$1 Million Project Aims To Stem the Seeds of Climate Change
June 9, 2021 Protecting crops from pests and disease is a constant battle for farmers. Climate change adaptation is becoming another concern to factor in for future production purposes. A new study backed by the Foundation for Food & Agriculture is set to turn up the heat on this hot-button issue, specifically for tomato growers.
The $1.1 million grant allows researchers to examine how rising temperatures impact development of tomato fruit and seeds. As a result of the project, producers of fresh market and processing tomatoes will have higher quality seeds for establishing their crops.
“The environment has a huge impact on plant health and reproduction,” says Heqiang “Alfred” Huo, University of Florida Assistant Professor of plant breeding and one of the four grant recipients. “Farmers and growers expect uniform seed quality, but variable quality due to environmental factors like high temperature cause poor plant population establishment and farmers experience big economic losses.
“Seed quality and plant vigor are heavily dependent on where the seed was produced and can be inconsistent. Seeds produced in Chile are very different than those produced in Mexico or Canada. Seed germination rate and vigor varies a lot based on the seeds’ origin and can impact farmers greatly. We try to understand why and how genetic and environmental factors, like temperature, impact seeds to help bring consistency to farmers.”
Three other leading scientists at the University of California, Davis will be working on the project with Huo.
“Each researcher involved in this project has a different objective,” Huo says. “The principal investigator of this project, Kent Bradford, Professor at UC Davis will work on seed physiology; another will work on how temperature affects tomato fruit development; and the third will examine the effect of temperature on pollen viability and pollination of tomatoes. At UF/IFAS, we will investigate how small RNAs – a type of short, tiny nucleotides – are responsive to different temperatures experienced by the mother plant during seed development.”
This study is an expansion of Huo’s current research, supported by a $420,000 USDA grant to study the same concerns with lettuce. Temperature has a significant impact on lettuce flowering, seed production, and seed germination as well.
“We hope that we can identify some interesting small RNAs and examine their function in controlling seed quality,” Huo adds. “We then develop practical application approaches for seed companies, growers and the nursery industry to control plant development and seed production for consistent results.”
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