Making plants make more food
Plant geneticists at CSIRO have produced mutant Arabidopsis plants that take them closer to cloning the apomixis gene, the regulator of fixed hybridity. Control of this mechanism would make food crops easier to improve and maintain. In other research, sulphate and phosphate transporter genes have been cloned. This may lead to the short-circuiting of internal signals limiting nutrient uptake, enabling development of plants that are higher yielding, more nutritious and designed for specific uses.