Sustainability & Climate Change
Food production needs are expected to roughly double over the next 35 years as the world population grows and people in under developed countries become more affluent and demand more calories. Healthy ecosystems are vital to the survival of all organisms. How can we grow crops without harming the environment? How can we balance technology and global food security? What is the right balance of organic and conventional farming? What role can genetics and biotechnology play without compromising the needs of tomorrow?
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Viewpoint: In damning genetic modification, activists fret ‘traditional vegetables may go extinct’. Why that’s not worrisome
Biodiversity generally refers to the billions of unique living organisms living in the world and the interactions between them. Biodiversity ...
AI gobbles up an enormous amount of energy—but its creators won’t say how much
“People are often curious about how much energy a ChatGPT query uses,” Sam Altman, the CEO of OpenAI, wrote in an aside in ...
From cells to sashimi: Lab-grown salmon and the future of sustainable seafood
The world has become increasingly more concerned about environmental sustainability, food security, and ethical sourcing, making lab-grown or cultivated meat ...
Feeding 10 billion in 2070: Deloitte’s vision for a food system transformation
By 2070, the global population is expected to reach nearly 10 billion, requiring a 40% increase in calorie production to ...
Viewpoint: Glyphosate’s often overlooked role in sustainable farming
What IF glyphosate didn’t exist? The best answer to that question comes from Aimpoint Research. The food / ag wargame ...
Smart cities, smart farms: The rise of vertical farming in global urban agriculture
Climate-smart innovations combined with efforts to achieve food self-sufficiency are fueling the swift expansion of the global vertical farming market ...
Processed human sewage waste is sometimes used as cheap fertilizers. It’s potentially dangerous
About 3.5 million tonnes of sludge – the solid waste produced from human sewage at treatment plants - is put ...
Viewpoint: Challenging food myths: What would it be like if we continue to demonize modern, high tech agriculture?
The current wave of food anxiety stems, in large part, from a misunderstanding of hazard versus risk. A substance can ...
Viewpoint: With lower yields, the future of organic farming is endangered. It needs biotechnology
The EU should allow gene editing to make organic farming more sustainable, researchers say. To achieve the European Green Deal’s ...
The never-ending GMO debate: Pros and cons
According to the Genetic Literacy Project, “The most recent data from the International Service for the Acquisition of Agri-biotech Applications (ISAAA) ...
Viewpoint: What impact will Trump’s budget cuts have on U.S. ability to track and adapt to climate change
Over the last few months, … there’s been an explosion of news about proposed budget cuts to science in the ...
Organic farming acreage in the U.S. is in steep decline
[A]merica’s certified organic acreage fell almost 11% between 2019 and 2021. Numerous farmers who implement sustainable practices told The Associated ...
The latest gene edited crop: Oats with higher yields, more fiber and climate change resilient
For the first time, scientists have successfully edited oat DNA, a breakthrough that could accelerate the development of oats with ...
Global food production has increased 390 percent since 1960. Here’s how farmers have done it
The use of modern seed genetics (which includes genetically modified (GM) crops, chemical and fertilizer use) greatly contributes to improved ...
When European politicians and ‘experts’ debate the future of farming, they listen to everyone but farmers
Georges Clemenceau once said war was too important to be left to the generals. Today, in Brussels, agriculture is too ...
Viewpoint: Sustainable agriculture—Why gene editing should be welcomed by organic farmers
Gene editing should be allowed in organic crop cultivation to boost yields and promote more sustainable farming practices, according to ...
Electric respiration: Bacteria that ‘breathe’ electricity could revolutionize wastewater treatment and biomanufacturing
A team led by Rice University bioscientist Caroline Ajo-Franklin has discovered how certain bacteria breathe by generating electricity, using a natural ...
Viewpoint: How media coverage has undermined support for cultivated ‘clean’ meat
Is cultivated meat ‘real meat’? Does it pose any benefits? Is it an inevitable, necessary marker of change to the ...
Climate change challenge: How to ‘future proof’ crops
In a review in The Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B, Stephen Long, a professor of crop sciences and of plant biology at ...
AI can read plant DNA. That could transform agriculture and help feed the world
Plant DNA has become a frontier for artificial intelligence, with large language models turning genetic sequences into interpretable content for ...
How worried should you be about the health effects of microplastics?
Animal studies indicate that microplastics may harm reproduction, particularly sperm quality. They can also affect lung and gut functioning and ...
Viewpoint: What would be the consequences if we moved from conventional, tech-advanced farming to organic?
Close your eyes and imagine grocery stores where produce costs triple, with a sparse selection and visible insect damage. This ...
India’s new gene-edited sheep increases muscle mass by 30%
The Sher-e-Kashmir University of Agricultural Sciences and Technology (SKUAST-Kashmir) has successfully produced a gene-edited sheep, setting a new benchmark in ...
Viewpoint: Is Trump’s embrace of nuclear energy a game changer?
President Trump [recently] signed four executive orders aimed at moving the United States’ nuclear industry forward. The executive orders (EOs) ...
60% of imported bananas go bad. How non-browning gene edited varieties will help reduce waste
It is estimated that a third of the produce that is harvested worldwide is never consumed and goes to waste ...
‘We’re talking about enough food for hundreds of millions of people’: Why are crops suddenly failing in different parts of the world?
In fields across the globe, crops that once thrived under predictable seasons are now struggling to survive. Hotter days and ...
Organic yields significantly lag conventional farming output. That gap will increase as gene editing accelerates in the U.S.
A lack of sufficient nutrient application and the limited ability to control weeds, insects, and plant diseases, results in organic ...
