A team of scientists from Purdue University and the Chinese Academy of Sciences has used CRISPR/Cas9 gene-editing technology to develop a variety of rice that produces 25-31 percent more grain and would have been virtually impossible to create through traditional breeding methods.
The CRISPR/Cas9 technology allows plant breeders to quickly and accurately snip portions of DNA out of a sequence, editing the DNA code. The method allowed Zhu's team to modify multiple genes at one time, something that would have taken decades to do with traditional methods without a guarantee that the resulting plants would have the desired characteristics."You couldn't do targeted mutations like that with traditional plant breeding. You'd do random mutations and try to screen out the ones you don't want," Bressan said. "It would have taken millions of plants. Basically, it's not feasible. This is a real accomplishment that could not have been done without CRISPR."
The improved rice plants created in these experiments come from a common research line. The next step is to use CRISPR/Cas9 to edit the same genes in elite varieties of rice to determine if those will also show similarly improved yield...."If this holds true for the varieties that farmers currently use, this big increase in yield would be very important," ... "It would really help produce a lot more grains to feed more people."
Chunbo Miao et al. Mutations in a subfamily of abscisic acid receptor genes promote rice growth and productivity, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (2018).
Heralded on the cover of Time magazine in 2000 as a genetically modified - GMO crop with the potential to save millions of lives in the Third World, Golden Rice is still years away from field introduction and even then, may fall short of lofty health benefits still cited regularly by GMO advocates, suggests a new study from Washington University in St. Louis.... "The rice simply has not been successful in test plots of the rice breeding institutes in the Philippines, where the leading research is being done," Stone said. "It has not even been submitted for approval to the regulatory agency, the Philippine Bureau of Plant Industry"
Stone, an internationally recognized expert on the human side of global agricultural trends, was an early advocate for keeping an open mind about "humanitarian" GMO crops, such as Golden Rice.
He has also supported the development of a genetically modified strain of cassava, a starchy root crop eaten by subsistence farmers across much of Africa. Unfortunately, efforts to develop a genetically improved, more productive and disease-resistant strain of cassava also appear to be a long way from practical field introduction, he notes.
"Golden Rice was a promising idea backed by good intentions," Stone said. "In contrast to anti-GMO activists, I argued that it deserved a chance to succeed. But if we are actually interested in the welfare of poor children—instead of just fighting over GMOs—then we have to make unbiased assessments of possible solutions. The simple fact is that after 24 years of research and breeding, Golden Rice is still years away from being ready for release."
Higher concentrations of carbon dioxide are associated with reductions in protein and multiple key nutrients in rice, according to a new field study by an international team of scientists
The study, published May 23 in Science Advances, showed for the first time that rice grown at concentrations of atmospheric CO2 expected by the end of this century has lower levels of four key B vitamins. The findings also support research from other field studies showing rice grown under higher CO2 concentrations has less protein, iron and zinc.
The researchers conducted the field study in China and Japan on 18 common strains of rice. Their results confirm previously reported declines in protein, iron and zinc in rice grown under atmospheric CO2 concentrations that scientists expect by the end of the 21st century. In addition, the paper reveals for the first time average declines in vitamins B1, B2, B5 and B9—vitamins essential to helping the body convert food into energy.
Average Vitamin B1 (thiamine) levels decreased by 17.1 percent; average Vitamin B2 (riboflavin) by 16.6 percent; average Vitamin B5 (pantothenic acid) by 12.7 percent; and average Vitamin B9 (folate) by 30.3 percent. The researchers reported no change in levels of Vitamin B6 or calcium, while Vitamin E levels increased for most strains.
Rice is the primary source of food for more than 2 billion people. Decreases in the nutritional content of rice could have a disproportionate impact on health outcomes in the poorest rice-dependent countries.
Crops grown in the high-CO2 atmosphere of the future could be significantly less nutritious, a new study published today in Nature suggests. Based on hundreds of experiments in the field, the work reveals a new challenge as society reckons with both rising carbon emissions and malnutrition in the future.... "Rising global CO2 increases yield and decreases water use by crops, and this is often presented as one positive of atmospheric change," Long says. But the Nature study's "significant" finding suggests that higher-CO2 environments will mean less nutritional crops, so that "increased quantity is at the expense of quality."
Alfred Tennyson wrote:We are not now that strength which in old days
Moved earth and heaven, that which we are, we are;
One equal temper of heroic hearts,
Made weak by time and fate, but strong in will
To strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield.
Newfie wrote:Tanada,
I guess you could overcome the define your by eating more. But I presume that would add to obesity?
Alfred Tennyson wrote:We are not now that strength which in old days
Moved earth and heaven, that which we are, we are;
One equal temper of heroic hearts,
Made weak by time and fate, but strong in will
To strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield.
dohboi wrote:But what is true of rice is likely true of all those other food, T. I don't see why it wouldn't be.
Alfred Tennyson wrote:We are not now that strength which in old days
Moved earth and heaven, that which we are, we are;
One equal temper of heroic hearts,
Made weak by time and fate, but strong in will
To strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield.
Corn, or maize, is the most widely grown crop in the world. Used in food, cooking oil, industrialized foods, livestock feed and even automobile fuel, the crop is one that both rich and poor people rely upon.
Research led by the University of Washington looks at what climate change will mean for global yields of this crop. The results show that warmer temperatures by the end of this century will reduce yields throughout the world, confirming previous research. But the study also shows dramatic increases in the variability of corn yields from one year to the next and the likelihood of simultaneous low yields across multiple high-producing regions, which could lead to price hikes and global shortages.
The study was published the week of June 11 in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences."Previous studies have often focused on just climate and plants, but here we look at climate, food and international markets," said lead author Michelle Tigchelaar, a UW postdoctoral researcher in atmospheric sciences. "We find that as the planet warms, it becomes more likely for different countries to simultaneously experience major crop losses, which has big implications for food prices and food security."
In the wake of a recent UW study looking at the nutritional value of rice crops under climate change, this study addressed overall yields and price volatility of corn.
While most rice is used domestically, corn is traded on international markets. Four countries—U.S., Brazil, Argentina and the Ukraine—account for 87 percent of the global corn exports (China mostly produces for domestic use). Today the probability that all four exporters would have a bad year together, with yields at least 10 percent below normal, is virtually zero.
But results show that under 2 degrees Celsius warming, which is projected if we succeed in curbing greenhouse gas emissions, this risk increases to 7 percent. Under 4 degrees Celsius warming, which the world is on track to reach by the end of the century if current greenhouse gas emissions rates continue, there's an 86 percent chance that all four maize-exporting countries would simultaneously suffer a bad year."Even with optimistic scenarios for reduced emissions of greenhouse gases, results show that the volatility in year-to-year maize production in the U.S. will double by the middle of this century, due to increasing average growing season temperature," said co-author David Battisti, a UW professor of atmospheric sciences. "The same will be true in the other major maize-exporting countries. Climate change will cause unprecedented volatility in the price of maize, domestically and internationally."
Michelle Tigchelaar el al., "Future warming increases probability of globally synchronized maize production shocks," PNAS (2018)
... If no action is taken to reduce the negative impacts on agricultural yields, the researchers estimate that the environmental changes predicted to occur by mid- to end-century in water availability and ozone concentrations would reduce average yields of vegetables and legumes by 35% and 9% respectively. In hot settings such as Southern Europe and large parts of Africa and South Asia, increased air temperatures would reduce average vegetable yields by an estimated 31%.
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