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Research recently published in the Journal Crop and Pasture Science indicates weeds could be stealing Nitrogen (N) from crops.
The study "investigated the ability of several plant species commonly occurring as weeds in Australian cropping systems to produce root exudates that inhibit nitrification via biological nitrification inhibition (BNI)."
The weeds -- wild radish, great brome grass, wild oats and annual ryegrass -- were considered.
Read the preliminary results of the study here: http://bit.ly/…
Each of the weed species showed the ability to suppress nitrification, which could help them to compete with other plants for nitrogen. "This highlights that increasing our understanding of how plants influence soil microbiota and associated nutrient cycling could open the door to potential novel weed-management strategies," according to the study. Further research is needed to explore whether it is possible to enhance weed-control strategies by manipulating the form and or timing of N supplied to crops.
"Weeds are called weeds for a reason," writes Cathryn O'Sullivan, a researcher with the Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organization. "They are masters of invasion, and they use sneaky tricks to give them an advantage over our crops. This is very interesting research that could one day give us another tool in our arsenal against our selfish weeds."
PASS THE CORN BELT-RAISED RICEhttps://www.dtnpf.com/agriculture/web/ag/news/crops/article/2017/12/01/weeds-nibble-away-nitrogen-3
Sufferers of malnutrition in the global south could soon find help from an unlikely source: a humble potato, genetically tweaked to provide substantial doses of vitamins A and E, both crucial nutrients for health.
Dubbed the “golden potato,” boosted levels of provitamin A carotenoids — which are found naturally in carrots and sweet potatoes — give the new tuber its yellow-orange flesh, and are converted into vitamin A by digestive enzymes when eaten.
The potato, created in a lab in Italy and studied at Ohio State University, is the most recent staple crop to be genetically transformed into a colorful superfood, joining such creations as antioxidant-rich purple rice and beta-carotene-enhanced golden rice.
But while foods with genetic tweaks to make them more commercially successful by increasing yield or longevity are relatively common — in the US, we have FDA-approved apples that don’t brown, bruise-free potatoes, and insect-resistant soy, among many other examples of genetically modified produce — these vitamin-enriched staples have yet to be grown commercially.
Potatoes are the fourth most popular crop worldwide, after rice, wheat, and corn, according to the US Department of Agriculture. It is a staple food in some Asian, African, and South American countries where vitamin A and vitamin E deficiencies are common.
Vitamin A deficiency (VAD) is the leading cause of preventable blindness in children, and is also key for growth, immunity, organ development, and reproductive health. Vitamin E protects against oxidative stress and inflammation, conditions that are associated with damage to nerves, muscles, vision, and the immune system.
The Ohio State University
A single serving of the golden potato could provide up to 42 percent of a child’s recommended daily intake of vitamin A and 34 percent of their recommended vitamin E intake, according to a recent study co-led by researchers at Ohio State, the Italian National Agency for New Technologies, Energy, and Sustainable Development (ENEA) in Rome, and the Italian Council for Agricultural Research and Economics.
Women of reproductive age could get 15 percent of their recommended vitamin A and 17 percent of their vitamin E intakes from the same 5.3 ounce serving, the researchers said.
Malnourishment is possible even when people appear to have ample food. This phenomenon is known as “hidden hunger,” as people can be surviving chiefly on crops that supply calories but lack essential nutrients for growth and health.
Mark Failla, a professor emeritus of human nutrition who lead the research at Ohio State, said that this is particularly prevalent in developing countries, where staple food crops have often been bred for high yield and pest resistance instead of nutritional quality.
“More than 800,000 people depend on the potato as their main source of energy and many of these individuals are not consuming adequate amounts of these vital nutrients,” said Failla in a statement.
The potato was genetically engineered in Italy using a technique called biofortification.
“Carotenoid biofortification has proven itself with ‘golden’ rice and maize,” said Giovanni Giuliano, coordinator of the studies from ENEA. “Potato was the third crop to join this group.”
Giuliano noted that the level of technology necessary for enrichment is dependent on the crop. Maize and cassava can be enriched with beta-carotene using traditional breeding techniques, where parents with the desired trait are crossed over several generations — a bit like breeding labradors to retrieve, or border collies to herd.
But with crops where beta-carotene is not naturally occurring, it has to be transgenically inserted. Traditional breeding can then pass the trait down the genetic line.
Once the potato had been genetically manipulated, researchers in Failla’s Ohio lab created a simulated digestive system — complete with virtual mouth, stomach, and small intestine — to determine how much provitamin A and vitamin E could potentially be absorbed by someone who eats a golden potato.
“We ground up boiled golden potato and mimicked the conditions of these digestive organs to determine how much of these fat-soluble nutrients became biologically available,” Failla explained.
The group began the work focused on provitamin A availability, so their discovery that the potato also supplied a 10-fold dose of vitamin E was an unanticipated and pleasant surprise.
“Universities and other research labs regularly put out press releases saying they have developed a GM crop that will help feed people.”
The potato will join a growing stable of other genetically modified staple crops. Just this July, biotechnologists at the Queensland University of Technology announced that they had created a vitamin A-enhanced “golden banana.”
But while researchers are keen to tout such crops as potentially transformational, the reality is that these foods are slow to have an impact. Golden rice was heralded with splashy headlines declaring its potential to save millions of lives when it was unveiled in 1999. But 18 years later, it still has yet to be marketed commercially.
One problem is that genetic engineers don’t always have control over where exactly the beta-carotene enhancing transgenes land in the target organism’s DNA, said Glenn Davis Stone, a professor of anthropology and environmental studies at Washington University and a longtime observer of golden rice.
It was only earlier this year that the International Rice Research Institution in the Philippines — the world’s top rice research institution and the center of the effort to commercialize golden rice — felt able to submit the enhanced grain for regulatory approval.
Before that, Stone noted, its yields were significantly lower than the same rice without the “golden” trait, “probably because the trait had been inserted into a gene that controlled root development.”
IRRI anticipates that the first high-yield varieties of golden rice will be available toward the end of the decade.
As for the chances of the golden potato and other new superfoods making it to market, Stone is skeptical.
“Universities and other research labs regularly put out press releases saying they have developed a GM crop that will help feed people,” he told Seeker. “Lycopene-enhanced tomatoes, sorghum with more digestible protein, iron-enhanced cassava, vitamin-E-enriched canola, and so on.”
“The biotech industry has shown no interest in commercializing these crops,” he added. “These potatoes will never be commercialized.”
Another challenge to crops like the golden potato is the fact that vitamin A is fat soluble, meaning we can only absorb it if it comes with enough dietary fat. As VAD often affects people with a generally poor diet, this is by no means assured.
In one heavily cited human trial of golden rice from 2012, the participating children were eating the rice as part of a balanced meal in which 20 percent of the calories were from fat. As Stone suggested in a 2015 blog post, this demonstrates only that golden rice successfully imparts vitamin A to children who don’t need it.
He pointed out that over the past decade or so, the Philippines has succeeded in slashing its VAD rate without using golden rice.
“For some reason, the GMO supporters who claim to be deeply concerned about VAD have not celebrated this,” Stone said.
WATCH: Solving Hunger Is Just a Matter of Logistics
Pamela Ronald, distinguished professor in the Department of Plant Pathology in the College of Agricultural and Environmental Sciences, and her team will identify genes that alter root growth in rice. (Photo / Deanne Fitzmaurice)
The Foundation for Food and Agriculture Research has awarded more than $1.7 million to University of California, Davis, researchers to identify genes responsible for drought tolerance in rice and test a new energy-efficient food-drying process.
Drought-resistant rice
A $1 million Seeding Solutions grant will go to a project to study the genetics of rice plants. The research is being led by principal investigator Pamela Ronald, distinguished professor in the Department of Plant Pathology in the College of Agricultural and Environmental Sciences and the Genome Center at UC Davis.
She and researchers at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, and collaborators, will develop and implement a chemistry-driven gene discovery approach to identify rice genes that influence root growth. The project targets protein kinases, enzymes that control diverse biological process in plants, such as root architecture and drought response.
“Our aim is to identify genes that alter root growth in rice, a staple food for half the world’s people. Because root systems play an essential role in yield and drought tolerance, results of these studies are relevant to agriculture,” said Ronald.
The FFAR grant has been matched with funding from the UC Davis Innovation Institute for Food and Health, the Structural Genomics Consortium, AgBiome and Promega for a total $2.3 million investment.
“This project is a prime example of how public-private partnerships can advance our understanding of plant genetics to develop crops resistant to drought and other climate extremes,” said Sally Rockey, executive director of the Foundation for Food and Agriculture Research.
Researchers on this project also include David Drewry, co-principal investigator and professor at University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill; Aled Edwards, collaborator, professor at the University of Toronto, and director of the Structural Genomics Consortium; and Rafael Najmanovich, collaborator, professor at the University of Montreal.
FFAR has also awarded $790,000 to UC Davis to test a new technology to improve the drying methods used in food production. Moisture must be removed from harvested agricultural products to safely preserve them prior to processing into food products.
Principal investigator Irwin Donis-Gonzalez (left) and assistant adjunct professor Kurt Kornbluth (right) in the Department of Biological and Agricultural Engineering will research new advanced food-drying technology.
Researchers will test an innovative moisture-absorbing technology called drying beads, instead of relying on heated air to dehydrate foods such as grains, nuts, rice and seeds. The beads absorb water without using heat, reducing the use of energy by up to 50 percent during the drying process. The beads are reusable and can be reactivated, which would reduce drying costs over time.
The research is being led by principal investigator Irwin R. Donis-Gonzalez, Department of Biological and Agricultural Engineering in UC Davis’ College of Agricultural and Environmental Sciences.
“Drying agricultural produce is an energy-intensive process, and it is imperative to find alternative means of drying for the enhancement of food quality, safety, and economical operations, while reducing food losses and waste,” said Donis-Gonzalez.
According to researchers, this technology could save more than 1.06 quadrillion kilojoules of energy annually in the U.S. This is about the same amount of energy it takes to provide electricity to residents of New York, California and Florida for one year.
The $790,000 FFAR grant has also been matched with funding from the UC Davis Innovation Institute for Food and Health, and the College of Agricultural and Environmental Sciences for a total $1.5 million investment.
“This project exemplifies how new innovations can help us produce a safe, reliable food supply that uses resources more efficiently,” Rockey said.
Researchers on this project include Kent J. Bradford, co-principal investigator, distinguished professor at UC Davis; Kurt Kornbluth, co-principal investigator, assistant adjunct professor at UC Davis; Edward Spang, co-principal investigator, assistant professor at UC Davis; and Johan Van Asbrouck, collaborator, CEO of Rhino Research, Bangkok, Thailand.
Among farmers and ranchers, agricultural research is a motherhood and apple-pie issue. Everyone's for it. Everyone "knows" ag research is a good thing that taxpayers should help finance.
Yet financing it hasn't proved an easy sell in Washington, even though every Congressman has agricultural constituents of one kind or another. For decades, government funding for ag research has paled compared to outlays for research on things like national defense, human health and energy. For almost two decades Uncle Sam's contributions to ag research have been declining.
American agriculture, it seems, is a victim of its own success. No agricultural system in history has come close to growing as much food. So, what's the problem, our public servants might well ask. Why, at a time of huge federal budget deficits, do we need to invest more in ag research when our farms already produce such an abundance of affordable food? Won't private companies reap much of the benefit? If they want the research, why not let them pay for it?
In 2014, Congress asked a different question: Could public investments be used to leverage private investments, multiplying the bang for the public's buck? The answer was yes, and the result was a provision in the 2014 farm bill creating the Foundation for Food and Agriculture Research, a nonprofit organization that builds public-private partnerships to increase scientific and technological research in agriculture.
In 2015 Sally Rockey became FFAR's first executive director. A glance at her resume explains why she was chosen for the job. A PhD entomologist, she spent much of the previous 30 years overseeing research grants at USDA and later the National Institutes of Health. She knows both the lay of the land and the need to get the most out of the limited resources available.
Harvested rice from MedLife-Liberia farms in Gbarnga.
Imagine a country where a water-loving crop like rice enjoys bountiful rainfall, fertile soil, and ecosystem suitable for growing it in abundance. This country is Liberia. Yet, Liberia spends millions of dollars each year to import rice. This import oriented food policy contributes to loss of foreign exchange, unemployment and lack of food self-sufficiency. In effect, Liberia subsidizes farmers in other countries, contributing to rising income and better living conditions for farmers in rice exporting countries like India and Thailand.
Workers harvesting rice in Totota
To change this situation, MedLife Liberia works with local farmers to create a sustainable pathway to increase rice production. If Liberia can make use of its available massive swampland to grow lowland rice, the country’s dependency on rice imports could be minimized and food security could be assured.
In a few years, the sector could provide massive employment for thousands of Liberia’s idle youth and improve rural income and livelihood. MedLife’s experience over the last few years suggests that improving agricultural productivity is the road to better schooling and healthcare. Farmers will continue to be reluctant to send their children to school as long as the price they pay is the risk of hunger due to low productivity. MedLife believes that we can overcome this food first logic by introducing improved rice farming techniques to produce surplus, where the children’s hands are needed on the farm to produce just sufficient food to feed the family.
That was the conclusion reached following a two-year experiment by a MedLife team that invested in lowland rice production in Totota, Garmu, Palala, Taylors Town, Fola and Green Hill Quarry with the support of UNDP GEF Small Grant Program. The program has shown increased promise of a better future for sustainable lowland rice production.
Mr. Alfred Miller, machine operator and supervisor of the project
Dr. Khalifa Bility, former deputy minister for planning, research, and development, is convinced that Liberia could feed herself only when adequate investment is made in soil, seeds, tools and machines and lots of common sense policies to support farmers in a process that could bring results in months and not in years.
But in a country where commitment to work is challenging and people tend to take advantage of a situation instead of using dignity in labor as the end of their hard work, Dr. Bility said he has come up with a performance-based contract system that motivates workers to justify their income.
“And after two years I have finally found a system to get increased production,” he said, after a tour of his farms in Totota, Bong County last Friday.
The seed variety planted in lowland rice cultivation, he said, is ready to harvest in three months. “And after the harvest, two months later, you will realize that another harvest will take place after one month,” he added.
He said he has established five zones with each zone containing four farms, and each farm contains twenty-three plots, that equal one hectare.
Though he operates from Monrovia, Bility has five core workers who ensure that they employ contractors, including women and young men, to prepare the land for planting.
Presently, with support from the UNDP GEF grant and the Chinese Embassy, he has purchased power tillers, rice mill, a rice thrasher and a rice harvester, and is planning to introduce additional farming implements that would graduate into appropriate mechanized farming in the near future.
Alfred Miller, a machine operator, is the supervisor of the project. He informed the Daily Observer that the project provides employment for more than 100 Liberians.
“We feed them once a day. They work from 8 a.m. to 4 p.m. or even more because the system rewards those who stay longer on the job to complete their day’s work on the farm,” Miller said.
Each worker is paid L$200 or more per day, and they are harvesting lowland rice planted three months ago; it would take them 5 days to complete the job.
“So after harvesting,” he said, “we restart the process and Liberia is blessed with rains that come even in the dry season.” In fact, Dr. Bility, following a visit to Southeast Asia (India, Malaysia, etc), borrowed a drainage system that ensures there is water on the farm at all times.
“Rice is a water product,” Dr. Bility said, “and so I borrowed the system that we have introduced to provide water all year round.”
He said his system is rooted in the spirit of self-help to generate income. However, the use of the machines is communal because most farmers cannot afford to purchase a power tiller on their own. This is why the system is called Fixed Price Communal Commercial Farming in the various communities in Bong County he is operating his farms.
“We make sure to identify suitable lowland and then we get the community’s help to clear or brush the land and remove all tree trunks from the soil,” he said. “There is additional work to be done, including the developing rice nursery for transplanting, weeding, as well as fertilizer and water management.”
Dr. Bility said the experiment received less than 20% external help from the UNDP and he has borne all expenses.
His system is organized in such a way that even birds that make their presence during the growing stage after planting are kept out of the farms.
His objective, he said, is to bring his products to the Liberian market and to help reduce government’s rice imports, which is in the hundreds of millions, to zero so that the money could circulate in the country.
Dr. Bility said after two years, he is succeeding, because “you can predict the behavior of people by knowing their interest.”
The quality of the rice from his farms, he said, is the same as those that are imported from other countries. He admitted that it will not hurt the Liberian government to provide support to ensure that food security is sustained in the country.
