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Re: [permaculture] Researchers make discovery that could increase plant yield in wake of looming phosphate shortage.
Chronological
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Chronological
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Thread
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From
: Jacqueline Greenleaf <jacque@book-woman.net>
To
: permaculture <permaculture@mailman1.ibiblio.org>
Subject
: Re: [permaculture] Researchers make discovery that could increase plant yield in wake of looming phosphate shortage.
Date
: Mon, 24 Apr 2017 16:24:44 -0700
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On Apr 24, 2017, at 4:08 PM, Lawrence London <lfljvenaura@gmail.com> wrote:
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Researchers make discovery that could increase plant yield in wake of
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looming phosphate shortage.
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https://phys.org/news/2017-03-discovery-yield-looming-phosph.html#nRlv
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Scientists at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill have
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pinpointed a key genetic switch that helps soil bacteria living on and
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inside a plant's roots harvest a vital nutrient with limited global supply.
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The nutrient, phosphate, makes it to the plant's roots, helping the plant
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increase its yield.
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The work, published in the March 15 issue of *Nature*, raises the
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possibility of probiotic, microbe treatments for plants
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<
https://phys.org/tags/plants/
> to increase their efficient use of phosphate
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<
https://phys.org/tags/phosphate/
>. The form of phosphate plants can use is
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in danger of reaching its peak - when supply fails to keep up with demand -
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in just 30 years, potentially decreasing the rate of crop yield as the as
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the world population continues to climb and global warming stresses crop
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yields, which could have damaging effects on the global food supply
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<
https://phys.org/tags/global+food+supply/
>.
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"We show precisely how a key 'switch protein',PHR1, controls the response
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to low levels of phosphate, a big stress for the plant, and also controls
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the plant immune system," said Jeff Dangl, John N. Couch Distinguished
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Professor and Howard Hughes Medical Institute Investigator. "When the plant
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is stressed for this important nutrient, it turns down its immune system so
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it can focus on harvesting phosphate from the soil. Essentially, the plant
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sets its priorities on the cellular level."
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Dangl, who worked with lead authors, postdoctoral researchers Gabriel
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Castrillo and Paulo José Pereira Lima Teixeira, graduate student Sur
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Herrera Paredes and research analyst Theresa F. Law, found evidence that
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soil
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bacteria <
https://phys.org/tags/soil+bacteria/
> can make use of this
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tradeoff between nutrient-seeking and immune defense, potentially to help
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establish symbiotic relationships with plants. Bacteria seem to enhance
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this phosphate stress response, in part simply by competing for phosphate
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but also by actively 'telling' the plant to turn on its phosphate stress
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response.
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In recent plant biology studies, there have been hints of a relationship
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between plant phosphate levels and immune system activity - a relationship
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that some microbes can manipulate. In the new study, Dangl and colleagues
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delved more deeply into this relationship, using mutant versions of
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Arabidopsis thaliana, a weed that has long been the standard "lab rat" of
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plant biology research.
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In one experiment, Dangl's team found that Arabidopsis plants with mutant
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versions of the PHR1 gene not only had impaired phosphate stress responses,
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but also developed different communities of microbes in and around their
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roots when grown in a local native North Carolina soil. This was the case
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even in an environment of plentiful phosphate - where phosphate competition
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wouldn't have been a factor - hinting that something else was happening in
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the plants to trigger the growth of different microbial communities. The
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researchers found similar results studying PHL1, a protein closely related
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to PHR1 with similar but weaker functions.
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In another experiment, in lab-dish conditions, the researchers colonized
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roots of sterile-grown normal Arabidopsis plants with a set of 35 bacterial
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species isolated from roots of plants grown previously in the same native
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soil. In these re-colonized plants, the phosphate stress response increased
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when exposed to a low-phosphate condition.
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Investigating further, the team showed that PHR1 - and probably to a lesser
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extent PHL1 - not only activates the phosphate stress response
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<
https://phys.org/tags/stress+response/
> but also triggers a pattern of
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gene expression that reduces immune activity, and thus makes it easier for
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resident microbes to survive.
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The findings suggest that soil-dwelling microbes have figured out how to
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get along with their plant hosts, at least in part by activating PHR1/PHL1
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to suppress immune responses to them. Dangl's team also thinks these
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microbes may even be necessary for plants to respond normally to
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low-phosphate conditions. It could be possible, then, to harness this
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relationship - via probiotic or related crop treatments - to enable plants
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to make do with less phosphate.
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"Phosphate is a limited resource and we don't use it very efficiently,"
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said Dangl, who is also an adjunct professor of microbiology and immunology
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at the UNC School of Medicine. "As part of fertilizer, phosphate runs off
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into waterways where it can adversely affect river and marine ecosystems.
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It would be better if we could use phosphate in a way that's more
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efficient."
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Read more at:
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https://phys.org/news/2017-03-discovery-yield-looming-phosph.html#jCp
>
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[permaculture] Researchers make discovery that could increase plant yield in wake of looming phosphate shortage.
,
Lawrence London, 04/24/2017
Re: [permaculture] Researchers make discovery that could increase plant yield in wake of looming phosphate shortage.
,
Jacqueline Greenleaf, 04/24/2017
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