to ammonia,
which is rapidly incorporated into organic compounds through a number of
metabolic pathways beginning with the activity of the enzyme glutamine
synthetase (GS), which catalyzes formation of the amino acid glutamine from
ammonia and glutamic acid. An individual nitrogen atom may pass many times
through the GS reaction, following uptake from the soil, assimilation,
remobilization, and delivery to growing roots and leaves, and ultimately,
deposition in seed as storage proteins. Thus GS is likely to be a major
check-point controlling plant growth and crop productivity.
In research
reported in The Plant Cell, scientists Antoine Martin and Bertrand Hirel from
the National Institute of Agronomic Research (INRA) in Versailles, France,
together with colleagues from institutions in the U.K., Spain, and Japan,
present new information on the roles of two forms (isoenzymes) of cytosolic
glutamine synthetase (GS) in maize, which underscores the importance of this
enzyme and nitrogen metabolism in cereal crop productivity. Improving nitrogen
use efficiency of crop plants, i.e. reducing the amount of costly nitrogen
fertilizer inputs that farmers need to apply to crops while at the same time
maintaining and even improving yields, is an important goal in crop research. As
noted by Dr. Hirel, “a more complete understanding of the roles of GS enzymes in
nitrogen metabolism and grain yield in maize and other crop plants (including
rice, wheat and barley) may lead to improvements in fertilizer usage and crop
yield, thus mitigating the detrimental effects of the overuse of fertilizers on
the environment“.
The roles of these two GS isoenzymes, products of the
Gln1-3 and Gln1-4 genes, were investigated by examining the impact of knock-out
mutations on kernel yield. GS gene expression was impaired in the mutants,
resulting in reduced levels of GS1 protein and activity. The gln1-4 phenotype
displayed reduced kernel size whereas gln1-3 had reduced kernel number, and both
phenotypes were evident in the gln1-3 gln1-4 double mutant. Shoot biomass
production at maturity was not affected in either the single mutants or double
mutants, suggesting that both gene products play a specific role in grain
production. Levels of asparagine increased in the leaves of the mutants during
grain filling, most likely as a mechanism for circumventing toxic ammonium
buildup resulting from abnormally low GS1 activity. Phloem sap analysis revealed
that, unlike glutamine, asparagine is not efficiently transported to developing
maize kernels, which could account for the reduced kernel production in the
mutants. Constitutive overexpression of Gln1-3 in maize leaves resulted in a 30%
increase in kernel number relative to wild type, providing further evidence that
GS1 plays a major role in kernel yield.
Some of the major cereals, such
as maize, sorghum, and sugar cane, exhibit C4 photosynthesis, which enhances the
efficiency of photosynthesis at high temperature (most C4 plants originated in
tropical climates). In standard C3 photosynthesis (present in rice, wheat, and
most temperate crop plants), CO2 entering the leaf is converted to a 3-carbon
compound via the C3 pathway, utilizing energy derived from the light reactions
of photosynthesis. In plants that have C4 photosynthesis, the C3 pathway enzymes
are localized in specialized “bundle sheath” cells which surround the vascular
tissue in the interior of the leaf. CO2 entering mesophyll cells at the leaf
surface initially is converted to a 4-carbon compound, which is shuttled into
the bundle sheath cells and then decarboxylated to release CO¬2. CO2 released
into bundle sheath cells then enters the standard C3 pathway. This
CO2-concentrating mechanism allows plants in a hot and dry climate to take up
CO2 at night and store it, and release it again inside bundle sheath cells
during the day, thus solving the problem of how to maintain a high concentration
of CO2 inside the leaf during the daylight hours, when stomata often must be
kept closed to prevent water loss. Using cytoimmunochemistry and in situ
hybridization, Martin et al. found that GS1-3 is present in maize mesophyll
cells whereas GS1-4 is specifically localized in the bundle sheath cells. Thus
the two GS1 isoenzymes play non-redundant roles with respect to their
tissue-specific localization, and the activity of both is required for optimal
grain yield. This work illustrates the close coordination between nitrogen and
carbon metabolism in photosynthetic tissues, and reveals that nitrogen
metabolism plays a critical role in optimizing grain yields.
###
Research
reported in The Plant Cell reveals important aspects of plant metabolism
associated with grain filling and kernel yield in maize. The scientific
breakthrough of this research is its indication that two closely related
isoforms of the cytosolic enzyme glutamine synthetase determine two major and
distinct yield components in maize, kernel size and kernel number. The results
point to a dominant role of nitrogen retranslocation rather than carbon
allocation during grain filling. This work has important implications for
improving nitrogen use efficiency in cereal crops that could lead to maintaining
or even enhancing yields with reduced fertilizer inputs.
The research
paper cited in this report is an OPEN ACCESS article, available at the following
link: http://www.plantcell.org/cgi/rapidpdf/tpc.106.042689v1
The
Plant Cell (http://www.plantcell.org/)
is published by the American Society of Plant Biologists. For more information
about ASPB, please visit http://www.aspb.org/.
Source:
EurekAlert.org
6 December 2006
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1.21 New life for old varieties
El Batán, Mexico
A CIMMYT scientist is working to see if instead
of replacing old varieties with “new and improved”, it is possible to combine
the best of the new while retaining the old.
In the village of Tumbadero,
Mexico, adjacent to CIMMYT’s Agua Fría maize research station, the farmers place
a very high value on their traditional varieties. The maize they grow has small
ears so it does not yield much. What makes each ear special is a long husk that
dwarfs it. The village is close to a major transportation route and traders pay
a premium for the husks, which are used to wrap one of Mexico’s most famous
foods, the tamale. “We make more money selling the husks than we do selling the
grain” says Ruben López, a farmer in the village. But he and the other villagers
have a problem: storing the ears without their husks is an open invitation to
insects to feast on the maize. With so little yield, saving every grain possible
for food is extremely important.
Less than a hundred kilometers from
Tumbadero is another villageCañada Rica. It is well off the beaten track
and far from traders. Farmers like Eva Cruz care much more about the cooking
quality of the maize flour than they do about the husks, which they cannot sell.
Eva uses husks as kindling for the fire on which she cooks tortillas each
morning. “Our maize makes the best tortillas,” she says. “They are thick and
filling, much better than ones you make with maize flour from the store.” But
Eva Cruz’s maize is not without problems either. Storage pests attack her
harvest regularly, just as they do the maize in Tumbadero.
Clearly the
traditional varieties grown by the farmers of these two villages are very
different and have been bred by them to meet specific needs. Each variety is
also well-adapted to its local environment. Farmers have no desire to abandon
those traits, but also need maize that yields, stores, and tolerates stress
better than their traditional varieties. That conundrum became a challenge for
Dave Bergvinson, a CIMMYT entomologist who specializes in maize pests. “What if,
instead of breeding whole new varieties on a mass scale, you gave the farmers
themselves a chance to breed their own?” asks Bergvinson. “You take their best
and combine it with our best and then let them do the rest.” To test the idea,
he is working with farmers in isolated, economically disadvantaged regions in
Mexico. He takes seed from farmers to a CIMMYT research site, like the station
at Agua Fría, where he can cross it with CIMMYT maize that has the
characteristics missing in the farmers’ varieties. Each cross is specific to a
particular village or farmer. After one season of crossing, Bergvinson selects
the progeny that perform the best and most closely match farmer preferences for
husk, grain type, adaptation, and other traits. Finally, he returns seed of the
improved local variety to the farmers. From then on each farmer has what is
basically his traditional variety, but with certain improved characteristics.
According to Bergvinson, CIMMYT lacks the resources to carry out such
work on a global scale. “It’s not a mass, large-scale solution,” says
Bergvinson. “But it is a way of getting to the small pockets of deep poverty and
giving those farmers a chance.” It also provides another way for breeders to get
a true sense of what end-users of breeding productsthe farmer and
consumerconsider important.
The pilot project is only in it’s
fourth season and there is much analysis to be done, but farmers like Eva Cruz
and Ruben López have grown their new seed and can see the improvement. They also
see that the traits they value so much in their maze have not been
lost.
For more information, David Bergvinson (d.bergvinson@cgiar.org)
Source:
CIMMYT E-News,
vol 3 no. 11, November 2006
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1.22 Harvesting corn and stover in a single
pass
Iowa State University researchers are testing a combine
that can harvest grain and cut the remaining stover (stalks, cobs and leaves) in
a single pass in the field. The prototype harvester works by dumping a crop of
corn kernels into the combine's hopper and blowing the stalks, cobs and leaves
into a trailing wagon. For farmers, they will only need the stover attachment
which they can use on a standard combine.
Corn stover was identified to
be an additional source of biomass. Cellulose from stover can be converted into
ethanol and thus could feed the next generation of ethanol plants. Stuart
Birrell of Iowa State University said that the supply of stover from the field
will help the U.S. bioeconomy by providing supply to biorefineries.
The
complete press release is at
http://www.iastate.edu/~nscentral/news/2006/dec/stover.shtml
From
CropBiotech Update 15 December 2006:
Contributed by Margaret E.
Smith
Dept. of Plant Breeding & Genetics
Cornell University
mes25@cornell.edu
(Return to Contents)
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1.23 New soybean pulls nitrogen from
soil, not air
Washington, DC
ARS News Service
Growers may soon
have the option of planting a non-transgenically modified soybean variety that
improves recovery of nitrogen from land-applied animal waste. That's thanks to a
newly released soybean germplasm that removes large amounts of nitrogen applied
to soil. If developed into a new cultivar, it could become an ideal candidate
for animal producers managing waste generated by their operations.
The
Agricultural Research Service (ARS) released the soybean germplasm, called
Nitrasoy, in conjunction with the North Carolina Agricultural Research Service
at North Carolina State University in Raleigh. Agronomist Joseph Burton,
physiologist Daniel Israel and microbiologist Paul Bishop developed the
germplasm. They are with the ARS Soybean and Nitrogen Fixation Research Unit in
Raleigh.
Today's commercial nodulating soybean varieties forge a
give-and-take relationship with bacteria, called rhizobia, that thrive in the
plants' root nodules in soil. The bacteria turn nitrogen gas--which makes up
about 80 percent of the atmosphere--into nitrogen fertilizer that the plant can
use to make proteins.
Uniquely, Nitrasoy is a non-nodulating soybean
germplasm with a large requirement for soil-applied nitrogen to obtain excellent
seed yield. Its capacity to recover applied nitrogen from soil reduces the risk
of possible nitrate pollution of groundwater.
In field tests, Nitrasoy
accumulated up to 17 percent more soil-applied nitrogen in its seed than did its
parent, D68-0099. In other tests, Nitrasoy was No. 1 in average seed yield when
compared to three other genotypes, after each had been fertilized with
swine-lagoon effluent.
Nitrasoy seed has been deposited in the National
Center for Genetic Resources Preservation and the National Plant Germplasm
System. Nitrasoy seeds are available for research purposes from the ARS lab in
Raleigh.
Rosalie Marion Bliss, rosalie.bliss@ars.usda.gov
ARS is the U.S. Department of Agriculture's chief scientific research
agency.
Agricultural Research Service, USDA
Source:
SeedQuest.com
4 December 2006
(Return to
Contents)
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1.24 ARS develops low-phytate wheat
The Agricultural
Research Service (ARS) of the United States Department of Agriculture has
developed low-phytate breeding lines of wheat which can produce flour with 25
times more magnesium than commercial varieties. Low levels of phytic acid may
also increase the uptake of magnesium by humans and animals. Magnesium
deficiency has been linked to health problems like osteoporosis and Type 2
diabetes.
Researchers led by Edward Souza said that the development of
low-phytate wheat is a natural way to improve nutritional content of the grain
since magnesium is not usually added to refined flours.
View this article
at http://www.ars.usda.gov/is/pr.
Four papers on various aspects of low-phytate grains are available online at http://crop.scijournals.org/cgi/content/full/46/6/2403.
From
CropBiotech Update 22 December 2006:
Contributed by Margaret E.
Smith
Dept. of Plant Breeding & Genetics
Cornell University
mes25@cornell.edu
(Return to Contents)
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1.25 A wheat gene for better
nutrition
Researchers at the University of California, Davis, the
U.S. Department of Agriculture and the University of Haifa in Israel have
identified a gene, Gpc-B1, that increases the protein, iron, and zinc
content of wheat kernels.
The team, who reports their findings in the
Science journal, found that kernels harvested from the plants with lowered
Gpc-B1 activity had at least 30 percent less protein, zinc and iron.
Gpc-B1 increases seed nutrient content by accelerating senescence (ageing)
of the plant and thereby increasing the remobilization of nutrients from leaves
to developing grains. The finding predicts that adding additional copies of the
functioning gene into bread and pasta wheats will be valuable to produce food
with enhanced nutritional value.
"Wheat is one of the world's major
crops, providing approximately one-fifth of all calories consumed by humans.
Therefore, even small increases in wheat's nutritional value may help decrease
deficiencies in protein and key micronutrients," said Professor Jorge Dubcovsky,
a wheat breeder and lead researcher on the project.
According to the
World Health Organization, more than 2 billion people are deficient in zinc and
iron, and more than 160 million children under the age of 5 lack an adequate
protein supply.
The abstract of the article "A NAC Gene Regulating
Senescence Improves Grain Protein, Zinc, and Iron Content in Wheat" can be
accessed at http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/abstract/sci;314/5803/1298
More
information available at: http://www.news.ucdavis.edu/search/news_detail.lasso?id=7949. Read ARS' press release at www.ars.usda.gov/is/pr.
From
CropBiotech Update 1 December 2006:
Contributed by Margaret E.
Smith
Dept. of Plant Breeding & Genetics
Cornell University
mes25@cornell.edu
(Return to Contents)
++++++++++++++++++++
1.26 New hybrid rice for
Malaysia
A new hybrid rice, Siraj , that is capable of
producing four times more yield than normal varieties has been developed by RB
Biotech Sdn Bhd in Malaysia. This hybrid is a cross-breed between Indian Basmati
and a Japanese rice variety using technology from China.
RB Biotech
Director Tan Sri Chua Hock Chin said the Center was expected to start producing
seedlings of the hybrid by March next year. He also added that the final
objective was to supply high quality hybrid rice seedlings for at least 60
percent of the rice fields in the country.
For more information,
contact Mahaletchumy Arujanan, program director, Malaysian Biotechnology
Information Centre (MABIC) at maha@bic.org or visit their website at http://www.bic.org.my.
From CropBiotech
Update 15 December 2006:
Contributed by Margaret E. Smith
Dept. of
Plant Breeding & Genetics
Cornell University
mes25@cornell.edu
(Return to Contents)
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1.27 Iowa develops soybean varieties
with healthy oils
Iowa State University, with support from the Iowa
Soybean Association and the United Soybean Board, has developed improved soybean
varieties that will promote the production of healthy oils good for human
health.
Three of the varieties will enhance the production of oil with 1%
linolenic acid. This oil increases shelf life, and has excellent frying and
flavor stability since it eliminates the hydrogenation process that creates
trans fats. Another variety contains twice the amount of oleic acid found in
conventional soybean oil and only 1% linolenic acid. The combination oil could
be used in many food products that require more stability than previous
unhydrogenated soybean oils.
Visit http://www.iastate.edu
for more research news from Iowa State University.
From CropBiotech
Update 1 December 2006:
Contributed by Margaret E. Smith
Dept. of
Plant Breeding & Genetics
Cornell University
mes25@cornell.edu
(Return to Contents)
++++++++++++++++++++
1.28 Found -- the apple gene for
red
CSIRO researchers have located the gene that controls the colour
of apples – a discovery that may lead to bright new apple varieties.
"The red colour in apple skin is the result of anthocyanins, the natural
plant compounds responsible for blue and red colours in many flowers and
fruits," says the leader of the CSIRO Plant Industry research team, Dr Mandy
Walker.
"Colour is a very important part of fruit marketing," she says.
"If fruit doesn't look good, consumers are far less likely to buy it, no matter
how good it might taste.
"As well as giving apples their rosy red hue,
anthocyanins are also antioxidants with healthy attributes, giving us plenty of
reasons to study how the biochemical pathway leading to apple colour is
regulated."
A Post Doctoral Fellow with the team, Dr Adam Takos, used
the latest molecular technology to measure how much particular genes were
activated, or expressed, in apple skin as the fruit ripened and coloured.
"Apple growers have always known that apple colour is dependant on light – apples grown in darkness or even heavy shade don't turn red when they ripen,"
Dr Walker says. "That made it very likely that the gene we were looking for
requires light to be activated."
"By identifying master genes that were
activated by light, Adam was able to pinpoint the gene that controls the
formation of anthocyanins in apples, and we found that in green apples this gene
is not expressed as much as in red apples."
In collaboration with apple
breeders at the Department of Agriculture and Food in Western Australia (DAFWA),
the scientists were able to show that fruit colour can be predicted even in
seedling apple plants by measuring the form of this gene that is
present.
The new knowledge about how apple colour is regulated will give
plant breeders the opportunity to use these molecular marker tests to speed up
apple breeding and select for improved fruit colour. Dr Walker believes that
this research could open the way to breeding new apple varieties.
"With a
better understanding of how apple colour is controlled we can begin to breed
apples with new and interesting colour variations," she says. "We may even be
able to breed apples that are better for you, though they already play an
important role in a healthy diet!"
The research is a collaboration
between CSIRO and the DAFWA, which has partly funded the project with a
voluntary contribution. The project has been facilitated by Horticulture
Australia Ltd (HAL) in partnership with industry and has been funded as part of
HAL's 'across industry program'. The Australian Government provides matched
funding for all HAL's research and development activities.
Contact:
Sophie Clayton
Sophie.Clayton@csiro.au
CSIRO Australia
Source:
EurekAlert.org
30 November 2006
(Return to
Contents)
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1.29 Counter defense strategy of virus
RNA silencing
evolved as a means of defense against viral pathogens. In turn, viruses have
evolved a counter-defense mechanism to inhibit RNA silencing. In the December
1st issue of G&D, a team of NYC scientists, led by Dr. Nam-Hai Chua at the
Rockefeller University, lend new insight into how the Cucumber mosaic virus
(CMV) executes its counter-defense. The researchers found that CMV synthesizes a
protein, called 2b, that binds to AGO1 (a core component of the RNA silencing
pathway) to inhibit its cleavage activity, and thereby attenuate RNA silencing.
Dr. Chua "expects that other viruses may use similar mechanisms. Therefore,
understanding how the 2b suppressor protein functions will allow us to design
novel strategies that enable crop plants to survive a variety of threatening
viruses."
Contact: Heather Cosel
coselpie@cshl.edu
Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory
Source:
EurekAlert.org
30 November 2006
(Return to
Contents)
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1.30 Gene discovery may improve wheat varieties - Newly cloned gene
key to more adaptable wheat varieties
Davis, California
In a
research discovery that has practical implications for improving wheat
varieties, a team of scientists at the University of California, Davis, and the U.S. Department of Agriculture have cloned a gene
that controls the flowering time of barley and wheat.
Differences in this
gene, called VRN3, are essential for adapting these two important crop species
to different climates.
The findings of the study, conducted by Professor
Jorge Dubcovsky, a wheat breeder and leader of the UC Davis research group, and
by plant geneticist Ann E. Blechl of the USDA's Agricultural Research Service in
Albany, Calif., will appear the week of Dec. 4 in the online issue of the
Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the U.S.A.
One of the
critical differences that help wheat and barley adapt to different environments
is the existence of winter and spring forms.
Winter wheat and barley
varieties are planted in the fall but wait until the very cold winter weather
passes before flowering. This requirement for a long-term exposure to low
temperatures to flower is called the "vernalization requirement."
In
contrast, spring wheat and barley varieties do not have this vernalization
requirement and can be planted in the spring. This is essential for regions of
the world where winter weather is so severe that cereals cannot be planted in
the fall.
The vernalization requirement in barley and wheat is very
flexible, Dubcovsky noted.
"During the domestication of these species,
the different mutations that occurred in the vernalization genes were selected
by humans, resulting in spring varieties better adapted to certain regions," he
said. "This flexibility has helped wheat to become one of the world's most
important crops."
The Food and Agriculture Organization of the United
Nations estimates that wheat now provides 23 percent of the food available for
daily human consumption around the world.
The vernalization requirement
in wheat and barley is controlled by three major vernalization genes designated
VRN1, VRN2 and VRN3. The first two genes were cloned two years ago by the same
group of researchers.
The cloning of VRN3 now completes a 10-year
research project to understand the genetic regulation of the vernalization
requirement in barley and wheat. Results from this new study show that mutations
in regulatory regions of the VRN3 gene are responsible for the evolution of
several barley and wheat spring lines.
To confirm that they had
identified the correct gene, the researchers transformed, or genetically
altered, the winter wheat variety Jagger with the VRN3 gene from the spring
variety Hope. The genetically modified plants showed the early flowering
characteristic of the spring wheat varieties, whereas the control non-transgenic
plants failed to flower in the absence of vernalization. This result confirmed
that the gene cloned by this research team was the correct one.
"The VRN3
mutation we discovered in the wheat variety Hope can now be used to accelerate
flowering time of other wheat varieties,"
Dubcovsky said. "The VRN3 molecular
markers developed in this study will help breeders to detect the mutations
present in their breeding lines and to study their effects on the adaptability
of wheat and barley varieties to particular environments."
Funding for
this research was provided by the National Research Initiative of the USDA
Cooperative State Research, Education and Extension Service.
Source:
SeedQuest.com
4 December 2006
(Return to
Contents)
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1.31 Scientists develop method to find genetic basis for plant
variation
WEST LAFAYETTE, Ind.
A new research approach that
allowed scientists to rapidly identify the gene responsible for high sodium
levels in certain naturally occurring plant populations could have applications
for the study of a wide variety of other important plant properties.
The
approach, a combination of new and existing technologies, may offer researchers
a tool to pinpoint genetic differences many times faster than currently possible
and help shed light on the likely origin of such differences.
"We've
combined a variety of techniques to get at the gene behind a specific trait,"
said David Salt, a horticulture professor at Purdue University. "If picked up
broadly, the approach could have an important impact on the activities of other
laboratories."
The method allowed Salt's research team to determine
differences within a single gene that drives a specific trait among naturally
occurring plant populations a finding that can take years with current
methods, he said.
Salt's method combines the new technology of DNA
microarrays with information from a large genetic database in order to sidestep
the lengthy processes previously used to identify similar genetic variations.
Salt employed his methodology to identify a sodium-regulating gene in the
extensively studied Arabidopsis thaliana, a wild mustard plant.
Salt said this approach could allow scientists to better understand the
genetic basis of naturally occurring variations. These variations occur in the
manifestation of tangible traits, or phenotypes, within a single species.
Phenotypic differences can include anything from flower color to cold
sensitivity or sodium concentration. This ubiquitous tendency of individuals and
populations to vary is termed natural variation. Evolutionary theory proposes
that differences among populations can arise for evolutionarily favorable, or
adaptive, reasons. If the differences between populations become great enough,
they might lead to the development of a new species, called speciation.
The mechanism of speciation, however, remains poorly understood. Salt
said this approach could hopefully shed light on the process.
"By
looking at natural variation, which we assume to be adaptive, we might be able
to better understand why the organism evolved to be that way," Salt said. "This
could be of value in many areas of biology."
Salt's findings were
published earlier this month in the online journal PLoS Genetics.
Salt studies the composition of elements and ions, tiny charged
particles, in plants. Called ionomics, the study of a plant's elemental
composition is important for understanding their physiology, Salt said.
Since plants are immobile, they must make the most of their environment the water, sunlight and soil where they are to survive. Plants'
ability to survive and thrive is tied to their ability to take up the right
chemicals, usually in ionic form, from the soil.
Salt uses the database,
known as the Purdue Ionomics Information Management System (PiiMS), to find "candidate genes," or genes that warrant further study. He combines this
knowledge with results from DNA microarrays, small chips that can identify
miniscule genetic differences between populations of a single species.
In the Arabidopsis study, Salt identified the gene, called
AtHKT1, responsible for elevated sodium levels in two wild populations of
the plant. The study began with a simple observation: Two populations of
Arabidopsis from coastal regions of Spain and Japan had inexplicably high
levels of sodium.
"So, the question became, 'Why?' But to get there, we
had to first answer a series of simpler questions," Salt said.
The first
question was how those plants differ from the "garden-variety" Arabidopsis. This is not a simple question, he said, which is why so few
studies have been published concerning the precise genetic basis of natural
variation.
The initial difficulty is that to date only one variety of
Arabidopsis has had its genetic material sequenced. But this particular
variety, called Col-0 (so named because it is indigenous to Colombia), is not
genetically identical to all other populations of Arabidopsis, Salt said.
For an answer, Salt used DNA microarrays to detect genes that varied in
the two coastal populations. He cross-referenced this information with the
database to seek out genetic differences that may play a role in regulating
sodium levels.
Salt found that the costal populations had a different
version of the gene called AtHKT1, which previous studies have shown
helps govern the process in which sodium is prevented from rising out of the
plant's roots.
Further experiments showed that AtHKT1 is
genetically associated with sodium tolerance, which could help explain why the
gene is found in coastal populations where there may be elevated salt levels.
"It could just be a coincidence that these coastal populations, where
soils naturally have higher sodium concentrations, have a defective version of a
gene involved in sodium regulation," Salt said, "But it also may not be. We are
currently in the process of answering the original question of why. This
methodology has gotten us very close to an explanation."
Sodium
chloride, or table salt, is generally toxic to plants at significantly high
concentrations. Salt said this study will help his team better understand the
way in which plants process sodium.
Postdoctoral researchers Ana Rus and
Ivan Baxter co-authored the paper. Salt is currently investigating the potential
origin of the defective AtHKT1 gene.
He continues to add to his
database, compiling thousands of samples a week. His database records what
Arabidopsis genes have been "knocked out," or mutated, and lists the
corresponding levels of 17 different elements in each plant. A paper describing
this PiiMS database has been accepted for publication in the journal Plant
Physiology. The database can be accessed online at http://www.purdue.edu/dp/ionomics.
Salt's research was funded by the National Science Foundation and the
Indiana 21st Century Research and Technology Fund.
Writer: Douglas M. Main,
dmain@purdue.edu
Source: David Salt dsalt@purdue.edu
Ag Communications: (765)
494-2722;
Beth Forbes, forbes@purdue.edu
Agriculture News
Page
Source: EurekAlert.org
21 December 2006
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1.32 Plant biologist seeks molecular differences between
rice and its mimic
Rice gone bad
By
Tony Fitzpatrick
Red rice sounds like a New Orleans dish or a San Francisco
treat. But it's a weed, the biggest nuisance to American rice growers, who are
the fourth largest exporters of rice in the world. And rice farmers hate the
pest, which, if harvested along with domesticated rice, reduces marketability
and contaminates seed stocks.
Complicating matters is the fact that red
rice and cultivated rice are exactly the same species, so an herbicide cannot be
developed that seeks out only red rice. It would kill cultivated rice, too.
But now a plant evolutionary biologist at Washington University in St.
Louis has been funded by the National Science Foundation (NSF) at $1.12 million
for two years to perform genetic studies on red rice to understand molecular
differences between the two that someday could provide the basis for a plan to
eradicate the weed. The particular NSF program funding the research is the Plant
Genome Comparative Sequencing Program.
Kenneth M. Olsen, Ph.D.,
Washington University assistant professor of biology in Arts & Sciences,
believes that gene flow is one factor that has been at work.
"We are
looking for candidate genes that underlie particular traits that differ between
the two," said Olsen. "Knowing more about the traits could help in potentially
controlling the weed. We have a key advantage in this research in that we know
the complete cultivated rice genome, so it's fairly easy to target genes of
interest."
Olsen and his colleagues, Ana Caicedo, Ph.D., of the
University of Massachusetts, and Yulin Jia, Ph.D., of the United States
Department of Agriculture National Rice Research Center, will test at least two
hypotheses. One is that red rice is rice that's gone feral, or gone bad.
"In this scenario, you have a sort of selection favoring the weedy
version of the crop that out-competes the crop itself," he said. "That's called
de-domestication."
Another possibility, which is not mutually exclusive,
is that weedy rice was introduced into the Americas from Asia, where weedy
hybrids of the cultivated species and the wild species occur. These weedy
strains then took hold in U.S. soils and began contaminating the U.S. cultivated
species.
Meet the candidates
Olsen says that the weed has
many characteristics of a wild species.
"By looking at candidate genes
and those genes surrounding them we can test the hypotheses of the origins of
traits and see if the traits have been introduced by hybridization of weedy and
wild species, or, conversely, we can look at the molecular level to see if the
de-domestication phenomenon is going on."
To control red rice
infestations, growers often will rotate crops away from rice to soybeans, for
instance. And there are cultivation techniques that can eliminate most of the
threat, although another nasty feature of the weed is its dormancy - its seed
can lie viable in soils for up to 20 years.
There also is a great amount
of variation in different red rice strains. Some look remarkably like cultivated
rice and behave like cultivated rice. The plants are as tall as cultivated rice
and flower at the same time. These "crop mimics" are difficult to spot.
Olsen hopes understanding trait differences can lead to eradication of
red rice.
"We're looking for anything that exploits the difference
between the crop and the weed and the way that the weed grows versus the way
that the crop grows," he said. "That's the way to eradicate it."
Source:
EurekAlert.org
14 December 2006
(Return to
Contents)
++++++++++++++++++++++++
1.33 John Innes Centre scientists develop revolutionary tool to predict heterosis
in hybrid crops
Norwich, United Kingdom
Prof Ian Bancroft and
colleagues at The John Innes Centre, UK
(JIC) have developed a revolutionary new method to predict heterosis. The method
can be used to accurately predict hybrid vigour for a range of important
crop
performance traits, including yield
Accurate predictions of field
performance of hybrids can be made from transcriptome analysis of samples taken
from parental seedlings grown in the laboratory.
Plant Bioscience Ltd. (PBL), the
technology transfer company of the JIC, has funded the further development of
this method, extending from the original work in Arabidopsis, to prove that the
technology also works accurately in maize.
PBL is now offering licences
to the seed and plant breeding industry to use this technology to assist the
breeding and development of a wide range of crops, worldwide.
Various
possibilities can also be arranged with PBL and the JIC to allow companies to
evaluate the methods on their own germplasm. "
For further information
and contact details, please see attached information sheet:
http://www.seedquest.com/News/releases/2007/pdf/18005.pdf
Source:
SeedQuest.com
4 January 2007
(Return to
Contents)
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1.34 RAPD markers associated with blackleg resistance in
Brassica
Blackleg, caused by the fungus Leptosphaeria
maculans, is a serious disease of Brassica species. One of the symptoms of
blackleg is the dark coloration of the stem of infected plants. Yield loss
(grain and oil) occurs when more than half of the cross-section of the stem is
discolored. A number of different sources of genes which confer complete
resistance to blackleg disease are now being tested. Scientists at the Alabama
A&M University used random amplification of polymorphic DNA (RAPD) technique
to identify molecular markers associated with resistance to the disease. Their
findings are reported in the article RAPD markers associated with resistance to
blackleg disease in Brassica species of the African Journal of
Biotechnology.
Genetic analysis of resistance to blackleg was carried out
with 24 genotypes from the USDA Brassica germplasm collections and 9 cultivars
from the National Winter Canola Variety Trials (NWCVT). All genotypes were
screened for blackleg disease at the juvenile stage and determined that almost
half of the genotypes were resistant. On the other hand, adult plant screening
revealed that all the NWCVT genotypes were resistant to the
disease.
Researchers subsequently screened all genotypes to identify
molecular markers associated with resistance to blackleg, and identified five
that can be used for selection for the resistance trait.
The full article
is available at http://www.academicjournals.org/AJB/PDF/
pdf2006/16Nov/Ananga%20et%20al.pdf.
Source:
CropBiotech Update 8 December 2006:
Contributed by Margaret E.
Smith
Dept. of Plant Breeding & Genetics
Cornell University
mes25@cornell.edu
(Return to Contents)
+++++++++++++++++++++++
1.35 CSIRO identifies markers for wheat
rust resistance
Australias CSIRO Plant Industry researchers have
discovered a DNA marker for two important rust resistance genes in wheat, Lr34
and Yr18. These two genes are often inherited together and provide wheat plants
with improved protection against leaf rust and stripe rust two major diseases of
wheat in Australia and worldwide.
CSIRO scientist Evans Lagudah said that
the DNA marker is 99 percent effective in determining the presence of Lr34 and
Yr18 in different wheat from Australia, India, China, and North America. The
markers are now being used in Australia and worldwide.
The complete press
release is at http://www.csiro.au/csiro/content/standard/ps2kc.html.
CSIROs information sheet detailing the discovery can also be accessed at http://www.csiro.au/files/files/pbb8.pdf.
From
CropBiotech Update 15 December 2006:
Contributed by Margaret E.
Smith
Dept. of Plant Breeding & Genetics
Cornell University
mes25@cornell.edu
(Return to Contents)
+++++++++++++++++++++++++
1.36 Cultivated potato cpDNA
sequenced
Korean researchers announced recently that they have
determined the complete chloroplast DNA (cpDNA) sequence of the cultivated
potato. Their research adds another solanaceous species to the list of plants
whose chloroplasts have been completely sequenced, which includes tomato and
tobacco.
Chloroplasts are intracellular organelles that have their own
genome, with most of the genes encoding for proteins needed for photosynthesis.
Hwa-Jee Chung and colleagues wrote in the paper published by the journal Plant
Cell Reports that the circular chloroplast of the cultivated potato has about
155,000 nucleotide pairs. They have also identified 79 proteins and 34RNAs
encoded in the genome.
The information will help in diversity studies and
will be useful to examine the evolutionary processes in potato landraces. After
comparing the sequence to that of a wild potato, the researchers found a single
large deletion that discriminates the cultivated potato from the wild
species.
The research abstract, with links for subscribers to the
complete paper containing the chloroplast gene map, is at http://www.springerlink.com/content/b4466721826551u3.
From CropBiotech Update 1 December 2006:
Contributed by Margaret
E. Smith
Dept. of Plant Breeding & Genetics
Cornell University
mes25@cornell.edu
(Return to Contents)
+++++++++++++++++++++++
1.37 Elusive rust resistance genes
located
The discovery of a DNA marker for two key rust resistance
genes is enabling plant breeders around the world to breed more effective rust
resistant wheat varieties.
The genes, Lr34 and Yr18 are inherited
together and provide wheat plants with improved protection against leaf rust and
stripe rust – two major diseases of wheat in Australia and worldwide.
CSIRO Plant Industry scientist, Dr Evans Lagudah, says various types of
rust resistance have been bred into Australian varieties but work against a
specific rust species and in some cases are only effective against a limited
range of rust strains.
“We have identified a ‘DNA marker’ that is 99 per
cent effective in flagging the presence of Lr34 and Yr18, which provide
resistance against different species and strains of rust," Dr Lagudah says.
"This means that breeders can track the presence of this rust resistance
through a simple DNA test. If the marker is present then it’s almost guaranteed
Lr34 / Yr18 will be too."
Plant breeders have long recognised the
usefulness of Lr34 / Yr18, which work together with other rust resistance genes
to boost the plants’ capacity to defend itself.
Wheat plants that contain
the Lr34 / Yr18 combination of genes also experience slower rates of rust
infection. This prevents widespread and rapid increase of rust spores reducing
the potential for disease epidemics throughout the crop.
"Up until now it
has been difficult to track Lr34 / Yr18 in wheat because of the masking effect
of other resistance genes," Dr Lagudah says.
"In addition, tests for
Lr34 / Yr18 were slow and could only be done once per season and on adult plants
growing in the paddock.
"Using the marker technology breeders can now
quickly and easily test seedlings for the presence of Lr34 / Yr18, to establish
known and unknown genes, and ideally combine different sources of resistance to
speed up the delivery of new rust resistant wheat varieties."
The marker
has proven effective in a range of wheats from different backgrounds including
from Australia, India, China, North America and the major wheat research centre,
CIMMYT.
Breeders in Australia and across the world are now using the
marker so that the durable rust resistance offered by Lr34 / Yr18 can be
incorporated into locally adapted wheat varieties.
###
This research is
supported by the Grains Research and Development Corporation and done in
collaboration with the International Maize and Wheat Improvement Center (CIMMYT)
in Mexico and the University of Sydney’s Plant Breeding Institute.
sophie.clayton@csiro.au
CSIRO Australia
Source:
EurekAlert.org
6 December 2006
(Return to
Contents)
+++++++++++++++++++++++
1.38 Update 8-2006 of FAO-BiotechNews
(Selected articles)
4) Plant
breeding and biotechnology capacity survey: More national reports As part of the
global survey that FAO is carrying out to assess national plant breeding and
associated biotechnology capacity, draft reports are now available on the web
for an additional 12 countries: Bulgaria, Costa Rica, Dominican Republic,
Ecuador, Lebanon, Moldova, Nicaragua, Niger, Oman, Slovakia, Thailand and
Turkey, bringing the total up to 37 countries. See the "What's new" section of http://apps3.fao.org/wiews/wiews.jsp or contact elcio.guimaraes@fao.org for more information. 5) IPRs and plant
genetic resources - Spanish On 18-20 October 2006, a workshop entitled "Los
derechos de propiedad intelectual en el ambito de los recursos fitogeneticos",
on intellectual property rights (IPRs) in relation to plant genetic resources
was held in Buenos Aires, Argentina. Presentations from the workshop, which also
considered the role of IPRs in transfer of technologies, including
biotechnologies, are now available on the web. The workshop was organised by
FODEPAL, in collaboration with REDBIO, both of which are projects based at the
FAO Regional Office for Latin America and the Caribbean in Santiago, Chile. See http://www.fodepal.org/Seminarios/seminarioDPI/index.html
(in Spanish) or contact rlc-fodepal@fao.org for more information.
2nd
International conference on plant molecular breeding. Sponsored by the
Generation Challenge Program (GCP) and the China Association of Agricultural
Science Societies, the conference focuses on applied plant genomics and
molecular plant breeding. The GCP is one of the Challenge Programmes approved by
the Consultative Group on International Agricultural Research (CGIAR). See http://www.icpmb.org/142.html or
contact mpbhn@vip.sina.com for more information. 1-3 April 2007, New Delhi,
India.
Molecular characterization of inbred lines and populations in
maize. Organised by the Generation Challenge Program, the goal of this training
workshop is to provide background and training in the use of simple sequence
repeat (SSR) markers for characterizing crop germplasm, with particular emphasis
on heterogeneous populations, particularly maize. Deadline for applications is 1
January 2007. See http://www.generationcp.org/capcorner/india_course_announcement_2007.pdf
or contact mwarburton@cgiar.org for more information.
Link to the
complete newsletter: http://www.fao.org/biotech/news_list.asp?thexpand=1&cat=131
(items on the web in English as well as in Arabic, Chinese, French and
Spanish)
(Return to
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+++++++++++++++++++++++
1.39 Selected Articles from Checkbiotech
Tomatoes against drought
http://www.checkbiotech.org/root/index.cfm?fuseaction=search&search=checkbiotech&doc_id=13853&start=1&fullsearch=1
Teamwork of two viruses produces a therapeutic antibody in plants
http://www.checkbiotech.org/root/index.cfm?fuseaction=search&search=checkbiotech&doc_id=13764&start=1&fullsearch=1
Plant-derived mini-antibodies fight cancer
http://www.checkbiotech.org/root/index.cfm?fuseaction=search&search=checkbiotech&doc_id=13761&start=1&fullsearch=1
GM technology causes conflicts in Germany
http://www.checkbiotech.org/root/index.cfm?fuseaction=search&search=translated&doc_id=13955&start=1&fullsearch=1
Steady increase in soybean production in South America
http://www.checkbiotech.org/root/index.cfm?fuseaction=search&search=translated&doc_id=13965&start=1&fullsearch=1
Submitted by Robert Derham
Checkbiotech Managing
Director
University of Basel
Robert.Derham@unibas.ch
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=========================
2 PUBLICATIONS
2.01 INTSORMIL publishes Atlas of Sorghum
The International Sorghum and Millet Collaborative
Research Support Program (INTSORMIL) has published the Atlas of
Sorghum, a document presenting information on sorghum in five Eastern
African countries to serve the needs of researchers, extension and rural
development specialists, policy makers, and emergency relief personnel.
The Atlas presents information in maps and tables addressing production
constraints, cropping systems, management, uses, preferences, gender roles, and
marketing. Numerous researchers and others knowledgeable of sorghum in their
country contributed information and expert opinions for the Atlas.
Atlas
in PDF format: http://intsormil.org/Sorghum%20in%20East%20Africa%20Nv06.pdf
Source:
SeedQuest.com
22 December 2006
(Return to
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+++++++++++++++++++++++++++
2.02 The Man Who Fed the World: Nobel Peace Prize
Luareate Norman Borlaug and his Battle to End World
Hunger
by Leon Hesser. Durban House, 297 pages, $24.95
New
York Post
By Henry I. Miller
LEON Hesser's straightforward yet
gripping biography of Norman Borlaug, the plant breeder known as the Father of
the Green Revolution, offers the kind of nobility and idealism shown by Jimmy
Stewart in the classic, "Mr. Smith Goes to Washington."
Borlaug's life
has been one of extraordinary paradoxes. A child of the Iowa prairie during the
Great Depression, he attended a one-room school and aspired to become a
high-school science teacher but flunked the university entrance exam. He went on
to receive the Nobel Peace Prize for averting malnutrition, famine and the death
of millions.
Borlaug, now 92, struggled against prodigious professional
obstacles, including what he calls the "constant pessimism and scaremongering" of critics who predicted that, in spite of his efforts, mass starvation was
inevitable and hundreds of millions would perish in Africa and Asia. His work
resulted in high-yielding varieties of wheat that transformed the ability of
Mexico, India, Pakistan, China and parts of South America to feed their
populations.
How successful was he? From 1950 to 1992, the world's grain
output rose from 692 million tons produced on 1.70 billion acres of cropland to
1.9 billion tons on 1.73 billion acres of cropland - an extraordinary increase
in yield of more than 150 percent.
Without high-yield agriculture,
either millions would have starved or increases in food output could have been
realized only through drastic expansion of land under cultivation. But that
would've meant losses of pristine wilderness far greater than all the losses to
urban, suburban and commercial expansion.
Borlaug recalls without rancor
the maddening obstacles to the development and introduction of high-yield plant
varieties: the "bureaucratic chaos, resistance from local seed breeders and
centuries of farmers' customs, habits and superstitions."
Both the need
for additional agricultural production and obstacles to innovation remain, and
in recent years, Borlaug has applied himself to ensuring the success of the
application of gene splicing, or "genetic modification," to agriculture. This
second wave promises to be as important as the first, offering the possibility
of even higher yields, fewer inputs of agricultural chemicals and water,
enhanced nutrition and even plant-derived, orally active vaccines.
Environmental extremists, though, are doing everything they can to stop
scientific progress, and their allies in the United Nations and other regulatory
agencies are eager to help. "If the naysayers do manage to stop agricultural
biotechnology, they might actually precipitate the famines and the crisis of
global biodiversity they have been predicting for nearly 40 years," says
Borlaug,
The essence of Norman Borlaug? I'm reminded of a line by
Matthew Arnold about Sophocles: a man "who saw life steadily, and saw it whole."
Henry I. Miller, a physician, is a fellow at the Hoover
Institution.
Contributed by Diana Oleskow Lubich
Heart Land
Publicity, LLc
239-293-1585
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+++++++++++++++++++++++++++
2.03 The Physiology of Crop Yield,
Second Edition
By Robert Hay and John
Porter
Description
First published in 1989, Physiology of Crop
Yield was the first student textbook to digest and assimilate the many
advances in crop physiology, within a framework of resource capture and use.
Retaining the central core of the first edition, this long-awaited second
edition draws on recent developments in areas such as phenology, canopy dynamics
and crop modelling, and the concepts of sustainable crop production. A broad
perspective is developed, from the gene through the plant and crop to the
ecosystem, covering:
-Advances in molecular biology relating to crop
science
-Limitation of crop yield by the supply of water or nitrogen
-Global climate change and its impact on crop modelling
-Physiological
aspects of crop quality
-A wider range of species, with emphasis on wheat,
maize and soybean
This book will be a valuable tool
for advanced undergraduate and postgraduate students of agricultural science,
plant science, applied ecology and environmental science. It will be an
essential addition to all libraries in universities and relevant research
establishments.
Table of
Contents
Preface
Acknowledgements
1. Introduction
2.
Development and Phenology. How Crops Fit Their Environment: Concepts and Case
Histories
2.1 Crop Development: Concepts and Tools
2.2 Case Histories: The
Influence of Environment and Management on Crop Development and Phenology
3.
Interception of Solar Radiation by the Canopy
3.1 The Life History of a
Leaf
3.2 The Components of Plant Leaf Area Expansion
3.3 The Development
of the Crop Canopy: Leaf Area Index
3.4 Canopy Architecture and the
Interception of Solar Radiation
4. Photosynthesis and Photorespiration
4.1
Introduction
4.2 Photosynthetic Efficiency
4.3 Photosynthetic
Processes
4.4 The C4 Photosynthesis Mechanism
4.5 Water Shortage and
Photosynthesis
4.6 Nitrogen Effects on Photosynthesis
4.7 Ozone Effects on
Photosynthesis and Crop Productivity
5. The Loss of CO2: Respiration
5.1
Introduction
5.2 The Basis of Crop Respiration
5.3 Growth and Maintenance
Respiration
5.4 The Respiration of Different Plant Substrates
5.5 Growth
and Maintenance Respiration in the Field
5.6 Respiration Associated with Crop
Processes
5.7 Environmental Effects on Respiration
5.8 Crop Respiration in
the Future
6. The Partitioning of Dry Matter to Harvested Organs
6.1 The
Processes and Pathways of Assimilate Partitioning
6.2 Ontogeny and Assimilate
Partitioning: A Survey of Source/Sink Relationships
6.3 Time Courses of Dry
Matter Partitioning: Harvest Index
6.4 Limitation of Yield by Source or
Sink
6.5 Sink Limitation of Yield in Cereals - Physiology of Ineffective
Grain Setting
6.6 Assimilate Partitioning and Crop Improvement: Historic
Trends in Harvest Index of Wheat and Barley
6.7 Assimilate Partitioning and
Crop Improvement: Historic Trends in Harvest Index of Maize
6.8 Assimilate
Partitioning to Potato Tubers
6.9 Assimilate Partitioning in Grassland:
Implications for Management of Grass Yield
6.10 Assimilate Partitioning in
Grassland: Implications for the Overwintering and Early Growth of White
Clover
6.11 Assimilate Partitioning in Diseased Plants: Temperate Cereals
Infected with Biotrophic Fungal Pathogens
7. Limiting Factors and the
Achievement of High Yield
7.1 Limitation by Water Supply
7.2 Limitation by
Nitrogen Supply
7.3 Achieving High Yield: Resource Capture and Assimilate
Partitioning
8. Physiology of Crop Quality
8.1 Wheat: Protein
content
8.2 Soybean: Oil and Protein Contents
8.3 Oilseed Rape:
Glucosinolates and Erucic Acid
8.4 Potato: Tuber Size and Processing
Quality
8.5 The Quality of Conserved Forages: Ontogeny and Yield
9. The
Simulation Modelling of Crops
9.1 Introduction
9.2 Building a Crop
Model
9.3 Crop Models of Wheat (AFRC2), soybean (CROPGRO) and maize
9.4
Modelling Variety Differences and Traits
9.5 Conclusions
10. The Future
for Crop Physiology
10.1 Introduction
10.2 Lowering Inputs
10.3 Climate
Change
10.4 Quality
10.5 New Crops
10.6 The Potential for Increasing
Crop Photosynthesis and Yield
10.7 The Last
Words
References
Indexes
Details about this book can be found on
the Blackwell Publishing website: http://www.blackwellpublishing.com/book.asp?ref=9781405108591&site=1
.
Contributed bySimon Joyce
Blackwell Publishing Professional
simon.joyce@ames.blackwellpublishing.com
http://www.blackwellprofessional.com/
http://www.blackwellplantsci.com
(Return to
Contents)
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++
2.04 The Plant Genome: a supplement to
Crop Science
If you don’t currently subscribe to Crop Science
journal, then you missed the launch of the newest CSSA publication: The Plant
Genome.
Who should read this special supplement?
-Plant breeders
who map traits and isolate genes
-Physiologists researching relationships
between genes and performance characteristics
-Plant scientists of all
disciplines who use analytical tools to understand plants in their environment
This supplement to Crop Science provides an outlet for the
publication of applied plant-genomics research, with a short submission-to-print
timeline. Subscribers access the latest original research in the application of
genomics to crop improvement. This easy-to-read, attractive four-color
supplement includes original research papers, activities and resource reports,
and review and interpretation articles that couple genomics with crops and
agriculture.
Why a Plant Genome supplement for Crop Science?
An
excerpt from the Guest Editorial:
Because there is a need to put
information about the genomes of crop plants in the field it servesUsing
systems-based approaches to solve difficult questions in crop science start
with, and are facilitated by, studies in plant genomicsThe sciences that derive
from knowledge of genome sequences are far broader than first anticipated by
many of us. The revolution that began in the late 1970s is showing the path to a
future in agriculture that is based on an understanding of molecular and
cellular events which, when combined with the wisdom of experiences of field
biologists, will allow plant scientists to achieve the goals outlined above, and
to go far beyond.
Roger N Beachy, Ph.D.
President and
Director
Donald Danforth Plant Science Center
Read the entire Guest
Editorial (2MB PDF)
See the Table
of Contents
Read a special 8-page
excerpt (1MB PDF)
(Return to
Contents)
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++
2.05 Proceedings of the First
International Meeting on Cassava Plant Breeding
You can now download
the meeting book from our site:
http://www.geneconserve.pro.br/meeting2/cassava_conference_book.doc
Submitted by Nagib Nassar
mandioca@unb.br
(Return
to Contents)
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++
2.06 Seed Development, Dormancy and
Germination
Edited by: Kent Bradford (Director, Seed Biotechnology
Center, University of California, Davis, USA) and Hiroyuki Nonogaki (Department
of Horticulture, Oregon State University, Corvallis, Oregon,
USA)
Blackwell Publishing
392 pages, 63 illustrations
USA/Canada
$199.99
Seed Development, Dormancy and Germination provides a
comprehensive overview of seed biology from the point of view of the
developmental and regulatory processes that are involved in the transition from
a developing seed through dormancy and into germination and seedling growth. It
examines the complexity of the environmental, physiological, molecular and
genetic interactions that occur through the life cycle of seeds, along with the
concepts and approaches used to analyze seed dormancy and germination behavior.
It also identifies the current challenges and remaining questions for future
research. The book is directed at plant developmental biologists, geneticists,
plant breeders, seed biologists and graduate students. For more information go
to Blackwell
Publishing.
Source: Seed Biotechnology Center E-News: December
2006
scwebster@ucdavis.edu
http://sbc.ucdavis.edu
(Return to
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=========================
3. WEB
RESOURCES
3.01 Agricultural Biodiversity
Weblog
Readers of Plant Breeding News might be interested in the new
Agricultural Biodiversity Weblog for news, information and discussion on
conservation and use of plant and animal genetic resources for food and
agriculture: http://agro.biodiver.se.
Contributed
by Luigi Guarino
luigi.guarino@gmail.com
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++++++++++++++++++++++++
3.02 Canola Performance On-line Database
(POD)
Canadian canola growers can now access the canola POD
(Performance On-line Database), developed by the Canola Council of Canada. The
canola POD allows farmers to explore canola performance trial results. The
information in the database often includes on-site management details obtained
by private seed companies.
The performance database is at http://81.137.139.227/pod3/index.aspx
From
CropBiotech Update 15 December 2006:
Contributed by Margaret E.
Smith
Dept. of Plant Breeding & Genetics
Cornell University
mes25@cornell.edu
(Return to
Contents)
========================
4. GRANTS
AVAILABLE
4.01 Call opened for Generation
Challenge Programme (GCP) fellowship grants
The GCP
is announcing that they have opened the call for applications for the 2007 GCP
Fellowships Programme.
Visit the Fellowships page
on our website for more information and application
instructions.
Please read all information carefully, as the call has
changed slightly this year.
Source: Generation Challenge Programme
(GCP) Latest News Alerts
7 November-11 December 2006
GCP Home Page
(Return to Contents)
+++++++++++++++++++++
4.02 Biotechnology risk assessment
request for applications
The Cooperative State, Research,
Education, and Extension Service (CSREES) is pleased to announce the release of
the FY 2007 Request for Applications (RFA) for the Biotechnology Risk Assessment
Research Grants Program (BRAG).
Deadlines:
Completed
Application: February 15, 2007, 5 p.m. Eastern Time to Grants.gov
RFA:
The BRAG RFA may be accessed at the following
websites:
Grants.gov: www.grants.gov; or
CSREES: www.csrees.usda.gov/fo/biotechnologyriskassessment.html
Funding Opportunity Number: USDA-CSREES-BRAP-000327 (must be
entered into Grants.gov exactly this way)
CFDA Number: 10.219
Useful Links:
Grants.gov Help: http://www.grants.gov/help/help.jsp
CSREES FY 2007 Grant Application Changes: www.csrees.usda.gov/funding/fy07changes
CSREES Electronic Submission Resources: www.csrees.usda.gov/funding/electronic
CSREES Electronic Submission FAQs: http://www.csrees.usda.gov/funding/electronic_faq
If you have questions regarding the RFA, please contact
either:
Dr. Daniel Jones, Email: djones@csrees.usda.gov, Phone: (202) 401-6854, or
Dr. Chris Wozniak, Email: cwozniak@csrees.usda.gov,
Phone: (202) 401-6020.
If you have questions regarding the
application packet, contact:
Email: electronic@csrees.usda.gov , Phone:
(202) 401-5048, business hours are M-F, 7:00 am 5 pm ET, excluding Federal
holidays.
(Return to
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+++++++++++++++++++++
4.03 Norman Bourlag fellowships
The objective of these
fellowships is to help developing countries strengthen sustainable agricultural
practices by providing short-term scientific training and collaborative research
opportunities to visiting researchers, policymakers and university faculty while
they work with a mentor.
The program is open to participants worldwide,
but focuses on African, South and Central American and Asian nations. The
program is administered by USDA's Foreign Agricultural Service in cooperation
with the U.S. Agency for International Development and the U.S. Department of
State.
(http://www.fas.usda.gov/icd/borlaug/borlaug.htm)
Global Facilitation
Unit for Underutilized Species
Via dei Tre Denari 472/a
00057 MACCARESE
(Fiumicino)
Rome, Italy
e-mail: underutilized-species@cgiar.org
tel: +39 06
6118-302
fax: +39 06 61979661
www.underutilized-species.org
(Return to Contents)
+++++++++++++++++++++
4.04 USDA National Needs Graduate
Fellowships
Two Ph.D.
level USDA National Needs Graduate Fellowships are
available
at Colorado State University beginning in summer or fall of 2007.
The fellowships
are in a novel program entitled “Crops for Health: Applying
Plant Genomics for
Human Health Benefits”, which links disciplines within the
agricultural and human
health sciences. Applicants must be U.S. citizens or
permanent residents.
For more details, please visit http://www.cropsforhealth.colostate.edu/fellowships.htm.
Submitted
by Pat Byrne
Colorado State
University
pbyrne@lamar.colostate.edu
(Return to
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========================
5. POSITION ANNOUNCEMENTS
5.01 Executive
Director, UC Davis Seed Biotechnology
Center
The UC Davis Seed Biotechnology Center is a focal point
for interaction between the seed industry and the research and educational
resources of the University of California, Davis. It coordinates research to
address problems of interest to the seed industry and provides continuing
education in seed biology and technology. Its mission is to mobilize the
research, educational and outreach resources of the University of California, in
partnership with the seed and plant biotechnology industries, to facilitate
discovery and commercialization of new seed technologies for agricultural and
consumer benefit.
The Executive Director is responsible for
providing leadership in the ongoing development and implementation of building a
premier entrepreneurial research and education program. The incumbent is
responsible and is accountable for the strategic planning and implementation of
the overall operation and evaluation of programs and activities that support the
Centers mission, goals, and partnership objectives to increase its capacity to
serve as a link between academic research, education programs, and the
commercialization of new agricultural technologies.
The Executive
Director is accountable for and
will:
provide leadership and
management for major gift fund-raising, strategic planning, operations and
services, and outreach and communications in order to deliver and expand the
Centers programs and
activities.
take a leading
role in establishing mutually beneficial collaborative relationships with
intramural and extramural stakeholders, clientele and
collaborators;
work with the
Center Academic Director and staff to design and implement programs and services
that facilitate partnerships between UC Davis and the national and international
seed and plant biotechnology industries.
For a detailed description
go to: http://hr.ucdavis.edu/emp (VL#6917). Submit curriculum vitae, a two-page letter of interest
including salary expectations, and the names, addresses and contact information
for a minimum of four references to: DeeDee Kitterman, Chair, Search
Committee, College of Agricultural and Environmental Sciences, 150 Mrak Hall,
University of California, One Shields Avenue, Davis, CA 95616.
Position is open until filled. To receive full consideration applications
should be received by January 2, 2007.
For more information
contact Sue Webster, Program Representative, Seed Biotechnology Center, at
530-754-7333 or at scwebster@ucdavis.edu.
Contributed by Susan
Webster
scwebster@ucdavis.edu
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+++++++++++++++++++++
5.02 Molecular fruit tree
breeder
Position and Qualifications: The Department of Horticulture
at Clemson University invites applications for a tenure-track, 12 month - 100%
research, faculty position at the Assistant Professor level in the area of tree
fruit genetics and breeding. We are seeking a highly motivated individual with a
record of research productivity and an interest in fruit tree cultivar
development. Candidates should have a Ph.D. in horticulture, plant
breeding, genetics, or a related discipline with knowledge, training and
experience in molecular biology (e.g., molecular map construction,
marker-assisted selection, transgenics, bioinformatics, etc.).
Post-doctoral experience is preferred, but not required to apply. Salary is
competitive and commensurate with the successful applicant’s background and
experience. This position offers competitive startup funds and laboratory space,
as well as use of the nearby 240-acre Musser Fruit Research Center. Clemson University is also home to the Genome Database for Rosaceae with
functional and structural genomic projects using peach as a model (
http://www.mainlab.clemson.edu/gdr/).
Responsibilities: The
successful applicant’s program will integrate traditional fruit tree breeding
and molecular genetic tools for the improvement of fruit trees with emphasis on
peach. He/She is expected to develop an independent, extramurally funded, fruit
tree-breeding program and contribute to the development of the Clemson
University Institute of Fruit and Forest Tree Genetics. The successful applicant
will be directly involved in graduate student mentoring. Furthermore, the
successful applicant will be expected to effectively communicate at various
levels with different constituencies such as the South Carolina Peach
Council.
Application: For more information contact Dr.
Gregory L. Reighard, Chair of Search Committee, Department of Horticulture, 170
Poole Ag Center, Clemson University, Clemson, SC 29634-0319, USA.
Voice: 864/656-4962; Fax: 864/656-4960. Email: grghrd@clemson.edu Applications should be
sent electronically via e-mail to: orousey@clemson.edu in a
single PDF file and should include a cover letter, a curriculum
vitae, a statement of research goals and interests, and contact information for
three potential references. Applications not in a single PDF will be returned
and must be resubmitted in the correct format. Applicants may request that
their candidacy remain confidential. Review of applications will begin March 1,
2007 and continue until a suitable candidate is identified. Minorities and women
are encouraged to apply. Clemson University is an AA/EEO employer and does
not discriminate against any individual or group of individuals on the basis of
age, color, disability, gender, national origin, race, religion, sexual
orientation or veteran status.
Contributed by Anne Marie Thro
CSREES,
USDA
athro@csrees.usda.gov
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+++++++++++++++++++++
5.03 Program Specialist (Plant
Science)
GS-0401-09/11/12
Plant and Animal Systems
Plant
Systems
Promotion potential: GS-12
Closing date: 01/22/2007
Who may
apply: All U.S. Citizens
Announcement Number: CSREES-2007-0008
You may use
the following link to view and/or apply for this position:
http://jobsearch.usajobs.opm.gov/a9csrees.asp
In
the key word search, type in the vacancy announcement
number:
CSREES-2007-0008
Scroll down the page and select "yes" under
Applicant Eligibility. You will then click on "search for jobs" at the
bottom of the page. Clicking on the position title will launch the vacancy
announcement. You can select "apply online" at the bottom of the page to
apply for the position. You will then be taken to a screen that will allow
you to either set up an account or input your account information if you have
already registered.
Please note that even if you registered previously
through the USDA QuickHire website, you will need to re-register through
USAJobs.
Please contact me if you encounter any problems or have
questions.
Thank you,
Tiffany Sample
Human Resources
Specialist
U.S. Department of Agriculture
Agricultural Research
Service
Phone: (202) 690-2482
Fax: (202) 690-1726
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+++++++++++++++++++++
5.04 Rice breeding and hybrid development manager
Due to our successfully expanding activities in hybrid
rice, Bayer CropScience has open positions for
i) plant breeders
ii)
seed production specialists and
iii) agronomists
in various
countries across the globe.
Currently, we have open positions in India,
Thailand, Brazil, China and the United States.
If you are interested to
join a globally operating breeding team, make a difference in offering farmers
seed of quality hybrids of the world's most important food crop, then we would
like to get in touch with you.
Although we make use of the most modern
of technologies, the core activities in plant breeding, agronomy trials and seed
production remain field oriented.
Affinity with rice and with field work is
therefore a must.
Interested ? Then please send a letter stating your
motivation, as well as your CV to:
Ed Roumen
Rice breeding and
Hybrid Development Manager
Bayer South East Asia Pte Ltd
9 Benoi Sector
Singapore 629844
or send by e-mail to
Ed.Roumen@BayerCropScience.com
(Return to
Contents)
===========================
6.
MEETINGS, COURSES AND WORKSHOPS
Note: New announcements (listed first)
may include some program details, while repeat announcements will include only
basic information. Visit web sites for additional details.
NEW
ANNOUNCEMENTS
* 1-3 April 2007. Course on Molecular
Characterization of Inbred Lines and Populations in Maize, New Delhi, India.
View this announcement in PDF.... Visit
Here
Source: Generation Challenge Programme (GCP) Latest News Alerts GCP Home Page
17 November-11
December 2006
+++++++++++++++
* 21 May – 1 June 2007. Training
course on "Promoting agrobiodiversity use: markets and chains" (Wageningen
International)
Information and the application form can be found
here "
Enhancing agrobiodiversity use: markets and chains"
This course
co-organized by the GFU will run for the second time from 21 May to
1 June 2007 at Wageningen International. It is one module within a larger
training program on " Conservation & sustainable use of plant genetic resources in
agriculture". Application deadline is 21 April 2007.
Fellowships are
offered by NUFFIC - Candidates who wish to apply should begin the application
procedure as soon as possible by applying for admission to Wageningen
International. Upon provisional acceptance candidates will be advised as to the
procedure to be followed, see also www.wur.nl/funding , www.nuffic.nl
Fellowship
deadline application is 1 February 2007. Differently from last year's procedure
fellowships are not available for individual modules but foe the entire course
only (2 modules of 2 weeks each).
+++++++++++
* 27-31 October
2007. 8th African Crop Science Society Conference, El Minia, Egypt--First
Announcement and Call for Abstracts. The African Crop Science Society (ACSS) and
Minia University announce the first call for abstracts for the 8th African Crop
Science Society Conference, which will take place from 27-31 October 2007 in
El-Minia, Egypt.
General topics will include: agronomy, horticulture,
crop improvement and physiology, post harvest handling and food sciences, crop
protection, rural socio-economics, agricultural extension and education,
agricultural economics, agricultural microbiology, crop genetics and
biotechnology, agricultural chemistry, integration of livestock in crop
production, soils and agricultural engineering sciences, water sciences,
environmental sciences, biodiversity, and natural resource management.
The deadline for registration is 30 April 2007.
For more
complete information on registration and abstract submission, visit http://www.africancrops.net/News/july06/acss8.htm
++++++++++++++++
REPEAT
ANNOUNCEMENTS
* 2006-2008. Plant Breeding Academy,
University of California, Davis.
The University of California Seed
Biotechnology Center would like to inform you of an exciting new course we are
offering to teach the principles of plant breeding to seed industry personnel.
This two-year course addresses the reduced numbers of plant breeders
being trained in academic programs. It is an opportunity for companies to invest
in dedicated personnel who are currently involved in their own breeding
programs, but lack the genetics and plant breeding background to direct a
breeding program. Participants will meet at UC Davis for one week per quarter
over two years (eight sessions) to allow participants to maintain their current
positions while being involved in the course.
Instruction begins
Fall 2006 and runs through Summer 2008 (actual dates to be
determined)
For more information: (530) 754-7333, email scwebster@ucdavis.edu, http://sbc.ucdavis.edu/Events/Plant_Breeding_Academy.htm
*
21-26 January 2007. Temperature Stress in Plants, Ventura, California.
The program will cover the physiology, biochemistry, and genetics/genomics of
plant responses to high and low temperatures. In addition to model species,
important issues regarding agronomic, horticultural and ornamental species will
be addressed. For more information, visit http://www.grc.uri.edu/programs/2007/tempstrs.htm.
*
8-9 February 2007. A national workshop on “Sustaining plant
breeding as a vital national capacity for the future of U.S. agriculture,”
Raleigh, NC. Co-organized by CSREES, USDA; and by the Departments of Crop
Science and Horticultural Science, North Carolina State University. http://www.plantbreedingworkshop.ncsu.edu/
* 23-27
March 2007. 2nd International Conference on Plant Molecular
Breeding (ICPMB), Sanya, Hainan, China. www.icpmb.org
* 26-29 March 2007. Biotechnology,
Breeding, and Seed Systems for African Crops, Maputo, Mozambique. Co-hosted
by the Rockefeller Foundation and the Instituto de Investigação Agrária de
Moçambique (IIAM). More information at:
http://www.africancrops.net/rockefeller/icv3/.
*10-16 June 2007. 7th International Symposium in
the Series: Recent Advances in Plant Biotechnology (First
Announcement),Stara Lesna, High Tatras, Slovak Republic; The Symposium Secretary
Handles all queries regarding abstract submission, registration, accommodation
and booking of air tickets for invited speakers:
Alena Gajdosova, Institute of Plant Genetics and Biotechnology
Nitra, Slovak
Republic
Phone: + 421/37 73 36659
Fax: + 421/37 73 36660
E-mail: alena.gajdosova@savba.sk
* June 17- 22 (inclusive) 2007. Invitation to a major international conference on potato viruses
1st call for paper and poster submissions
The 13th European Association for Potato Research (EAPR)
Virology Section Meeting, Scotland, United Kingdom
The Scottish Agricultural Science Agency (SASA) and Scottish Crop Research Institute (SCRI) are proud to host the 13 th triennial meeting of the EAPR Virology Section. The meeting will take place at the Hilton Hotel (Coylumbridge, Aviemore) which is set in a woodland estate in the centre of the Cairngorm National Park. Aviemore is about 2.5 hours travel time by rail from Edinburgh and 30 minutes from Inverness. Both Edinburgh and Inverness are served by airports. Details of the hotel can be found at http://www.hilton.co.uk/coylumbridge and further information on Aviemore and the Cairngorms at http://www.visithighlands.com/aviemore/
The meeting will be made up of scientific sessions (presentations and posters) and scientific and tourist visits.
-Scientific sessions will include for example, virus epidemiology, diagnostics, virus resistance, certification and quarantine.
-Scientific visits will include a visit to the new laboratories of Scottish Agricultural Science Agency and its renowned training plots for potato inspectors ( http://www.sasa.gov.uk/ )
-Possible tourist venues are Loch Ness and a whisky distillery.
Abstracts from the meeting will be published in Potato Research.
The proceedings for the 12 th meeting can be found at http://www.rennes.inra.fr/eapr2004/Compilation%20of%20abstracts.pdf
It is expected that costs for the meeting will be around £100 GBP per day for accommodation and meals plus a registration fee.
Local Organising Committee
Isla Browning, Colin Jeffries, Carolyn Nisbet (SASA, Edinburgh, Scotland)
Finlay Dale, Brian Fenton, Lesley Torrance (SCRI, Dundee, Scotland)
If you would like to register an interest in submitting a paper or just attending this meeting and to receive further circulars please send an e mail to eaprvirology2007@sasa.gsi.gov.uk
The main call for papers is in early 2007 and registration details will be supplied in January 2007, contact: Colin.Jeffries@sasa.gsi.gov.uk or Finlay.Dale@scri.ac.uk
Submitted by Dale Finlay
Finlay.Dale@scri.ac.uk
*
24-28 June 2007. The 9th International Pollination Symposium on
Plant-Pollinator RelationshipsDiversity in Action. Scheman Center, Iowa
State University, Ames, Iowa. The official theme is: "Host-Pollinator Biology
Relationships - Diversity in Action." The Conference webpage can be viewed at
http://www.ucs.iastate.edu/mnet/plantbee/home.html
*
9-14 September 2007. The World Cotton Research Conference-4, Lubbock,
Texas, USA (http://www.icac.org). There is no
cost of pre-registration and if you pre-register you will receive all the
up-coming information on WCRC-4.171 researchers from over 20 countries have
pre-registered.
* 14-18 September 2008. The 12th
International Lupin Conference, Perth, Western Australia conference@lupins.org.
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=======================
7. EDITOR'S NOTES
Plant Breeding News is an
electronic forum for the exchange of information and ideas about applied plant
breeding and related fields. It is published every four to six weeks throughout
the year.
The newsletter is managed by the editor and an advisory group
consisting of Elcio Guimaraes (elcio.guimaraes@fao.org), Margaret Smith
(mes25@cornell.edu), and Anne Marie Thro (athro@reeusda.gov). The editor will
advise subscribers one to two weeks ahead of each edition, in order to set
deadlines for contributions.
REVIEW PAST NEWSLETTERS ON THE WEB: Past
issues of the Plant Breeding Newsletter are now available on the web. The
address is: http://www.fao.org/WAICENT/FAOINFO/AGRICULT/AGP/AGPC/doc/services/pbn.html. We
will continue to improve the organization of archival issues of the newsletter.
Readers who have suggestions about features they wish to see should contact the
editor at chh23@cornell.edu.
Subscribers are encouraged to take an active
part in making the newsletter a useful communications tool. Contributions may be
in such areas as: technical communications on key plant breeding issues;
announcements of meetings, courses and electronic conferences; book
announcements and reviews; web sites of special relevance to plant breeding;
announcements of funding opportunities; requests to other readers for
information and collaboration; and feature articles or discussion issues brought
by subscribers. Suggestions on format and content are always welcome by the
editor, at pbn-l@mailserv.fao.org. We would especially like to see a broad
participation from developing country programs and from those working on species
outside the major food crops.
Messages with attached files are not
distributed on PBN-L for two important reasons. The first is that computer
viruses and worms can be distributed in this manner. The second reason is that
attached files cause problems for some e-mail systems.
PLEASE NOTE: Every
month many newsletters are returned because they are undeliverable, for any one
of a number of reasons. We try to keep the mailing list up to date, and also to
avoid deleting addresses that are only temporarily inaccessible. If you miss a
newsletter, write to me at chh23@cornell.edu and I will re-send it.
To
subscribe to PBN-L: Send an e-mail message to: mailserv@mailserv.fao.org. Leave
the subject line blank and write SUBSCRIBE PBN-L (Important: use ALL CAPS). To
unsubscribe: Send an e-mail message as above with the message UNSUBSCRIBE PBN-L.
Lists of potential new subscribers are welcome. The editor will contact these
persons; no one will be subscribed without their explicit permission.
(Return to Contents)