An Anglo-Danish biological insights group has identified a way to reduce emissions from cattle by selecting the ones that produce less methane using genetic tools. Using genetics, scientists from Synomics identified a gene in cattle that causes excessive methane production. The group claims that selective breeding will help farmers breed »
As meat-eating continues to increase around the world, food scientists are focusing on ways to create healthier, better-tasting and more sustainable plant-based protein products that mimic meat, fish, milk, cheese and eggs. It's no simple task, says food scientist David Julian McClements, University of Massachusetts Amherst Distinguished Professor and lead »
Scientists from the Institut National de la Recherche Scientifique (INRS) have developed a packaging film made of shellfish shells, essential oils, and nanoparticles to keep strawberries fresh for up to 12 days. The film possesses antifungal and antimicrobial properties that help in preserving the strawberries. It is made of chitosan, »
Scientists at the University of California Riverside are hoping the RNA of an obscure infection can one day be used like a Trojan horse to deliver life-saving treatments to citrus trees. Citrus yellow vein disease, discovered 64 years ago in Riverside has finally been unraveled, a significant step toward harnessing »
From 1980 to 2016, grain production in Brazil increased more than fourfold, and the country now stands as the world's largest soybean exporter and the second largest exporter of corn. The two main drivers of this increase in food production were cropland expansion and double-cropping, harvesting two crops, such as »
Jeffrey Dangl and his research team at the Howard Hughes Medical Institute (HHMI) have discovered the mechanism that plants use to self-destruct in order to survive. Plant cells self-destruct to survive. When they detect a pathogen, they set off a chain reaction that ultimately destroys them, preventing the disease from »
Researchers from the Chinese Academy of Agricultural Sciences and partners used CRISPR-Cas9 technology to engineer broad-spectrum disease resistance on rice. The results of their study are published in the Journal of Integrative Plant Biology. Rice blast and bacterial blight are two of the most destructive diseases of rice caused by »
Land productivity could be greatly increased by combining sheep grazing and solar energy production on the same land, according to new research by Oregon State University scientists. This is believed to be the first study to investigate livestock production under agrivoltaic systems, where solar energy production is combined with agricultural »
Scientists from Jilin Academy of Agricultural Sciences and Jilin Normal University in China used polypeptide fusion strategy to study the capacity of the elastin-like polypeptide (ELP) and γ-zein fusions in boosting the production of recombinant protein in soybean seeds. The results are published in Transgenic Research. Soybeans are considered as »
Researchers in Penn State's College of Agricultural Sciences have developed a robotic mechanism for mushroom picking and trimming and demonstrated its effectiveness for the automated harvesting of button mushrooms. In a new study, the prototype, which is designed to be integrated with a machine vision system, showed that it is »
The expression of a single protein located in the subcellular organelles of the tomato was found to help speed up or slow down its fruit ripening, providing a novel opportunity for crop improvement. Scientists from the University of Oxford focused on the role of plastids, or the sub-cellular organelles in »
