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Soil and Crop Sciences faculty mentor Borlaug Fellows from Africa

23Oct

By: Beth Ann Luedeker

Three cotton researchers from throughout Africa have teamed up with Texas A&M Soil and Crop Sciences professors as part of the Borlaug International Agricultural Science and Technology Fellowship Program.

Adama Ouattrata, Gapili Naoura and Larbouga Bourgou

Three Borlaug Fellows working with faculty from the Soil and Crop Sciences Department to share knowlege about cotton breeding. From left to right are: Adama Ouattrata, Dr. Gapili Naoura and Dr. Larbouga Bourgou.

Dr. Gapili Naoura, Adama Ouattrata and Dr. Larbouga Bourgou will be working with Drs. Jane Dever, Jake Mowrer and David Stelly in College Station and Lubbock until they return to their home countries in late November.

The Aggie professors will each make a reciprocal visit to the home country of the Fellow with whom they are working to see how they are using practices and technologies learned while in Texas.

Funded through the USDA – Foreign Agriculture Service, the Fellows program is designed to promote food security and economic growth in developing and middle-income countries by providing training and collaborative research opportunities.

Fellows are selected based on a variety of criteria, including their academic and professional research interests, level of scientific competence, aptitude for research, leadership potential and the likelihood of bringing new ideas back to their home institution.

Dr. Naoura working in lab

Dr. Naoura works with Master’s student Kubra Velioglu in Dr. Stelly’s cotton breeding lab

Dr. Bourgou is a cotton breeder from Burkina Faso in western Africa, one of the highest cotton production countries in Africa. He works in cotton variety development, focused on earlier generation of seed multiplication for cotton companies there.

“I first met Dr. Bourgou during a visit to Burkina Faso in 2015 as a technical advisor to a USDA-FAS funded development project, “Revenue thorugh Cotton Livelihood, Trade and Equity” (RECOLTE),” and was impressed with his passion for cotton breeding and enhancing genetic diversity in breeding populations for western Africa,” said Dever, a Professor at the TAMU AgriLife Research and Extension Center in Lubbock.

“I am delighted to be hosting him and working together to develop breeding gene pool populations to select new high quality cotton varieties adapted to African growing conditions,” Dever said.

Bourgou has personally assembled 350 locally collected accessions to conserve and rejuvenate genetic resources, and through the fellowship he will continue to characterize those accessions and evaluate how to best utilize them for cotton improvement.

Dr. Naoura is from Chad, a country in north-central Africa. He was a sorghum breeder until about two years ago, when he began working with cotton. He is now working to develop cotton varieties suited to production in Chad.

Robert Vaughn places liquid in test tube with others looking on

Drs. Naoura and Bourgou observe Research Associate Dr. Robert Vaughn in Dr. Stelly’s cotton breeding lab.

“We are trying to share knowledge about germplasm, germplasm resources, relatively cost-effective DNA extraction methods, hands-on experience with PCR-based SNP genotyping and more, all in the context of breeding,” said Stelly, a professor and cotton breeder in College Station.

“A part of the discussion is how SNP genotyping can be useful in Gapili’s breeding program and possibly adapted to other Chad crop programs,” he said.

Adama Ouattara is also from Burkina Faso, where he is a cotton production scientist.

He and Dr. Mowrer are studying the effect of potassium nutrition on water stress resistance in cotton. They have designed a greenhouse study to evaluate the effect of potassium fertilization on early plant growth under repeated cycles of imposed water stress.

“Our visitors are impressive and eager to learn more, which makes our job for training fun and relatively easy,” said Stelly. “Clearly the screening system that is used to identify trainees is very, very good.”

Protein derived from cottonseed for human nutrition is one step closer to reality

22Oct

By: Kay Ledbetter
Contact: Dr. Keerti Rathore – rathore@tamu.edu

Cottonseed ground into flour to deliver protein to millions of people, a project to which Dr. Keerti Rathore has devoted more than half his professional career, is one step closer to reality.

Dr. Keerti Rathore looking at immature cotton boll

Dr. Keerti Rathore, a Texas A&M AgriLife Research plant biotechnologist in College Station, received word that Texas A&M’s “Petition for Determination of Non-regulated Status for Ultra-Low Gossypol Cottonseed (ULGCS) TAM66274” has been approved by the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service, or APHIS. (Texas A&M photo by Lacy Roberts)

Rathore, a Texas A&M AgriLife Research plant biotechnologist in College Station, received word that Texas A&M’s “Petition for Determination of Non-regulated Status for Ultra-Low Gossypol Cottonseed (ULGCS) TAM66274” has been approved by the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service, or APHIS.

Texas A&M University Chancellor John Sharp, who oversees Texas A&M AgriLife Research along with 11 universities and seven state agencies, said Rathore’s work will have a dramatic effect across the world.

“The work and dedication of Dr. Rathore has paid off,” Sharp said. “He and his team exemplify the values of the Texas A&M System, and because of them, more than half a billion people across the world may have access to a new form of protein, and our farmers will be able to earn a much better living.”

Through a project funded by Cotton Incorporated, Rathore and the Texas A&M team have developed a transgenic cotton plant – TAM66274 – with ultra-low gossypol levels in the seed, while maintaining normal plant-protecting gossypol levels in the rest of the plant.

Dr. Kater Hake, vice president of agricultural and environmental research at Cotton Incorporated, said it has been a decades-long journey.

“Gossypol suppression in cottonseed has been part of our funded research portfolio for over 30 years,” Hake said.

Tom Wedegaertner, director of cottonseed research and marketing at Cotton Inc., underscores the potential of the breakthrough and the journey through the regulatory process.

cottonseeds cut in half to show many black specks inside seed

Seeds containing gossypol have glands showing up as black specks. (Texas A&M AgriLife photo by Dr. Devendra Pandeya)

“Gossypol in the leaves and stalks of the cotton plant serve as a pest deterrent, but its presence in the seed serves no purpose,” Wedegaertner said. “The more widespread use of cottonseed as a livestock feed and even for human consumption has been stymied by the natural levels of gossypol in the seed. As we progress through the regulatory review, the ability to utilize the protein potential in the seed gets that much closer.”

The recent USDA action confirms that TAM66274 and any cotton lines derived from crosses between TAM66274 and conventional cotton or biotechnology-derived cotton granted non-regulated status by APHIS are no longer considered federally regulated articles, he said.

For the past 23 years, Rathore has been determined to create cotton plants that produce seeds containing gossypol well below what the U.S. Food and Drug Administration considers safe levels while maintaining normal levels of gossypol and related chemicals in the foliage, floral parts, boll rind and roots.

cottonseed halves showing very few black specks.

Glands are still present, but are much lighter, reflecting the very low levels of gossypol in the deregulated cottonseed. (Texas A&M AgriLife photo by Dr. Devendra Pandeya)

Gossypol, while toxic to humans and monogastric animals such as pigs, birds, fish and rodents, is useful to cotton plants for defense against insects and pathogens. Therefore, cottonseed containing gossypol is currently used mainly as ruminant animal feed, either as whole seed or cottonseed meal after oil extraction.

“Biotechnology tools that made the ULGCS technology successful had just become available when I started looking at the potential to make this new source of protein available to hundreds of millions of people,” Rathore said.

“I also realized the value to cotton farmers everywhere of removing gossypol from the cottonseed because such a product is likely to improve their income without any extra effort on their part or additional input,” he said. “Such a product can also be important from the standpoint of sustainability because farmers will produce fiber, feed and food from the same crop.”

Cotton-producing countries with a limited supply of feed protein can realize great benefits by utilizing this seed-derived protein as a feed for poultry, swine or aquaculture species, Rathore said.

These animals are significantly more efficient in converting plant protein into high-quality meat protein, he said. Egg and broiler production could become the most efficient use of any available feed protein source, including the ULGCS.

Despite the obstacles, failures and lack of funding at times, Rathore said it was the dedication and loyalty of his team and supporters such as the late Dr. Norman Borlaug, who was known as the “father of the Green Revolution,” that kept him going on this project.

“Dr. Borlaug was the biggest supporter of this project. During the lean times when I was struggling to get funding and after the failed attempts – there were many, it was his words of encouragement that provided the inspiration to continue,” Rathore said.

While there were many team members over the years working on the project, he said key contributors to its advancement were Dr. Devendra Pandeya, LeAnne Campbell, Dr. Sreenath Palle and Dr. Sunilkumar Ganesan, all who worked in his laboratory at Texas A&M, as well as by Dr. Robert Stipanovic and associates with USDA-Agricultural Research Service who conducted biochemical analysis of gossypol levels in the ULGCS lines.

Dr. Rathore and two others in a greenhouse with cotton plants

Dr. Keerti Rathore discusses the ultra low gossypol cotton with his team, Dr. Devendra Pandeya and LeAnne Campbell. (Texas A&M photo by Beth Luedeker)

“It feels good to have come this far as Texas A&M AgriLife is only the fourth public institution to have accomplished such a feat as deregulation of an engineered crop.”

Rathore has been granted several U.S. patents. In 2006, he published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences announcing the cotton plants had been successfully altered in the lab to “silence” gossypol in the seed. In 2009, field trials verified the lab and greenhouse studies indicating the crop could become a source of protein.

The cottonseed from these plants met World Health Organization and FDA standards for food consumption, he said, thus opening the potential to make the new source of high-protein food available to hundreds of millions of people a year.

Rathore said cottonseed, with about 23 percent protein content, can play an important role in human nutrition with the gossypol eliminated, especially in countries where cereal/tuber-based diets provide most of the calories but are low in protein content.

“Growing up in rural India as the son of a doctor, I had seen the effects of malnutrition firsthand in my father’s patients,” he said. “Many of their health issues were due to inadequate food and nutrition.”

Rathore said for every pound of cotton fiber, the plant produces about 1.6 pounds of seed. The annual global cottonseed production equals about 48.5 million tons.

“The kernels from the safe seed could be ground into a flour-like powder after oil extraction and used as a protein additive in food preparations or perhaps roasted and seasoned as a nutritious snack,” he said.

Rathore said cotton will continue to be grown as a source of natural fiber, but the adoption of the ultra-low gossypol varieties by farmers has the potential to make the seed just as valuable as the lint.

“Our approach, based on the removal of a naturally occurring, toxic compound from the cottonseed, not only improves its safety but also provides a novel means to meet the nutritional requirements of the burgeoning world population,” he said.

Aside from the human aspect, Rathore said the potential of ultra-low gossypol cottonseed as a fish meal replacement in the diets of shrimp and southern flounder has been demonstrated. Additional aquaculture and poultry feeding studies are planned to fully evaluate the nutritional value of the unique cottonseed.

Even after this deregulation hurdle has been jumped, the team knows the work is not done.

“The next major effort will be aimed at activities to demonstrate the value-added potential of this technology,” Wedegaertner said. “The first step will be to produce enough ULGCS seed for a commercial-scale production run at a cottonseed oil mill. This will take a couple of years.”

Rathore said development of ULGCS involved several patented technologies, so additional steps must be taken to secure agreements with the patent holders, then to find a seed company willing to market the ULGCS trait and make it available to cotton farmers worldwide.

Rathore said as a scientist who has conceived and developed this technology, “My personal preference as we move forward would be to follow the ‘Golden Rice’ example in terms of its use for humanitarian purposes.”

Coffee Education Symposium

11Oct

A Coffee Education Symposium will be held at the Scotts Miracle-Gro Center on F and B Road in College Station, Thursday, November 8, from 9:00 a.m. – 2:00 p.m.  Lunch and a coffee tasting will be included.

The symposium will include presentations on the Texas A&M Coffee Center, coffee chemistry, coffee sensory, the research and development of coffee projects, and an overview of the coffee industry and its current trends. Dr. Ben Wherley, Department of Soil and Crop Sciences, and Amanda Birnbaum, Dept. of Horticultural Sciences, will present agronomic opportunities for spent coffee grounds followed by a field tour of ongoing research with spent coffee grounds.

For more information, contact: Dr. Ben Wherley, b-wherley@tamu.edu or (979) 845-1591.

The full agenda and RSVP is found on the Center for Coffee Research and Education website.

Turfgrass researchers gather in College Station

13Aug

By: Beth Ann Luedeker

Contact: Dr. Ben Wherley – b-wherley@tamu.edu

Members of a collaborative research project funded by the USDA Specialty Crops Research Initiative recently met at the Scotts Miracle-Gro turfgrass facility at Texas A&M University for an update on the project. The group is studying the persistence, survival and recovery of warm-season turfgrasses under limited irrigation and long-term drought in an effort to produce more sustainable urban landscapes.

group of 28 turfgrass researchers

Collaborating researchers from multiple universities gathered in College Station for their biannual meeting.

This group is comprised of twenty-four researchers from Texas A&M, the University of Florida, Oklahoma State University, the University of Georgia and North Carolina State University. These researchers are replicating trials in their respective states to better understand which turfgrass varieties are best suited for use in landscapes where water may be limited.

According to the presentation made by Kevin Kenworthy, Professor, Plant Breeding from the University of Florida, there are an estimated 40 to 50 million acres of turf in the United States, potentially three times more acres than irrigated corn, and the turfgrass industry has a multi-billion dollar impact on the U.S. economy. As water resources become more limited and the population increases, urban water restrictions will most likely increase.

people looking at plots with small squares of different grasses

Dr. Ambika Chandra, Texas A&M AgriLife Turfgrass Specialist in the Department of Soil and Crop Sciences (2nd from left), discusses the drought tolerance research with Dr. Kevin Kenworthy of the University of Florida.

Urban landscapes need to adapt to these changes.

With water scarcity concerns, we are seeing increased pressures by regulatory agencies to incentivize or mandate removal of turfgrasses from landscapes in many parts of the country because they are perceived as lacking drought tolerance,” said Dr. Ben Wherley, Associate Professor of Turfgrass Ecology in the Department of Soil and Crop Sciences at Texas A&M.

group of people standing near research plot

Dr. Ben Wherley discusses coffee grounds research currently being done at Texas A&M. This is one of many other research projects underway at the university in addition to the SCRI drought research.

“This project aims to cooperatively develop improved grasses that can withstand and perform well even under extremely limited, infrequent levels of irrigation commonly mandated during water restriction periods in many parts of the southern and western U.S. Considering the environmental, ecological, and social benefits of turfgrasses to the landscape, this group’s efforts are more important than ever,” he said.

The group, which is made up of turfgrass breeders and physiologists, meets two times a year, rotating between the collaborating campuses.

Since the project’s inception, this group of researchers have identified 140 advanced lines of bermudagrass, zoysiagrass, St. Augustinegrass and seashore paspalum for short-term drought stress and released several cultivars, including TamStar St. Augustinegrass, which was created at Texas A&M, TifTuf bermudagrass (UGA), ‘Tahoma 31 bermudagrass (OSU), FAES 1312, 1313 and 1319 zoysiagrass (UF) and FSA 1620 St. Augustinegrass (UF).

Three people talking near research plots

Dr. Becky Grubbs, AgriLife Extension Turfgrass Specialist- College Station, and Dr. Ben Wherley discuss the research with North Carolina State researcher, Dr. Grady Miller, during the field tour.

Engineered cotton uses weed-suppression chemical as nutrient

16Jul

Writer: Kay Ledbetter, 806-677- 5608, skledbetter@ag.tamu.edu
Dr. Keerti Rathore, 979-862-4795, rathore@tamu.edu

 

COLLEGE STATION – A newly developed fertilizer system will provide nutrition to engineered cotton crops worldwide and a deadly dose to weeds that are increasingly herbicide resistant, according to a Texas A&M AgriLife Research study.

Keerti Rathore, Devendra Pandeya and LeAnne Campbell in greenhouse

Dr. Keerti Rathore examines the health of ptxD-cotton plants being grown in the greenhouse for seed increase for a field trial with Dr. Devendra Pandeya and LeAnne Campbell. (Texas A&M AgriLife photo by Beth Luedeker)

The new system applies phosphite to cotton crops engineered to express a certain gene — a gene that makes cotton able to process the phosphite into nutrition while the same compound suppresses weeds that are unable to use it, researchers said.

“Our researchers here at Texas A&M AgriLife have addressed an issue that costs producers billions of dollars,” said Dr. Patrick Stover, vice chancellor of agriculture and life sciences at Texas A&M in College Station and AgriLife Research acting director. “This is an economical, envrionmentally safe and sustainable solution.

Stover said this is an exciting and timely discovery in the movement to get ahead of the ongoing problem of weeds evolving faster than the chemicals and other methods developed to control them.

“We believe the ptxD/phosphite system we have developed is one of the most promising technologies of recent times that can help solve many of the biotechnological, agricultural and environmental problems we encounter,” said Dr. Keerti Rathore, an AgriLife Research plant biotechnologist in College Station.

pigweed in cotton field

Palmer amaranth, more commonly known as pigweed, infests a High Plains cotton field. (Texas A&M AgriLife photo)

“Selective fertilization with phosphite allows unhindered growth of cotton plants expressing the ptxD gene while suppressing weeds” is the title of a Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America journal article to be released the week of June 4. The article will be found at: https://tinyurl.com/ptxDcottonphosphite.

Phosphorus is a major element required by all living beings – life is not possible without it. Most organisms can only utilize phosphorus in the form of orthophosphate.

“We have determined ptxD-expressing cotton plants can utilize phosphite as a sole source of phosphorus while weeds cannot, thus making it effective at suppressing weed growth,” Rathore said.

The transgenic plants expressing the bacterial ptxD gene gain an ability to convert phosphite into orthophosphate, he said. Such plants allow for a selective fertilization scheme, based on phosphite as the sole source of phosphorous for the crop, while offering an effective alternative to suppress the growth of weeds that are unable to utilize this form of phosphorus.”

The international research team led by Rathore consists of Dr. Devendra Pandeya, Dr. Madhusudhana Janga, Dr. Muthu Bagavathiannan and LeAnne Campbell, all with Texas A&M AgriLife in College Station. Others are Dr. Damar Lopez-Arredondo and Dr. Priscila Estrella-Hernandez at StelaGenomics Inc. and Dr. Luis Herrera-Estrella at the Center for Research and Advanced Studies of the National Polytechnic Institute, all in Irapuato, Mexico.

LeAnne Campbell and Keerti Rathore looking at tiny plants sealed in small jars

LeAnne Campbell and Dr. Keerti Rathore examine the quality of engineered transgenic cotton plants regenerated from tissue cultures. (Texas A&M AgriLife photo by Beth Luedeker)

This research was funded in part by Cotton Inc. Weed herbicide resistance and weed control are the No. 2 and No. 3 concerns of U.S. cotton farmers after input costs.

“We can and will deliver for our cotton producers in Texas and beyond, in collaboration with Cotton Inc. and partners,” said Dr. Bill McCutchen, executive associate director of AgriLife Research in College Station.

Weeds typically are managed manually, mechanically or chemically. However, he said, chemical control options are rapidly shrinking due to an increasing number of herbicide-resistant weeds in crop fields, with few alternatives on the horizon.

“Over the years, it has become abundantly clear that new strategies are needed for weed control to sustain agriculture production while reducing our dependence on herbicides,” Herrera-Estrella said. “There is an urgent need for alternative weed suppression systems to sustain crop productivity, while reducing our dependence on herbicides and tillage.”

Rathore, who has been researching genetic improvement of cotton for more than 20 years, said herbicide-resistance in weeds in not just a U.S. problem, but rather a global challenge for producers of cotton, corn and soybeans.

Such a development will also relieve some of the negative perceptions associated with the use of herbicide-resistance genes and heavy dependence on herbicides, he said.

Rathore has also developed cotton plants that produce very low levels of gossypol in the seeds to improve the safety and nutrition aspects of the cotton seed, but simultaneously maintain normal levels  of this chemical in the foliage, floral parts, boll rind and roots for protection against insects and pathogens.

He previously published a report identifying ptxD as a selectable marker gene to produce transgenic cotton plants. The ptxD gene derived from Pseudomonas stutzeri WM88 encodes an enzyme that changes phosphite into orthophosphate, a metabolizable form of phosphorus, when expressed in transgenic plants.

Importantly, the ptxD/phosphite system proved highly effective in inhibiting growth of glyphosate-resistant Palmer amaranth, Rathore said. Resistance to current technologies in this highly noxious weed started showing up in fields about 10-15 years ago.

tiny cotton plantlets in covered petri dishes

A cultured somatic embryo developing into a normal cotton plantlet following introduction of a transgene into cotton cells some 10 months previously. (Texas A&M AgriLife photo by Beth Luedeker)

“The results presented in our paper clearly demonstrate the ptxD/phosphite system can serve as a highly effective means to suppress weeds under natural, low-phosphorus soils, including those resistant to the herbicide glyphosate, while allowing better growth of the ptxD-expressing cotton plants due to lesser competition from the debilitated weeds,” Rathore said.

Unlike weeds acquiring resistance to herbicides, he said it is highly unlikely weeds will gain the ability to use phosphite as a source of phosphorus.

“In order for a weed to acquire the ability to utilize phosphite, one of its dehydrogenase genes will have to undergo a complex array of multiple mutations in its DNA sequence – that’s unlikely to happen by random mutations that occur in all organisms,” Rathore said.

Another important point, he said, is compared to phosphate, phosphite has higher solubility and a lower tendency to bind soil components. So, if it is applied in proper formulation to prevent leaching, lower quantities can be used without sacrificing the crop yields.

“Even if some phosphite ends up in streams and rivers and eventually in lakes and the sea, the algal species will be incapable of using it as a source of phosphorus, thus preventing toxic algal blooms that kill fish and other creatures in water bodies,” Herrera-Estrella said.

Future studies will focus on testing ptxD-transformants in the fields that are low in phosphorus as well as evaluating the utility of phosphite as an over-the-top ‘herbicide,’ Rathore said. Also, long-term impact of the use of phosphite as a source of phosphorus on the soil microflora under field conditions needs to be investigated.

Corn Whiskey Research in Aggieland

12Jul

Story and Photos by Beth Ann Luedeker

 

Dr. Seth Murray, Texas A&M Soil and Crop Sciences Associate Professor and Butler Chair, primarily focuses his research on improving the

Dr. Seth Murray putting corn tassles into collection bag

Dr. Seth Murray collects pollen from the tassles of a corn plant in his research field west of College Station, TX.

productivity, sustainability and quality of agriculture production through scientific research; most of his work is in corn (maize).

He has recently branched out, slightly, to help his graduate student, Rob Arnold, search for the ideal Texas-grown corn for the production of whiskey.

Arnold, who is working on his doctoral degree in Plant Breeding under Murray, is also the head distiller for Firestone & Robertson Distilling Company, of Fort Worth. Through controlled plant breeding, he and Murray are trying to develop Texas-grown corn varieties with distinctive and identifiable flavors to use in the production of whiskey.

Research is being conducted on non-GMO varieties of corn at the Texas A&M Farm outside College Station. Seed from selected varieties of corn are planted and hand-pollinated to control the genetics of each ear.

first shoot on corn stalk

The first shoots are covered as soon as they emerge, kept covered until pollination, and then re-covered.

Reuters recently wrote and article and created a video about these men, the distillery and Texas whiskey. It can be found at https://www.reuters.com/article/us-texas-whiskey/fields-of-dreams-texas-researchers-seek-to-redefine-u-s-whiskey-idUSKBN1JD09C

pollen being dumped on corn silks

Corn silks are uncovered, pollinated by hand and immediately re-covered to prevent additional pollen from contacting the plant.

“Despite being less than 1% of my research program, the amount of press interest this generated blew me away, from KBTX to the Eagle to NPR and the New York Times,” Murray said. “I found that colleagues at other institutions had similar experiences with their beer and wine related breeding and genetics.”

“I also learned there are opportunities to change the conversation if you are prepared,” he said. “I have interjected the importance of science, of public sector research, and the great things Texas A&M is doing every chance I got!”

girl bagging shoots in corn field

Regan Lindsey, senior Plant and Environmental Soil Science major, assisted Dr. Murray and his graduate students with the pollinating process.

Soil and Crop Science Faculty on X-Grants teams

12Jul

Written by: Beth Ann Luedeker

 

Part of President Michael Young’s excellence program, X-Grants is an interdisciplinary program intended to find creative solutions to some of the most important challenges facing the global society.

Several projects selected to receive X-Grants funding include Soil and Crop Sciences faculty. “CRISPER Gene Editing for Healthier Foods and Crop Resistance” is led by Dr. Michael Thomson; “Multi-functional and Sustainable Materials for 3-D Printing Environmentally Adaptive Resilient Buildings” is led by Dr. Paul Schwab; and Dr. Cristine Morgan is involved with “Monitoring Rapidly Changing Arctic Ecosystems Using High-Resolution Satellite-Based Datasets and Artificial Intelligence.

Dr. Michael Thomson

Dr. Michael Thomson

The CRISPR gene editing project led by Thomson includes 16 members across five departments and two agencies, including four other Soil and Crop Sciences faculty: Dr. Joseph Awika, Dr. Endang Septiningsih, Dr. Keerti Rathore and Dr. Sakiko Okumoto.

“The interdisciplinary team will enable greater interactions between faculty from the College of Engineering and COALS to accelerate the application of gene editing for crop improvement, facilitated by co-leaders from Electrical and Computer Engineering (Dr. Aniruddha Datta) and Plant Pathology and Microbiology (Dr. Libo Shan),” Thomson explained.

This two-year pilot project will test a series of breakthrough technologies that have the potential to increase the power and efficiency of crop gene editing, while at the same time establishing a collaborative platform called the “CRISPR Crops Initiative” to provide a focal point for crop gene editing activities on campus.

Healthier foods are needed to address the dual challenges of malnutrition in the developing world and chronic disease prevention in the developed world.  Likewise, changing climate patterns along with a greater demand for food require that future crops combine higher yields with tolerance to abiotic stresses and resistance to invasive pests and pathogens.

In 2012, a landmark discovery demonstrated that Clustered Regularly Interspaced Short Palindromic Repeat (CRISPR)-based bacterial defense systems can be used for precise gene editing. Since then, CRISPR technologies have begun to transform the fields of medicine, plant and animal research, and microbiology.

“One of the most promising applications of gene editing is to rapidly accelerate plant breeding efforts, as the technology is perfectly suited for a quantum leap in crop improvement due to the power of the technology to precisely modify genes and the straightforward regulatory pathway for this non-transgenic approach,” Thomson said.

“This project will establish the CRISPR Crops Initiative to encourage interdisciplinary interactions between faculty and will integrate advances into the new AgriLife Research Crop Genome Editing Lab to accelerate crop editing projects across the Texas A&M system through the core facility services.

 

Paul Schwab

Dr. Paul Schwab

Dr. Paul Schwab, an environmental soil chemist in the Department of Soil and Crop Sciences, is part of the 3-D printing project led by Dr. Zofia Rybkowski of the Department of Construction Science. Other team members include: Manish Dixit from Construction Science; Sarbajit Banerjee from Chemistry, Bjorn Birgisson from Civil Engineering; Negar Kalantar from Architecture; and Aditi Pandey, a doctoral student in soil science.

“3D printing is the computer controlled production of three-dimensional objects,” said Schwab. “Our team will be examining the application of 3D printing to the rapid production of structures, primarily buildings.”

Schwab explained that one unusual aspects of this project will be printing buildings from local materials while minimizing the environmental and ecological impacts of the construction. The base materials will be clay minerals or soils and will be used to establish the shape of the structure.

The team will seek to find local binding materials (cellulose, resins, lignins) that will hold the clays/soils together, much like straw is used in making adobe bricks, he said. Advanced molecular modeling will help choose and modify binders that will not inhibit the printing process and will cure quickly.

A larger scale computer-based model will control the 3D printer to add high levels of efficiency and sophistication to the construction including adaptive insulation, water repellency and the greatest structural stability while using the least amount of materials.

Potential applications of the emerging technology include erecting temporary structures in hostile environments, such as health clinics to fight disease in tropical jungles or shelters in remote locations.

 

Cristine Morgan

Dr. Cristine Morgan

The arctic project, led by Dr. Julie Loisel, is made up of ten members across five departments, including Morgan, a soil scientist in the Department of Soil and Crop Sciences, and professors in the departments of Geography, Civil Engineering, Computer Science, and Meteorology.

The goal of this pilot project is to incorporate big data into arctic research to generate the first reliable Holarctic map of permafrost-affected ecosystems and to address fundamental research questions pertaining to arctic science.

Land-use and climate change are impacting the world’s ecosystems even in the most remote areas, the grant writers explained. Permafrost soils contain large amounts of organic carbon and nitrogen which may be released if soils warm.

Currently there is no effective way to estimate future greenhouse gas emissions in permafrost-affected ecosystems.
According to the grant, this project will combine satellite based datasets with emerging computational and information technologies to monitor and document changes in the permafrost soils and associated greenhouse gas emissions.

This information will help determine the accuracy of current soil carbon predictive models, allow for data model comparison, provide new constraints on nitrogen cycling in the arctic and provide new means to monitor permafrost landscapes.

“Ultimately, we will contribute to the ongoing and future Arctic observational networks and provide new means to monitor permafrost landscapes,” the team said.

 

 

AgriLife Research and Forage Genetics International sign multi-year agreement

12Jul

Writer: Kay Ledbetter, 806-677-5608, skledbetter@ag.tamu.edu
Contact: Dr. Bill Rooney, 979-845-2151, wlr@tamu.edu

COLLEGE STATION – A greater interest in forage sorghums from the beef and dairy industries has led to a multi-year agreement between Texas A&M AgriLife Research and Forage Genetics International LLC, or FGI, a subsidiary of Arden Hills, Minnesota-based Land O’Lakes Inc.

“FGI is excited to collaborate with Texas A&M AgriLife Research and Dr. Rooney,” said Shawn Barnett, FGI president in Arden Hills, Minnesota. “For more than 25 years, FGI has led the forage industry with innovative genetic discoveries, variety developments and cutting-edge alfalfa product introductions.

Bill Rooney in sorghum field

Dr. Bill Rooney, a Texas A&M AgriLife Research sorghum breeder in College Station, manages an active breeding program with evaluation sites throughout Texas and the U.S. (Texas A&M AgriLife photo)

“This collaboration opportunity further expands our efforts to deliver best-in-class forage solutions to our customers and relentlessly pursue advancement in the forage industry,” Barnett said.

Dr. Bill McCutchen, executive associate director of AgriLife Research in College Station, said, “We are appreciative of FGI’s interest in our sorghum breeding program and willingness to invest in future outcomes. Within the agreement, FGI will have an option to license intellectual property developed in the program.

“Not only does this collaboration strengthen our program and FGI’s potential product development, but it will help identify forage sorghum traits that will benefit producers and all of the industry in years to come,” McCutchen said.

Rooney, an AgriLife Research sorghum breeder in the Texas A&M University department of soil and crop sciences, manages an active breeding program with evaluation sites throughout Texas and the U.S. His primary research activities are in the development of grain, forage and bioenergy sorghum parental lines for the production of commercial hybrids.

As commercial interest in bioenergy crops has waned, Rooney, who is the Borlaug-Monsanto Chair for Plant Breeding and International Crop Improvement, has transitioned from bioenergy to forage breeding.

“We’ve been working on forage sorghums for 20-plus years,” he said. “The challenges in the forage industry are to improve quality while maintaining agronomic productivity.”

Given the right hybrid combinations, silage sorghum has yields and quality comparable to corn silage. Further, that productivity is accomplished using less water, Rooney said.

He said the funding from FGI will help expand his forage breeding program, which has a goal of developing sorghum seed and pollinator parents with desirable forage quality and yield.

field with grain sorghum and forage sorghum

A Texas A&M AgriLife Research forage sorghum variety trial. (Texas A&M AgriLife photo)

“Our program has concentrated on seed and pollinator parents with desirable characteristics such as good leaf to stem ratios, producing forage plants of different types and heights,” Rooney said.

Matt Sowder, FGI director of corn silage/forage sorghum in Arden Hills, Minnesota, said, “Texas A&M AgriLife Research represents world class research and aligns with what we want to deliver to our customers. Through this collaboration, FGI can continue our intense focus on technology and hybrid development. Our joint efforts will provide FGI customers with cutting-edge solutions to productivity in their forage operations.”

Rooney said he is continually looking to improve sorghum for whatever challenges may arise, such as sugarcane aphids, foliar diseases and other stress tolerances to improve overall productivity and quality.

He said initially all the breeding process under the new agreement will be conducted at the College Station area facilities.

Texas A&M AgriLife researchers push drones to ‘read the weeds’

20Apr

Writer: Kay Ledbetter, 806-677-5608, skledbetter@ag.tamu.edu
Contact: Dr. Muthu Bagavathiannan, 979-845-5375, muthu@tamu.edu

 

COLLEGE STATION – Even barely poking through the ground, weeds are distinctive. Determining the right tools for early identification and control are the goals of an ongoing Texas A&M AgriLife Research project.

Dr. Muthu Bagavathiannan, AgriLife Research weed scientist in College Station, is using unmanned aerial vehicles, or UAVs, to “read the weeds.”

drone over research plots

A rotary wing drone captures images over a weed research plot at Texas A&M University, College Station. (Texas A&M AgriLife photo by Dr. Muthu Bagavathiannan)

“Our goal is to use advanced sensor technology to detect weeds from above the ground and implement precision weed management,” Bagavathiannan said.

The current practice is to have field scouts walk the large fields to look for weed issues, he explained. This is a tedious, time-consuming task that can be inaccurate, and bad weather conditions can prevent timely assessments of weed problems.

“But the UAV technology would provide the ability to fly over large fields and collect reliable information in a short time period that can be directly relayed into actionable information,” Bagavathiannan said. “We need this technology to make that identification sooner than the naked eye can.”

“The ultimate goal is to identify the weed species, the areas of the field they appear and in what densities so precision herbicide applications can be made or a herbicide program developed that better suits what is in the field,” said Dr. Vijay Singh, AgriLife Research assistant research scientist working with Bagavathiannan in College Station. “Geotagged maps would allow coordinates to be fed to a ground vehicle or an aerial applicator to treat specific areas.”

Members of the Texas A&M team that Bagavathiannan works with in College Station, among others, includes Dr. Nithya Rajan, AgriLife Research crop physiologist; Drs. Michael Bishop and Anthony Philippi at the Center for Geospatial Sciences, Applications and Technology, or GEOSAT; and Dr. Dale Cope, associate professor in the department of mechanical engineering.

The GEOSAT scientists are creating algorithms and indices that can one day be used by crop consultants to help producers identify weeds earlier, achieve greater control and use less chemical overall, thus be more economical and environmentally friendly.

man collecting data from research plot

Dr. Vijay Singh, A Texas A&M AgriLife Research assistant research scientist, uses a hyperspectral radiometer to collect reflectance signatures from weeds. (Texas A&M AgriLife photo by Dr. Muthu Bagavathiannan)

“Putting this information into the hands of a consultant will be more cost-effective, as they can fly multiple fields in a short time,” Bagavathiannan said.

“We started working on weed and crop species differentiation in 2015 and over the past two years, we’ve collected a good amount of preliminary data to be able to look at images and conduct analysis,” he said.

The project is not without its challenges, though, Bagavathiannan said.

“We have to be able to detect weeds when they are very small and treatable, and that is only achievable by flying very low or using very high resolution cameras,” Singh said. “We have found the rotary wing aircraft to be more useful than fixed wing, because they can hover at lower altitudes and perform agile maneuvering, which makes them well suited for field inspections.”

For instance, he said the current cameras are able to achieve a pixel size of 2 centimeters, but a size of a few millimeters is ideal for capturing more details of the weed and accurate identification.

Singh said a simple RGB image analysis was sufficient to differentiate some weeds, such as morning glories, devil’s claw and cocklebur, which can be done based on color, shape and textural features. They are also using multispectral and hyperspectral imagery, both useful in distinguishing several species.

“Hyperspectral imagery can pick up differences among weeds even at a distance,”  Bagavathiannan said.

They are currently developing a spectral library for different weeds using the high-end hyperspectral spectroradiometer available with Rajan.

“It can be difficult for the untrained eye to tell the difference between the pigweed species Palmer amaranth and waterhemp, but using hyperspectral, we can look at the spectral waves for differences; a wide band in the water region may indicate one over another,” Bagavathiannan said.

“The challenge will be in a stress situation such as drought, because that can influence the results you get,” Rajan said. “That’s why we need more intensive research to understand the influence of all these interacting factors.”

It is also possible to use multi-temporal remote sensing and thermal cameras to create a temperature map to identify different weed species as they may have different thermal signatures, Bagavathiannan added.

Other tools to incorporate are spatial information and knowledge integration.

“Each weed species has a specific structure and infestations have specific spatial features, which could be used to create algorithms for weed detection in the field,” said Bishop. “Also, certain weeds occur only at certain times of the year and that information can be integrated into the models.”

Bagavathiannan said weed detection is complex and there is no one-size-fits-all type solution.

“We may have to use more than one tool or employ all the tools together to achieve our goal,” he said. “At this point we are generating a database of critical fundamental information about weed species characteristics. Ultimately we will be able to develop cost-effective technology.”

Study sheds light on nodulation in guar

8Feb

Writer: Kay Ledbetter, 806-677-5608, skledbetter@ag.tamu.edu

Contact: Dr. Curtis Adams, 940-552-9941, Curtis.Adams@ag.tamu.edu

VERNON – Texas A&M AgriLife scientists are conducting several research projects to improve producers’ understanding of guar and the legume’s value to their operations in the Rolling Plains and South Plains.

Guar has been grown in Texas for more than a century, but acreage of the crop in the state is relatively low, said Dr. Curtis Adams, Texas A&M AgriLife Research crop physiologist in Vernon,

Lack of nodulation on guar roots is one of the producer concerns addressed in a recent AgriLife Research study by Adams and Dr. Calvin Trostle, Texas A&M AgriLife Extension Service agronomist in Lubbock, along with Dr. Santanu Thapa, AgriLife Research postdoctoral research associate in Vernon.

Nodulation is the process of forming nodules on the roots of legume plants. Nodules are root structures that legumes make to house bacteria capable of using nitrogen gas from the air to form fertilizer that the plant can use to grow.

Guar growing in research greenhouse

Dr. Curtis Adams, Texas A&M AgriLife Research crop physiologist, Vernon, tested the effects of contrasting soils, a sandy loam and a clay loam, and Rhizobium inoculants on nodulation and plant growth in two guar varieties in the greenhouse. (Texas A&M AgriLife photo by Dr. Curtis Adams)

The team conducted a controlled environment study to compare the impact of environmental and management factors on guar nodulation and crop nitrogen uptake, Adams said.

Guar is grown in semi-arid regions and produces a seed containing galactomannan gum, which is a product used in a variety of food and industrial applications as a lubricant, binder, thickener or hardener, he said.

“As a legume, Rhizobium bacteria in the soil will associate with guar roots and potentially develop nodules where the bacteria converts atmospheric nitrogen into fertilizer for the plant and soil,” he said, adding that “the plant is also drought tolerant and uses relatively little water.”

Thapa said guar is unfamiliar to most people, but it is a part of their lives nonetheless.

Guar has been grown in Texas for more than a century, but acreage of the crop in the state is relatively low. (Texas A&M AgriLife photo by Dr. Curtis Adams)

“Guar gum is a common ingredient in the food we eat every day,” he said. “It is used extensively in oil and gas exploration, and in so many other ways.”

The majority of the world’s guar is grown in India and Pakistan, and the U.S. has had variable and relatively low acreage over time, Trostle said. In the U.S., guar is mostly grown across the Southern Great Plains region where the climate is suitable.

“Guar being a legume and adapted to a semi-arid region’s dryland agriculture is important,” Trostle said. “There are few legumes that would be adapted in this type of environment. That is why this work is especially important, to get potential nitrogen fixation in a legume rotational crop where it doesn’t rain a lot.”

Adams said despite the potential nitrogen benefits of the crop, there is a worldwide perception that guar does not nodulate effectively.

“So, we tested the effects of contrasting soils, a sandy loam and a clay loam, and Rhizobium inoculants on nodulation and plant growth in two guar varieties,” he said.

Although Rhizobia bacteria often occur naturally in soils, Rhizobium inoculants are crop-specific bacterial cultures prepared in the lab and applied to the seed or in-furrow at planting to increase the likelihood of root nodulation, Adams said.

He said because guar acreage is not large in the U.S., there is a lack of inoculant products specific to guar.

“In our study, we tested one commercially available inoculant and a custom inoculant prepared by a microbiologist colleague, both containing bacterial strains thought to create nodules on guar roots that fix nitrogen,” he said.

Guar growing in field

Guar has been grown in Texas for more than a century, but acreage of the crop in the state is relatively low. (Texas A&M AgriLife photo by Dr. Curtis Adams)

Thapa said two iterations of the 50-day study were run in 2017. Plant growth, plant nitrogen concentration, measures of yield potential, root nodule number, nodule weight and other parameters were determined.

“The results of this study clearly showed in different soils that guar is capable of producing plenty of nodules,” Adams said. “The soils we tested are representative of the semi-arid soils on which guar is produced around the world.

“We saw very different nodule characteristics in each soil, with a high number of nodules of low weight in the clay loam soil and low number of nodules with high weight in sandy loam. In the end, the amount of nitrogen supplied to the plants was similar between soils.”

The difference in nodule characteristics between the soils may have resulted from differences in Rhizobia population already in the soil, Adams said.

The study showed no effect of the inoculants on the number or size of nodules or plant nitrogen uptake, Thapa said.

“We are not sure why the inoculants had no effects, but it likely has to do with survival or competitiveness of the inoculant bacteria, or naturally occurring levels of Rhizobia in the soil,” he said.

“Based on the results of this study, we expect guar will nodulate and supply nitrogen in the field, as long as the conditions are right,” Adams said. “Factors like drought or low soil levels of Rhizobia bacteria could prevent nodulation.”

But little is known about the effects of external factors on guar nodulation, he said, so there are still many questions to answer.

Trostle said recent discussion with an inoculant manufacturer may provide AgriLife the opportunity to work with experimental products to expand biological nitrogen fixation in semi-arid dryland agriculture.

Trostle said four additional federally funded projects, three led by AgriLife Research, are aimed at providing more information for producers on guar in relation to guar agronomics, wheat rotation, plant breeding/adaptation and bioenergy.

And, he said, if the production builds up, Texas growers of guar seed have a market in Brownfield. The guar is processed into several different products, either for supplying specialty manufacturers who do their own refining or direct use in commercial products.

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