Seeds, Bees and Pollen was the theme at this year's hands-on exhibition run jointly by the Sainsbury Laboratory Cambridge University (SLCU) and Cambridge University Botanic Garden (CUBG) at Big Biology Day.
Overlap in lateral root and nodule development brings self-fertilising cereals one step closer
A vision of creating crops that do not need chemical fertilisers is one step closer thanks to the recent discovery that a substantial overlap exists in the developmental programmes plants use for lateral roots and nitrogen-fixing nodules.
Once dismissed as ‘junk DNA’ that served no purpose, a family of ‘jumping genes’ found in tomatoes has the potential to accelerate crop breeding for traits such as improved drought resistance.
Food of the Future: free online course launched to inspire the next generation of scientists
A new, free online course aimed at 16-19 year olds across Europe, funded by EIT Food and developed by the Gatsby Plant Science Education Programme (GPSEP) at the University of Cambridge alongside international partners, aims to inspire young people to study science so they can help to create food of the future.
Engineering new rhizosphere signalling networks to produce crops that need less fertiliser
An interdisciplinary research collaboration between SLCU and the University of Oxford has engineered a novel synthetic plant-microbe signalling pathway that could provide the foundation for transferring nitrogen fixation to cereals.
Giles Oldroyd announced as Professor of Crop Science at 3CS
The University of Cambridge has elected Giles Oldroyd to the Russel R Geiger Professorship of Crop Science, leading the Cambridge Centre for Crop Science (3CS), which is a partnership between the University of Cambridge and NIAB.
Ancestral deterrence strategy protects land plants from microbial infection
Scientists at Sainsbury Laboratory have uncovered striking similarities in how two distantly related plants defend against pathogens despite splitting from their common ancestor more than 400 million years ago.
Dr Sarah Robinson has joined the SLCU research leadership team and will head a new research group focused on investigating the mechanical properties of plants associated with growth.
