Transformational Science
By Kathy Barnard, Marketing and News Services
Feed the world. Power the planet. Save the environment. It’s a tall order by any measure, but especially when you consider that experts predict that by 2035 the world population will grow to more than eight billion human beings. During that same timeframe, Washington State is expected to add three million to its current population of six million.
What does that kind of growth mean? It means eight billion hungry mouths to feed. It means increased demand for petrochemicals just as oil is becoming more costly and scarce. It means intensified competition for water between residential, agricultural, and other users. It means growing more on less as the amount of land dedicated to food production shrinks.
A Safe and Abundant Food Supply
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At the center of the issue is the agricultural enterprise of the 21st Century. How do you build a modern food system that is productive, competitive, and sustainable? With science. Innovative, transformational science. The same way Washington State University and the United States led the global “green revolution” in the 1960s.
“WSU has to do the best science we can,” said John Gardner, WSU vice president for economic development and Extension. “Plant science is key because it’s the place where solar energy is converted to carbon. And we need to be urgent about it. We need to rise to the occasion.”
It's in the Genes
Today’s transformational science starts at the most basic level of life—the gene. WSU has assembled some of the finest scientists in the world to help unlock the genetic secrets of all sorts of plants with an eye toward developing new, better varieties faster.
For example, WSU scientists are spearheading a public, international effort to map and unlock the secrets of the apple genome to develop better tree fruit faster. The vision is to create at WSU a genomics knowledge base of Rosaceae—which includes apples and other tree fruit as well as cherries, peaches, strawberries, raspberries, roses, and nuts—that will translate into improved and innovative varieties for growers in Washington and worldwide.
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But is it truly transformational? Absolutely, according to Dan Bernardo, dean of the WSU Col-lege of Agricultural, Human, and Natural Resource Sciences, and representatives from Washington’s agriculture industry.
“Genomics, genetics, and bioinformatics are the next major technological breakthrough that will revitalize and are revitalizing most industries within plant sciences,” Bernardo said.
Travis Allen,’00, general manager of Allan Brothers Fruit at Naches, clearly sees the impact of that science. “The WSU team is going to be able to give us the map that tells us how the apple works,” he said. “WSU is developing the hammer that is going to let us build a better building, and great things are going to happen.”
The partnership between scientist and grower has made American agriculture what it is today, according to Scott Yates, director of communications for the Washington Grains Alliance in Spokane.
“The march of science is amazing,” he said. “Just look at how precise it has been in its ability to kill specific insects and weeds.”
And, Yates noted, the increase in wheat yields and quality are directly linked to the breeding and introduction of new varieties developed through science by WSU and other researchers.
Science for the People
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How does science help? In production agriculture, it helps by providing plant breeders with better information about what genes control what traits in plants. With that in hand, breeding for specific characteristics, such as better nutrition or stronger disease resistance, changes from shotgun blasting to target shooting.
“There has been an explosion of genetic information on which breeders can make decisions, with which growers can identify disease,” said Ralph Cavalieri, associate dean and director of WSU’s Agricultural Research Center. “Information is power; it makes things happen much more quickly.”
Professor Mike Kahn, assistant director of the ARC, agreed.
“The stuff you would only find in IBC (WSU’s Institute of Biological Chemistry), you’re now finding in test kits used by field managers in the state,” he said.
Kahn emphasized that plants bred based on genomics information are not necessarily GMOs, the genetically modified organisms that have sparked heated debate throughout the United States and beyond.
“These are not GMOs,” he said. “They are traditionally bred plants, but the breeding process is much more precise because of the genetic information available.”
Cavalieri agreed. “Traditional wheat varieties took between 10 and 15 years from the time you made the first cross to the time it was field ready,” he said. “Now we are cutting that time by a half or a third, and growers are getting new varieties much faster.
“We can use molecular techniques,” he added, “to see what characteristics a tree would have long before it would bear any fruit, then screen out those without the genes we’re after and focus on those that do.”
That saves enormous amounts of time in the breeding process, Kahn said, and time is money.
“Practical application of this science allows us to do things much more quickly, increasing nutrition and yields with much more predictability,” he said.
More detailed genetic information also allows the industry to respond more quickly to disease outbreaks, Kahn and Cavalieri said. Instead of waiting several seasons to adjust a variety by traditional means, plant breeders armed with a better understanding of the genetic make-up of the plant can make changes for the very next growing season.
Let's Get Precise
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Another technological advancement that already is making a difference in the competitiveness and environmental sustainability for Washington farmers is precision agriculture.
“Instead of farming an entire field the same way, you can now farm part of a field,” Kahn said.
Aided by high-tech tools like WSU’s Web-based AgWeatherNet and DecisionAid systems, growers can apply fertilizers and other ag chemicals specifically when and where they will do the most good. “It’s a matter of putting the right input at the right place in the field at the right time,” Kahn said. And, that, he added, saves money and limits environmental impact.
Yates agreed. “I truly believe that—not in my lifetime or my children’s lifetime, but in their chil-dren’s lifetime—we will have farms operated with farmers sitting at their computers operating their combines and sprayers without anyone in them.”
Science and technology also may help address one of the most pressing challenges for growers today—labor shortages.
WSU scientists and Extension educators already are working on things like mechanized asparagus harvesters and robotic pesticide applicators for orchards that could help fill the labor gap. Tools of the future—including plants and trees bred to ease use of technology—could minimize environmental impacts and maximize product quantity, quality, and profits. And that means sustainability, even in light of significant population growth.
Whatever the future holds, partnership between the agricultural enterprise—farmers, processors, and consumers—and their land-grant institution will be as important as it has been for the past 150 years. The difference will be a sense of urgency and the willingness to explore the unknown and adopt the emerging.
“By virtue of our legacy and our status (as the state’s land-grant institution), we have a big role to play in all this,” Gardner said. “We need to take some risks, calculated and disclosed risks, to meet these urgent needs. The teaching, research, and extension missions of WSU are still relevant, but they have to meet the needs of the times.”
Farms, Food and the Future
- Transformational Science
- Growing Washington: A New Approach
- Unlocking the Bioproduct Potential of Plants
- ¡Si Habla Agricultura!
- Keeping it Local
- The Farm of the Future
- Planting the Seeds of Community Service