Food and Agricultural Sciences News and Research

Latest Food and Agricultural Sciences News and Research

An overview on the transition to responsible, high-quality cocoa production

Worldwide demand for food from the tropics that meet higher environmental and social standards has risen sharply in recent years. Consumers often have to make ethically questionable decisions: products may be available to the global market through child labor, starvation wages, or environmental destruction.

20 Oct 2020

Use of nitrogen-containing fertilizers may increase climate-damaging carbon emissions

Concentration of dinitrogen oxide - also referred to as nitrous oxide - in the atmosphere increases strongly and speeds up climate change. In addition to CO2 and methane, it is the third important greenhouse gas emitted due to anthropogenic activities.

20 Oct 2020

KAUST researchers report a peculiar feeding strategy by titan triggerfish

Any Red Sea diver will have encountered colorful triggerfish along coral reefs, and some divers will have experienced the painful bite of their huge teeth if they get too close to their nesting grounds.

20 Oct 2020

Cheese-ripening bacteria respond to volatile gases produced by fungi

Scientists have discovered that fungi use many ways to interact with bacteria and one of these methods is through the smells emitted by cheese.

19 Oct 2020

UNM researchers identify medications that could help fight COVID-19 infection

University of New Mexico researchers who combed through a "library" of previously approved drugs believe they have identified a medication with the potential to help speed a patient's recovery from SARS-CoV-2 infection.

19 Oct 2020

Fertilization of paddy soil can help reduce greenhouse gases

A soil scientist from RUDN University discovered the effect of fertilization on the ability of the soil to retain carbon. To understand this mechanism, he and his team studied the movement of organic carbon in the soil of rice paddies.

19 Oct 2020

Plant genetic engineering can help address micronutrient malnutrition

More than two billion people worldwide suffer from micronutrient malnutrition due to deficiencies in minerals and vitamins.

19 Oct 2020

Researchers discover new protocol to detect lipid production in microalgae

Dietary supplementation of fatty acids produced from microalgae have wide-reaching health benefits for humans, including the ability to reduce obesity, diabetes and fatty liver disease, preventing hair loss, and assisting wounds to heal.

16 Oct 2020

Cell-cultured meat can surpass nutritional profile of conventionally farmed meat

Researchers have produced plant nutrients by genetically modifying the muscle cells of cows. These nutrients are not natively found in beef cells.

15 Oct 2020

Army researchers test alternative ways to measure COVID-19 antibody levels

Researchers with the U.S. Army Futures Command are part of a team that tested alternative ways to measure COVID-19 antibody levels, resulting in a process that is faster, easier and less expensive to use on a large scale. Their method holds promise for accurately identifying potential donors who have the best chance of helping infected patients through convalescent plasma therapy.

15 Oct 2020

Researchers assess heat-stress tolerance of different varieties of sweet potato

Climate change poses a threat to the world's subsistence crops. Heatwaves, which are likely to intensify according to climate evolution predictions, are generating levels of heat stress that are damaging to agricultural production.

15 Oct 2020

Future Of Farming

A $1.5 million grant awarded to an East Carolina University research team supports environment, farmers and rural communities.

15 Oct 2020

Cornell researchers aim to help vineyard growers identify nutrient deficiencies

The U.S. Department of Agriculture's National Institute of Food and Agriculture has awarded a $676,000 grant to a pair of Cornell University researchers aiming to use high resolution sensors to help vineyard growers identify nutrient deficiencies.

14 Oct 2020

Study shows how droughts are threatening the health of wetlands

University of Adelaide scientists have shown how droughts are threatening the health of wetlands globally.

14 Oct 2020

Study shows lasting immunity offered by SARS-CoV-2 antibodies

One of the most significant questions about the novel coronavirus is whether people who are infected are immune from reinfection and, if so, for how long.

14 Oct 2020

Researchers discover new gene involved in the architecture of grass inflorescence

The “spikelet meristem,” or SM for short, has a crucial role to play during the development of the grass inflorescence.

14 Oct 2020

Two proteins compete to give shape to plants

In an elegant choreography, plants take cues from their environment and channel them into flowers, roots, or branches.

13 Oct 2020

Scientists develop UK Crop Microbiome Cyrobank to facilitate sustainable yield improvement

Scientists from the UK's foremost agricultural research institutes have teamed up to create a new UK Crop Microbiome Cyrobank (UK-CMCB) to safeguard future research and facilitate the sustainable yield improvement of the UK's six major food crops including barley, oats, oil seed rape, potato, sugar beet and wheat.

12 Oct 2020

Genomes provide insights into fig-wasp coevolution

Banyan trees are fig trees that begin their life as an epiphyte. The most noticeable feature of banyan Ficus species is their extraordinary aerial roots, which enable them to live as hemi-epiphytes, as do the strangler figs often seen in tropical forests.

12 Oct 2020

Researchers investigate how mining activities affect deep seafloor food web

The deep sea is far away and hard to envision. If imagined it seems like a cold and hostile place. However, this remote habitat is directly connected to our lives, as it forms an important part of the global carbon cycle.

9 Oct 2020