(Press-News.org) CHAMPAIGN, Ill. -- Using high-performance computing and genetic engineering to boost the photosynthetic efficiency of plants offers the best hope of increasing crop yields enough to feed a planet expected to have 9.5 billion people on it by 2050, researchers report in the journal Cell.
There has never been a better time to try this, said University of Illinois plant biology professor Stephen P. Long, who wrote the report with colleagues from Illinois and the CAS-MPG Partner Institute of Computational Biology in Shanghai.
"We now know every step in the processes that drive photosynthesis in C3 crop plants such as soybeans and C4 plants such as maize," Long said. "We have unprecedented computational resources that allow us to model every stage of photosynthesis and determine where the bottlenecks are, and advances in genetic engineering will help us augment or circumvent those steps that impede efficiency."
Substantial progress has already been made in the lab and in computer models of photosynthesis, Long said.
"Our lab and others have put a gene from cyanobacteria into crop plants and found that it boosts the photosynthetic rate by 30 percent," he said.
Photosynthetic microbes offer other clues to improving photosynthesis in plants, the researchers report. For example, some bacteria and algae contain pigments that utilize more of the solar spectrum than plant pigments do. If added to plants, those pigments could bolster the plants' access to solar energy.
Some scientists are trying to engineer C4 photosynthesis in C3 plants, but this means altering plant anatomy, changing the expression of many genes and inserting new genes from C4 plants, Long said.
"Another, possibly simpler approach is to add to the C3 chloroplast the system used by blue-green algae," he said. This would increase the activity of Rubisco, an enzyme that catalyzes a vital step of the conversion of atmospheric carbon dioxide into plant biomass. Computer models suggest adding this system would increase photosynthesis as much as 60 percent, Long said.
Computer analyses of the way plant leaves intercept sunlight have revealed other ways to improve photosynthesis. Many plants intercept too much light in their topmost leaves and too little in lower leaves; this probably allows them to outcompete their neighbors, but in a farmer's field such competition is counterproductive, Long said.
Studies headed by U. of I. plant biology professor Donald Ort aim to make plants' upper leaves lighter, allowing more sunlight to penetrate to the light-starved lower leaves.
Computer modeling of photosynthesis also shows researchers where the traffic jams occur - the steps that slow the process down and reduce efficiency.
"The computer model predicts that by altering this system by up-regulating some genes and down-regulating others, a 60 percent improvement could be achieved without any additional resource - so 60 percent more carbon could be assimilated for no more nitrogen," Long said.
"The next step is to create an in silico plant to virtually simulate the amazingly complex interactions among biological scales," said U. of I. plant biology professor Amy Marshall-Colon, a co-author on the report. "This type of model is essential to fill current gaps in knowledge and better direct our engineering efforts."
While many scientific, political and regulatory hurdles remain for plants engineered to do a better job of converting the sun's energy into biomass, the work should be undertaken now, Long said.
"If we have a success today, it won't appear in farmers' fields for 15 years at the very earliest," he said. "We have to be doing today what we may need in 30 years."
INFORMATION:
Stephen Long is a professor in the Carl R. Woese Institute for Genomic Biology at Illinois.
Funding for this work was provided by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, the U.S. Department of Agriculture, the National Science Foundation and the Chinese Academy of Sciences.
Editor's notes:
To reach Stephen Long, call 217-2440-0881; email slong@illinois.edu.
The paper, "Engineering crop photosynthesis and yield potential to meet the global food demand of 2050," is available to members of the media from the U. of I. News Bureau.
Scientists have revealed a brand new function for one of the first cancer genes ever discovered - the retinoblastoma gene - in a finding that could open up exciting new approaches to treatment.
The retinoblastoma gene is so called because mutations to it cause a rare children's eye cancer of the same name, and is known to play a central role in stopping healthy cells from dividing uncontrollably.
Now the new study - jointly led by scientists at The Institute of Cancer Research, London, and UCL (University College London) - has found that the gene also has another important ...
How you feel pain is affected by where sources of pain are in relation to each other, and so crossing your fingers can change what you feel on a single finger, finds new UCL research.
The research, published in Current Biology, used a variation on an established pain experiment, known as the "thermal grill illusion". In the thermal grill illusion, a pattern of warm-cold-warm temperatures applied to the index, middle and ring finger respectively causes a paradoxical, sometimes painful, sensation of burning heat on the middle finger - even though this finger is actually ...
Sand, rocks, grains, salt or sugar are what physicists call granular media. A better understanding of granular media is important - particularly when mixed with water and air, as it forms the foundations of houses and off-shore windmills. Until recently, there was no single theory that could account for granular media's flows at different speeds. Now, a new theory dubbed GSH, which stands for granular solid hydrodynamics, is supplementing previous models of granular material that work only for narrow speed ranges. And Yimin Jiang from Central South University, Changsha, ...
CHICAGO (March 26, 2015): A new study of women with early-stage breast cancer finds that surgeons no longer universally remove most of the lymph nodes in the underarm area when a biopsy of the nearby lymph nodes shows cancer--a major change in breast cancer management. The study, which evaluated data from 2.7 million U.S. breast cancer patients, is published as an "article in press" on the Journal of the American College of Surgeons website in advance of print publication later this year.
Until now, it was unclear to what extent surgeons were following the recommendations ...
Researchers at the University of Texas at Dallas have created new structures that exploit the electromechanical properties of specific nanofibers to stretch to up to seven times their length, while remaining tougher than Kevlar.
These structures absorb up to 98 joules per gram. Kevlar, often used to make bulletproof vests, can absorb up to 80 joules per gram. The material can reinforce itself at points of high stress and could potentially be used in military airplanes or other defense applications.
In a study published by ACS Applied Materials and Interfaces, a journal ...
PROVIDENCE, R.I. [Brown University] -- In a paper published in the journal Nanoletters, the researchers describe methods for making nanoribbons and nanoplates from a compound called silicon telluride. The materials are pure, p-type semiconductors (positive charge carriers) that could be used in a variety of electronic and optical devices. Their layered structure can take up lithium and magnesium, meaning it could also be used to make electrodes in those types of batteries.
"Silicon-based compounds are the backbone of modern electronics processing," said Kristie Koski, ...
TAMPA, Fla. - The lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender/transsexual, queer/questioning and intersex (LGBTQI) population has been largely understudied by the medical community. Researchers at Moffitt Cancer Center found that the LGBTQI community experience health disparities due to reduced access to health care and health insurance, coupled with being at an elevated risk for multiple types of cancer when compared to non-LGBTQI populations.
Gwendolyn P. Quinn, Ph.D., scientific director of the Survey Methods Core Facility at Moffitt, identified physicians largely operate ...
Men with a high fitness level in midlife appear to be at lower risk for lung and colorectal cancer, but not prostate cancer, and that higher fitness level also may put them at lower risk of death if they are diagnosed with cancer when they're older, according to a study published online by JAMA Oncology.
While the association between cardiorespiratory fitness (CRF) and cardiovascular disease (CVD) has been well-established, the value of CRF as a predictor of primary cancer has gotten less attention, according to background in the study.
Susan G. Lakoski, M.D., M.S., ...
WASHINGTON, D.C. - Buildings destroyed by the 2011 Tohoku earthquake released thousands of tons of climate-warming and ozone-depleting chemicals into the atmosphere, according to a new study.
New research suggests that the thousands of buildings destroyed and damaged during the 9.0 magnitude earthquake and tsunami that struck Japan four years ago released 6,600 metric tons (7,275 U.S. tons) of gases stored in insulation, appliances and other equipment into the atmosphere.
Emissions of these chemicals, called halocarbons, increased by 21 percent to 91 percent over ...
MINNEAPOLIS - A blood test may shed new light on Fragile X syndrome related disorders in women, according to a new study published in the March 25, 2015, online issue of Neurology®, the medical journal of the American Academy of Neurology. Fragile X is the most common inherited form of intellectual disability and the most frequent genetic cause of autism.
Fragile X, which is caused by a mutation in a single gene on the X chromosome, affects about 1 in 4,000 men and 1 in 6,000 women. Even more common are Fragile X carriers of a lesser change in the Fragile X gene ...
