BIOTECHNOLOGICAL APPROACHES TO VEGETABLE CROP BREEDING

Genetic and biotechnological approaches for biofuel crop improvement.

Research and development efforts for biofuel production are targeted at converting plant biomass into renewable liquid fuels. Major obstacles for biofuel production include lack of biofuel crop domestication, low oil yields from crop plants as well as recalcitrance of lignocellulose to chemical and enzymatic breakdown. Researchers are expanding the genetic and genomic resources available for cr...

Breeding Bees to the Crop

Starch biosynthesis, its regulation and biotechnological approaches to improve crop yields.

Structurally composed of the glucose homopolymers amylose and amylopectin, starch is the main storage carbohydrate in vascular plants, and is synthesized in the plastids of both photosynthetic and non-photosynthetic cells. Its abundance as a naturally occurring organic compound is surpassed only by cellulose, and represents both a cornerstone for human and animal nutrition and a feedstock for m...

Sustainable vegetable crop supply problem

We consider an agricultural production problem, in which one must supply a given demand of crops while respecting ecologically-based production constraints. The problem is twofold: in order to supply the demand, one must determine the division of the available heterogeneous arable areas in plots and, for each plot, obtain an appropriate crop rotation schedule. Rotation plans must respect ecolog...

Edamame: A Nutritious Vegetable Crop

Edamame, also called mao dou in China, is a large-seeded (seed dry wt. >250 mg/seed) green vegetable soybean [Glycine max (L.) Merr., Fabaceae] cooked and served in pods as snack-like peanuts (Arachis hypogaea) (Shurtleff 2001). In Asia, where edamame is an important vegetable (Fig. 1), farmers harvest stems with fresh green pods before full maturity when pods are fully filled, nearly 80% matur...