Shifting cultivation is a traditional agricultural practice in most tropical regions of the world and has the potential to provide for human livelihoods while hosting substantial biodiversity. Little is known about the resilience of shifting cultivation to increasing agricultural demands on the landscape or to unexpected disturbances. To investigate these issues, we develop a simple social-ecol...

Agricultural animal research has been immensely successful over the past century in developing technology and methodologies that have dramatically enhanced production efficiency of the beef, dairy, swine, poultry, sheep, and aquaculture industries. In the past two decades, molecular biology has changed the face of agricultural animal research, primarily in the arena of genomics and the relative...

The microbial component of healthy seeds - the seed microbiome - appears to be inherited between plant generations and can dynamically influence germination, plant performance, and survival. As such, methods to optimize the seed microbiomes of major crops could have far-reaching implications for plant breeding and crop improvement to enhance agricultural food, feed, and fiber production. Here, ...

It is a challenge to breed maize (Zea mays L.) varieties with enhanced levels of protein, oil, starch, and essential amino acid contents while maintaining competitive agronomic capability. We used multivariate statistical procedures to quantify total diversity and its components for 31 physical, biochemical, nutrient, and color traits of 1348 accessions from 13 maize populations. The germplasm ...

Why might it be that low income countries would apply regulatory systems for agricultural biotechnology modeled after European standards, even though it means their poor farmers and consumers lose any potential gains in agricultural productivity and social welfare? Ten years of commercial use in the United States, Canada, Argentina, and Brazil have demonstrated that traits such as insect-resist...

Genetic variability is an indicator for a plant breeder to proceed further. Six F3:4 derived inter-specific Brassica populations along with three checks were evaluated for genetic variability for agronomic characters at NWFP Agricultural University, during 20052006. Highly significant (P < 0.05) genetic variations were recorded for plant height. Maximum number of pods main receme (94) was obser...

Agricultural animal research has been immensely successful over the past century in developing technology and methodologies that have dramatically enhanced production efficiency of the beef, dairy, swine, poultry, sheep, and aquaculture industries. In the past two decades, molecular biology has changed the face of agricultural animal research, primarily in the arena of genomics and the relative...