China scientists find a grain of hope in climate change rice research
- Study identifies a pair of genes in the staple that could be tweaked to improve its tolerance to heat stress
- Rising temperatures and extreme weather events are threatening food supplies, with rice particularly susceptible to changing conditions
Tweaking a pair of genes in rice could significantly improve the crop’s heat stress tolerance and increase yield under higher temperatures, according to a new study by Chinese scientists.
The study identified the interaction between two genes in rice cells, which the scientists found can enhance the heat tolerance of rice and increase its productivity by 20 per cent in a heatwave. The same genes can be cloned in other major crops, such as maize and wheat, to improve their heat tolerance, they said.
“[The genes] are valuable resources for breeding highly heat stress-tolerant crops to address food security concerns caused by global warming,” according to a statement by the authors of the study, which was led by researchers from the Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS) and Shanghai Jiao Tong University.
As global temperatures increase, heat stress has become one of the most important factors affecting global food security.
According to a 2017 study published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, each degree-Celsius temperature increase will on average reduce global wheat yields by 6 per cent, rice by 3.2 per cent and maize by 7.4 per cent.
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