News & Events
Genome editing tool known as TALEN was found to be 5 times more efficient than CRISPR-Cas9 at locating and editing genes in the densely-packed DNA called heterochromatin. Thus, it has more potential to address genetic defects in the heterochromatin such as sickle cell anemia,beta-thalassemia, fragile X syndrome, and others. According to the article published in Nature, the researchers from the University of Illinois at Urbana−Champaign used single-molecule imaging to observe the performance of genome-editing proteins in mammalian cells.
Northern corn leaf blight (NCLB) is one of the most devastating leaf pathogens in maize (Zea mays L.). Maize cultivars need to be equipped with broad and stable NCLB resistance to cope with production intensification and climate change. Brazilian germplasm is a great source to increase low NCLB resistance levels in European materials, but little is known about their effect in European environments. To investigate the usefulness of Brazilian germplasm as NCLB resistance donors, we conducted multi-parent QTL mapping, evaluated the potential of marker-assisted selection as well as genome-wide selection of 742 F1-derived DH lines.
Monday 1 February 2021, Geneva: FIFA is teaming up with the World Health Organization (WHO) to promote the need for fair access to COVID-19 vaccines, treatments and diagnostics, and to encourage people to keep practicing life-saving, everyday public health measures to prevent the spread of the coronavirus and to protect health. In conjunction with the FIFA Club World Cup 2020, being held in Qatar from 4 to 11 February 2021, FIFA and WHO are launching a public awareness campaign involving star footballers, through TV and in-stadium messaging, to further promote the Access to COVID-19 Tools (ACT) Accelerator initiative launched in April 2020, and to urge people to practice mask wearing, physical distancing and hand hygiene.
The changing global landscape, combined with new and better data, technologies, and understanding, means that agriculture can and must contribute to a wider range of development outcomes than ever before, including reducing poverty, ensuring adequate nutrition, creating strong food value chains, improving environmental sustainability, and promoting gender equity and equality. Agricultural Development: New Perspectives in a Changing World is the first comprehensive exploration of key emerging issues facing developing country agriculture today, from rapid urbanization to rural transformation to climate change.
The biotrophic rust fungus Puccinia triticina is one of the most important wheat pathogens with the potential to cause yield losses up to 70%. Growing resistant cultivars is the most cost-effective and environmentally friendly way to encounter this problem. The emergence of leaf rust races being virulent against common resistance genes increases the demand for wheat varieties with novel resistances. In the past decade, the use of complex experimental populations, like multiparent advanced generation intercross (MAGIC) populations, has risen and offers great advantages for mapping resistances.
The Food and Agriculture Organization’s Director-General QU Dongyu today welcomed Her Excellency Jackline Lumumba Yonga, Ambassador and Permanent Representative of the Republic of Kenya, as the new chairperson of the Africa Regional Group in Rome, taking over from His Excellency Hisham Mohamed Badr, Ambassador and Permanent Representative of the Arab Republic of Egypt.
Global fisheries and aquaculture have been hard hit by the COVID-19 pandemic and could face further disruption in 2021 as lockdowns affect supply and demand across the sector, according to a report by the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO). The report, The impact of COVID-19 on fisheries and aquaculture food systems, was featured during the 34th session of the Committee on Fisheries (COFI) hosted by FAO.
The CRISPR/Cas system exhibits a great potential for rice improvement, but the application was severely hindered due to insufficient target genes, especial the lack of validated genes underlying quantitative trait loci having small effects. In this study, a minor QTL for grain weight, qTGW1.2b, was fine-mapped into a 44.0 kb region using seven sets of near isogenic lines (NILs) developed from the indica rice cross (Zhenshan 97)3/Milyang 46, followed by validation of the causal gene using CRISPR/Cas9-targeted mutagenesis. In the NIL populations, 1000-grain weight of the Zhenshan 97 homozygous lines decreased by 0.9–2.0% compared with the Milyang 46 homozygous lines.
The European Food Safety Authority (EFSA) Panel on Genetically Modified Organisms of the European Food Safety Authority (GMO Panel) has published their Scientific Opinion on genetically modified (GM) six‐event stack maize MON 87427 × MON 87460 × MON 89034 × 1507 × MON 87411 × 59122 and its subcombinations independently of their origin. The scientific opinion is published based on the application EFSA‐GMO‐NL‐2017‐139 under Regulation (EC) No 1829/2003 from Monsanto Company.
Researchers from China identified the factors affecting social media users' emotions regarding food safety issues from the perspective of communication and social psychology. Their objective was to study how social media mechanisms affect users' emotions and to understand the changes and dissemination of a user's emotions in food safety and health information environment.
Plant pathogens elaborate the extracellular matrix (ECM) to inhibit host immunity during their interactions with the host. The formation of ECM involves a series of continuous steps of vesicular transport events. To understand how such vesicle trafficking impacts ECM and the virulence in the rice blast fungus Magnaporthe oryzae, we have characterized MoSwa2, a previously identified actin-regulating kinase MoArk1 interacting protein
Researchers from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) successfully developed materials made of wood-like plant cells in a lab with the objective of making biomaterials production more efficient than conventional agriculture and forestry.The researchers extracted live cells from the leaves of a zinnia plant and cultured the cells in a liquid growth medium. This allows the cells to metabolize and multiply. The researchers lure the cells to grow into a rigid and wood-like structure by using a gel mixture of two plant hormones called auxin and cytokinin.