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Scientific Breakthrough Increases Plant Yields By One Third (wsu.edu)
Slashdot reader schwit1 writes, "Plant scientists have found a way to encourage plants to better use atmospheric nitrogen, thus increasing yields by more than one third. The technique not only produces healthier plants and more seeds, it reduces the need for fertilizer, the overuse of which can be an environmental issue." From WSU News:
For years, scientists have tried to increase the rate of nitrogen [conversion] in legumes by altering...interactions that take place between the bacterioid and the root nodule cells. [Washington State University biologist Mechthild] Tegeder took a different approach: She increased the number of proteins that help move nitrogen from the rhizobia bacteria to the plant's leaves, seed-producing organs and other areas where it is needed. The additional transport proteins sped up the overall export of nitrogen from the root nodules.
This initiated a feedback loop that caused the rhizobia to start fixing more atmospheric nitrogen, which the plant then used to produce more seeds. "They are bigger, grow faster and generally look better than natural soybean plants," Tegeder said.
This initiated a feedback loop that caused the rhizobia to start fixing more atmospheric nitrogen, which the plant then used to produce more seeds. "They are bigger, grow faster and generally look better than natural soybean plants," Tegeder said.
Why didn't natural selection already "discover" this? Perhaps there's a big trade-off that hasn't been discovered yet.
Table-ized A.I.
Honestly having enough food is the least of the problems with too many people on the planet.
The big problem is that every calorie of food requires the input of 10 calories of fossil-fuel energy, mainly from oil and gas, which will be running out within your lifetime.
"I bless every day that I continue to live, for every day is pure profit."
You are right that political issues don't make you anti-science, but the vast, vast majority of complaints about GE crops I see claiming to be 'political issues' are simply nonsense dressed up to justify irrational opposition. I'm not sure which specific patent problem you are referring to though.
You are also right that we need better regulation. The regulations on GE crops are so strict right now that only one non-corporate GE crop is presently in use right now...the Rainbow papaya, developed by the University of Hawai'i, and even the creator of that one believes that the only reason that one made it is because it was released before the regulations became stricter. Very recently we saw approval of an apple by a smaller company. If you want to avoid excessive corporate control by Monsanto (which by the way isn't actually a monopoly considering that the are several other similar companies out there, like Pioneer, Syngenta, Bayer Crop Science, and Dow AgroSciences) then what we need are regulations that will allow innovations like this to actually come to use instead of being shelved indefinitely, which is the fate of most university developed GE crops.
Monsanto's first generation of GE soybean went off patent a while back and anyone can now use it. Unlike copyright, plant patents do actually expire.
Maybe. But then there's that little bit in TFS that says "it reduces the need for fertilizer". Which means less petrochemical input into the food cycle. That could be a good thing.
Have gnu, will travel.
Plant and animal hormones share a chemical structure.
We're evolved to eat 'pseudo estrogens'. Picking a particular plant to fear, misses be basic point.
First: they are phytoestrogens not pseudo estrogens.
Second: different estrogen class steroids bind differently to different receptor types
Third: different receptor types have differing physiological expressions.
Your reply is like saying we share opioid structures with plants and have evolved that way so different plants and different opioids do not matter.
You have definitely missed the basic point of my post which, just to make clear, was soy estrogens do not cause breast enlargement at any humanly consumable level, but 8-Prenylnaringenin, which is converted by gut bacteria from Isoxanthohumol is far more potent and binds to the receptor which will cause breast growth.
In case anyone is wondering genestine (the phytoestrogen in soybeans), is 100 times weaker than 8-Prenylnaringenin.
They are GMOs - the abstract specifically mentions that the plants are transgenic. How big a problem that is though depends on what exactly they did. I mean it's already almost impossible to get your hands on non-GMO soybeans in the US, and this modification manages to simultaneously boost yields, reduce fertilizer demands, and potentially improve long-term soil health. Exactly the sort of GMOs I'm actually (tentatively) in favor of.
Since it's transgenic I'm guessing they now produce additional kinds of nitrogen-transport proteins rather than just boosting the levels of the proteins they already use, which does increase the potential for health problems to emerge in those who eat them, unless they're something already found in other food crops. Even if not though, they're far less likely to cause problems than transgenic "pest-resistance" genes, which as a rule specifically code for the plant to produce anti-pest toxins. Even if those poisons aren't an obvious short-term problem for mammals, thy may present longer-term risks - after all an awful lot of our cellular biology is still shared with insects and the like.
Personally, I'd have a lot fewer problems with GMOs if we made two modifications to the law:
1) eliminate gene patents, and with them a host of the perverse incentives currently infesting the industry.
2) require all new compounds produced in modified organisms to undergo extensive independent safety testing at least on par with what the FDA (supposedly) requires for new drugs.
--- Most topics have many sides worth arguing, allow me to take one opposite you.