Feature Channels: Agriculture

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The guidelines cover everything from planning, design and construction of the courses to water quality and quantity used. They also cover nutrition, integrated pest management, pollinator protection and energy management, said Bryan Unruh, a UF/IFAS professor of environmental horticulture.

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Columbia Engineering researchers have found that vegetation plays a dominant role in Earth’s water cycle, that plants will regulate and dominate the increasing stress placed on continental water resources in the future. “This could be a real game-changer for understanding changes in continental water stress going into the future,” says Prof. Pierre Gentine. In this paper, he demonstrates vegetation’s key role in responding to rising CO2 levels and shows how plants will regulate future dryness.

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Deep underground, changes to rock layers are impacting the Earth’s surface. The Soil Science Society of America (SSSA) April 1 Soils Matter blog explains how these deep layers inform our knowledge of surface soils.

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For the third consecutive year, Cornell University has posted a record-high number of applications for admission. More than 51,000 students sought a place in the Class of 2022.

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Ragweed, its pollen potent to allergy sufferers, might be more than a source of sneezes. In the Midwest, the plant may pose a threat to soybean production.Scientists have found that ragweed can drastically reduce soybean yield.

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In the wake of the 2010 Deepwater Horizon oil spill, University of Florida researchers surveyed people in Gulf coast communities, representing 930 household members, to learn patterns of seafood consumption. A key element needed for this effort was a tool to help survey participants accurately report how much Gulf seafood they actually eat. Anne Mathews, a UF/IFAS assistant professor of food science and human nutrition, led research that examined how accurately people could report their seafood intake, based on photographs of different portion sizes of cooked seafood.

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A research team at Virginia Tech has improved the traditional design of fog nets to increase their collection capacity by threefold

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The high price of sweetening your Sunday morning pancakes may be old news. A project led by Cornell University researchers promises to reverse the upward trend and help maple syrup producers get more sap from less land.

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A new analysis indicates that if the land used to support animal-based diets were instead used for food crops, it would add enough food to feed a further 350 million people – more than the entire population of the U.S.

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A team that includes Cal Poly Pomona scientists was honored for their work on an Integrated Pest Management (IPM) approach to help control the spread of the Asian citrus psyllid (ACP)

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The availability of livestock as a food source for vampire bats influences their immune response and infection by bacterial pathogens, according to a new paper in Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B. Because cattle ranching is common in areas where the bats live, the findings have implications for human as well as animal health.

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Research in an arid area of Texas has yielded a statewide rainwater harvesting award for a group at The University of Texas at El Paso.

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New study at the University of Haifa reveals the first archeological evidence of the role played by pigeons in Byzantine agriculture in the Negev: improving and fertilizing soil in vineyards and orchards

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Experiments testing a hybrid method of disposing of animal carcasses following animal health emergencies could point the way toward safer and more efficient carcass burial. The results of the experiments were published recently in a peer-reviewed scientific journal.

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Researchers at the Department of Energy’s Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (Berkeley Lab) and UC Berkeley have discovered that as plants develop they craft their root microbiome, favoring microbes that consume very specific metabolites. Their study could help scientists identify ways to enhance the soil microbiome for improved carbon storage and plant productivity.

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Some waters are so shallow, they're susceptible to boat propellers scarring the seagrass beds in them.

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To make protein, soybean plants need a lot of nitrogen. Beneficial bacteria in root nodules typically assist. A new study shows it’s possible to increase the number of soybean root nodules—and the bacteria that live there--to further increase crop yields. This could remove the need to apply additional nitrogen fertilizers.

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West Virginia University alumnus Jothiganesh Shanmugasundaram received an Outstanding Scientist Award during the National Conference on Climate Resilience for Sustainable Livelihood in Annamalai Nagar, Tamil Nadu, India on Wednesday, Feb. 28.

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On any given day, 20 percent of Americans account for nearly half of U.S. diet-related greenhouse gas emissions, and high levels of beef consumption are largely responsible, according to a new study from researchers at the University of Michigan and Tulane University.

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Patrick Dickinson, Texas A&M AgriLife Research water conservation horticulturist in Dallas, gives tips for repairing and maintaining sprinkler systems for EPA WaterSense Fix A Leak Week 2018. (Texas A&M AgriLife video by Gabe Saldana)

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The University of Portsmouth is playing a major role in a European project using agricultural and fisheries waste to develop sustainable methods and products to improve soil quality and reduce CO2 emissions.

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When most people walk into a grocery store, the shelves are stocked year-round with all the food they want, so they might not consider the origins of their food. Jack Payne, University of Florida senior vice president for agriculture and natural resources, said it’s critical to know the origins of our food supply, and not just the sake of being aware.

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The world drinks a lot of wine, and that means a lot of grapes are consumed every year. But not every part of the grape ends up in the bottle. Seeds, stalks and skins — roughly a quarter of the grapes —- are typically discarded in landfills as waste. But now, researchers say they have found some useful commercial applications, such as prolonging the shelf life of fatty foods, for these wine leftovers.

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Researchers at Queen’s University Belfast have discovered that the first people to inhabit Malta arrived 700 years earlier than history books indicate.

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New research reveals that even the highest performing maize crops contain rare harmful mutations that limit crop productivity.

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A researcher from Queen’s University Belfast has developed an interactive map of the island of Ireland which shows the impact the Great Irish Famine had on the population during the nineteenth century.

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We all want assurance that the food we eat is safe. The Soil Science Society of America (SSSA) March 15 Soils Matter blog explains how regulations regarding manure use on agricultural fields keep our food safe and the soil healthy.

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High-performance computing reveals the relationship between DNA and phosphorous uptake.

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How will the farms of the future feed a projected 9.8 billion people by 2050? Berkeley Lab’s “smart farm” project marries microbiology and machine learning in an effort to reduce the need for chemical fertilizers and enhance soil carbon uptake, thus improving the long-term viability of the land while increasing crop yields.

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Pumpkins and their seeds are good for you. For example, the flesh of the fruit is a good source of many vitamins and fiber, and its seeds provide unsaturated fats that help reduce cholesterol, among their other health benefits.

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Bioreactors, which are woodchip-filled ditches and trenches, are often used near crop fields to filter the water running off of them. The woodchips enhance a natural process called denitrification that prevents too much nitrogen from getting into other bodies of water like rivers and streams.

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A new paper by Northern Arizona University professor Andrew Richardson published in the journal Scientific Data describes a vast network of digital cameras designed to capture millions of images documenting seasonal changes of vegetation across North America.

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The American Society of Agronomy (ASA) has released four videos highlighting scientists in action. The series, “A Day in the Life,” explains the science of agronomy to the general public.

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MANHATTAN, Kan. – Kansas State University researchers have discovered how weeds develop resistance to the popular herbicide glyphosate, a finding that could have broad future implications in agriculture and many other industries. Their work is detailed in the March 12 edition of the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

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The colleges of engineering and agriculture worked together over the summer to find out if turfgrass conserves more water than real grass does. At the end of the project they concluded that turfgrass requires a lot more water to stay cool throughout the day than real grass does.

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Three women driving agricultural and ecological research in North Texas seek new solutions for sustainable urban and suburban living in 2018.

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While most industrial grain crops are annuals that must be replanted every year, a new perennial grain called Kernza has hit the markets with growing interest from restaurants, bakeries and brewers.

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This new study punches a hole in the idea that increased genetic complexity of sex chromosomes accompanied the origin of sexes.

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When you go online, do you want a flowery review of groceries, or do you want a write-up that’s more straightforward and factual? A new University of Florida study shows consumers find the “just-the-facts” approach more useful.

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Home and large-scale growers share a common struggle: weeds! The March 7th Sustainable, Secure Food blog post explains what makes weeds survive—and how to tackle them.

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Researchers at Durham University in the UK have identified a crucial link in the process of how plants regulate their antiviral responses. The research is published in the March 2 issue of the Journal of Biological Chemistry.

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The same products that get rid of internal parasites in livestock may adversely impact the dung beetles that help break down dung. That could be bad news for the dung beetles and livestock production.

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Letting the soil rest can be difficult economically for farmers. Researchers experimented with crop rotation and grazing to discover the least possible amount of time it would take to allow the soil to heal.

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Fertilisers with lower environmental impacts and reduced costs for farmers are being developed by University of Adelaide researchers in the world-first use of the new advanced material graphene as a fertiliser carrier.

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For years, scientists have argued about whether managing both nitrogen and phosphorus – versus managing strictly phosphorus or just nitrogen – would control harmful algal blooms.