Nitrogen is a vital nutrient for plants, but they can't pull it out of the air, hence the need for artificial fertilizer. But now, researchers have engineered bacteria that can efficiently suck nitrogen out of the air, and the long-term goal is to develop crops that can do the same.
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Although it's associated with nasty cigarettes, the tobacco plant is also a potential source of vaccines, biofuel and antibiotics. Now, a chemical from the plant is also being used as a bug repellent for crops, which could replace eco-unfriendly insecticides.
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Scientists have revealed that a genetic tweak to a single protein could result in crops needing up to 25 percent less water to produce a regular yield. It's hoped the breakthrough will lead to a new generation of water-efficient agriculture.
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Our planet is expected to host an extra two billion people by 2050, making food security a real issue. Researchers are now reporting an advance in a field known as speed breeding, which relies on intense lighting regimes to raise crops several times faster.
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If humans are ever going to colonize Mars, we need to make sure we can grow food locally. Now a team from Wageningen University & Research has found that earthworms might soon need a name change: these creatures crucial for making soil fertile, can thrive and reproduce in simulated Martian soil.
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A new study from the ESA has looked at how seedlings handle microgravity. The results show that the unusual conditions do stress the plants out, but they manage to adapt, which bodes well for the future of astronomical agriculture.
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With the world only getting hotter, scientists are already looking at clever ways of changing up food production to make sure future generations don't go hungry. New research looks in this area looks at breeding new kinds of peas that are built to take the heat.
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Is sex overrated? The asexual root-knot nematode might think so. It has evolved to reproduce without sex and while this might not sound like a life worth living, it has turned them into far more efficient crop-killing machines than their sexually reproducing cousins.
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Sugar cane farmers have to be very careful when carting off their harvests to prevent the trucks destroying surrounding plants and soil. Volvo has been working on a self-driving solution to this problem and says it can save farmers big money in lost yields per season.
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Plant roots are industrious, often burrowing in search of water even if it means dislodging things like pavement and sewer lines. But how is it exactly that they sense a source of water and nutrients and alter their path to find it?
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