The Sustainable Agronomy Conference, sponsored by American Society of Agronomy (ASA) June 26-27, “will bring together the best science and the best practitioners to advance sustainability,” says Gary Pierzynski, ASA president.
University of Adelaide-led research has uncovered the history of when and why the native vegetation that today dominates much of Australia first expanded across the continent.
A team lead by researchers from the National University of Singapore has developed a self-sustaining anaerobic digester system that recycles food scraps to produce electrical energy, heat and fertilisers.
“The forests are natural draws for outdoor recreationists looking to see native Florida,” said Taylor Stein, a University of Florida professor of forest resources and conservation. Forests in Florida are home to all kinds of fascinating plants, trees and animals.
Contrary to previous analyses, research published by Michigan State University shows that projected changes in temperature and humidity will not lead to greater water use in corn. This means that while changes in temperatures and humidity trend as they have in the past 50 years, crop yields can not only survive – but thrive.
In Texas, the Southern High Plains uses water from an aquifer to water cotton fields. However, the aquifer is running low. Scientists from the area are working to find the best irrigation method for cotton that uses the least water.
To say that hard cider has been making a comeback is an understatement. In the U.S. alone, the hard cider market has increased more than 10-fold in the past decade, with sales reaching $1.5 billion in 2017. And Gregory Peck, assistant professor of horticulture, has been paying attention. Taking advantage of this upward trend, Peck has been tapping cider’s full potential to grow New Yorkstate’s apple market. Now he’s at the forefront of a hard cider renaissance.
The impacts of potential trade tariffs on crops such as soybeans would send ripple effects through other agricultural commodities, according to a Texas A&M AgriLife Extension Service economist.
Texas A&M AgriLife research will collaborate with the Texas Department of Agriculture and the University of California at Davis on a project to help agricultural producers and consumers through improving nitrogen use efficiency and food safety in spinach
This partnership between Beck's, the largest independent seed company in North America and Benson Hill Biosystems, is revolutionary for the agriculture industry in a couple of ways: It will deliver the first photosynthetic efficiency trait to the market, and it represents a novel channel for the development and delivery of biotech traits.
More neighborhoods are incorporating native grasses to their landscapes—but it’s not as easy as one might think. The Soil Science Society of America (SSSA) May 15 Soils Matter blog outlines the necessary conditions to rehabilitate land back to native grasses.
A recently identified pig virus can readily find its way into laboratory-cultured cells of people and other species, a discovery that raises concerns about the potential for outbreaks that threaten human and animal health.
“Between a bouquet that lasts one or two weeks at most and an orchid that can stay in bloom for three months and live up for 15 years or longer, orchids are definitely a winner for any mom’s heart,” said UF/IFAS environmental horticulture professor Wagner Vendrame, an orchid expert.
Healthy, fertile soil feeds our garden’s growth. The May 7th Sustainable, Secure Food blog explains how to build soil health in two words: organic matter!
New research out of the University of Wisconsin–Madison has, for the first time, detected prions responsible for chronic wasting disease (CWD) in samples taken from sites where deer congregate.
Southern Research’s Prosperity Fund is assisting an Alabama startup that sees one of nature’s great recyclers – the black soldier fly – as an instrument to convert chicken poop into high-value products such as protein-rich animal feed and organic fertilizer.
Skilled engineers for the Australian and global defense industries will graduate from a new dual Master's degree in engineering to be offered in Australia and France.
Indoor farming startup Beanstalk Farms has come a long way in a short period of time. Jack Ross and brother Michael Ross started their venture in the incubator program at the i.Lab in 2017, building a prototype and learning as much as they could about the complicated world of fresh produce. Jack Ross recently spoke about his experience launching Beanstalk; the UVA network on both coasts; and his quest for faster, cheaper and better-tasting lettuce and spinach.
Crop breeding research and innovation requires funding. But funding—and revenue from the crops developed—is increasingly hard to obtain.In response, a group of plant breeders met to discuss best practices. A recent paper summarizes their recommendations.
CTC, the world’s largest sugarcane technology company, announced today that following a nationwide search, the company has selected St. Louis, Missouri for its North American research headquarters.
The Department of Defense wants to know as far in advance as possible when and where these mass migrations are likeliest to happen. That way, the federal government can know when and where to deploy military force and where to send humanitarian aid, as just two possible examples.
The concrete jungle is anything but natural. But there are ways to help it be a little greener. The Soil Science Society of America (SSSA) May 1 Soils Matter blog explains what green roofs are, and how they benefit urban life.
Summers are no time to relax for Adam Willman. Instead, the graduating Iowa State University senior in agronomy and global resource systems has hopped on a plane every summer to study and work – from California to Turkey to Morocco to China.
Scientists from Kenya and South Dakota are evaluating the bread’s starch digestibility and nutritional potential to sweet potato-enriched bread to help prevent vitamin A deficiency in Africa.
About 21 million years ago, a fungus that causes a devastating disease in rice first became harmful to the food that nourishes roughly half the world’s population, according to an international study led by Rutgers University–New Brunswick scientists.The findings may help lead to different ways to fight or prevent crop and plant diseases, such as new fungicides and more effective quarantines.
A new approach developed by Iowa State University scientists could allow plant breeders and farmers to diagnose soybean stresses – such as iron deficiency, disease or herbicide injury – by using a smartphone. The technology may have uses in unmanned aerial vehicles and ground robots as well. The researchers describe their approach in a recently published article in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.
How do you boost soil water content and soil health without irrigating? Best cover it with a layer of straw, a new study concludes.
Bovine mastitis is typically treated with antibiotics, but with the potential threat of antimicrobial resistance and the disease’s long-term harm to the animal’s teat, researchers at the Cornell University College of Veterinary Medicine are laying the foundation for alternative therapies derived from stem cells.
The “Campus as a Living Lab” program uses the CSU itself to teach students real-world skills that are good for the planet and the future of California.
Mississippi State University President Mark E. Keenum was designated chairman of the Board for International Food and Agriculture Development (BIFAD) by President Donald J. Trump, the White House announced this week.
Many homeowners appreciate the springy feel of a healthy lawn. But what are the tricks to keeping your lawn healthy? The April 22nd Sustainable, Secure Food blog explains how to maintain your lawn, and where to find resources specific to your region.
The Latest News On Marijuana Research
The Waterloo Centre for Microbial Research has joined the International Alliance for Phytobiomes Research as a sponsoring partner, both organizations announced today
Gardeners, are you eager for winter to lose its icy grip? There’s no time like the present to improve your garden knowledge! Soils Matter, Soil Science Society of America’s science-based blog, provides insights to starting off the garden season.
More than one in five fawns of white-tailed deer – the most economically important big-game mammal in the United States – can contract a malaria parasite, making fawns susceptible to diseases and death, a new study co-authored by a University of Florida researcher shows.
Americans waste nearly a pound of food per person each day, but the exact amount of food we trash differs by how healthy your diet is, new research finds. Annually, food waste corresponds with the use of 30M acres of land (7% of total US cropland) and 4.2 trillion gallons of water. Surprisingly, higher quality diets were associated with higher levels of food waste.
Researchers from Uppsala University are using neutrons to study RuBisCO, an abundant enzyme essential to life on earth. They hope to determine how plants and other organisms use this enzyme to catalyze a reaction called carbon fixation that converts carbon dioxide into useful organic compounds.
We might think of roots as necessary, but uninteresting, parts of the crop production process. New research, however, focuses on what’s going on in the soil with the plant’s roots and the chemicals they produce.
UC San Diego biologists have created the world’s first gene drive system—a mechanism for manipulating genetic inheritance—in Drosophila suzukii, an agricultural pest that has invaded much of the United States and caused millions of dollars in damage to high-value berry and other fruit crops.
Dairy farmers use antibiotics to keep their herds healthy and production high. At the same time, these treatments threaten to harm public health through the creation of antibiotic-resistant bacteria. While the full impact of such antibiotics on humans is not completely understood, a new Cornell University study has pinpointed the financial toll that eliminating antibiotic use would have on dairy farms, a finding that could help guide regulatory policy.
UF/IFAS researchers are exploring all sorts of crops, including hops, artichokes, pomegranates, blackberries, olives and more.
Researchers have found that increasing land clearing for logging in Solomon Islands–even with best management strategies in place – will lead to unsustainable levels of soil erosion and significant impacts to downstream water quality.
Each year, farmers in the U.S. purchase tens of millions of pounds of antibiotics approved for use in livestock. When the animals’ manure is reused as fertilizer or bedding, traces of the medicines leach into the environment. New research holds troublesome insights with regard to the scope of this problem.
Where machine learning meets spring planting and big data intersects with farming big and small, two Washington University in St. Louis researchers at Olin Business School have devised a computational model so farmers and seedmakers could take the guesswork out of which particular variety of, say, soybean to plant each year.
Home and property owners often enhance their landscapes with the beautiful lantana, but some of the plant’s varieties may escape yards, spread to areas where they shouldn’t go and cross-pollinate Florida’s native lantana. Bloomify™ Rose and Bloomify™ Red are beautiful – so they will continue to enhance landscapes – but they don’t produce fruit and seeds, don’t spread and don’t cross-pollinate Florida’s native lantana, Lantana depressa, said Zhanao Deng, a professor of environmental horticulture at the UF Institute of Food and Agricultural Sciences.
WCS announced today that a group of the world’s leading coffee companies has committed to addressing deforestation from illegal coffee production inside Indonesia’s Bukit Barisan Selatan (BBS) National Park – a key protected area for Sumatran tigers, rhinos, and elephants.
World-renowned University of Florida entomologist Nan-Yao Su came up with the idea for a termite-baiting system when he was a graduate student. Now, his peers in the pest management industry are recognizing Su for the global success of his invention, known as Sentricon®.
Researchers have good news for growers. Farmers raising a nitrogen-hungry crop like sweet corn may save up to half of their nitrogen fertilizer cost. The key: using a faba bean cover crop.
Colony collapse disorder has claimed more than 50 percent of honeybee populations the world over. A Creighton biologist is looking at a virus spread by a mite that could be a leading culprit.
UF/IFAS researchers like Fred Gmitter saw some of the fruits of their labor consumed at this week’s Flavors of Florida event in Gainesville, Florida.
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