How this wild grass could help save the world’s wheat supplies

By Mark Waghorn via SWNS

A wild grass eaten by goats could save our bread, according to new research.

It contains 'superfood' genes that are resistant to climate change.

Wheat, the foundation of life in much of the world, is struggling to cope with hotter temperatures.

The plant, named Aegilops sharonensis, thrives in the sandy soils of Israel and southern Lebanon.

It is not even affected by stem rust - a black fungus that ravages farmer's crops in the USA, and worldwide.

Outbreaks are increasing because of global warming.

Co-author Dr. Brande Wulff, of King Abdullah University, Saudi Arabia, said: "We now have this blockbuster gene that confers amazing immunity. If I were stem rust, I would be shaking in my spore."

Wheat, a staple food crop, makes up about a fifth of the calories on our plates. It is being attacked by stem rust in many parts of the world.

First author Dr. Guotai Yu, of the John Innes Centre, England, said: "It has been an arduous research journey lasting many years.

"But we have now found this gene that confers broad-spectrum resistance."

He added: "We have yet to come across an isolate a pathogen which can overcome the gene."

The study in Nature Communications mapped the complete genome of the species.

A search tool called 'Mutant Hunter' then scanned variants that conferred immunity to stem rust - the bane of farmers' lives for millennia.

Using molecular 'tweezers,' an international team transferred a specific gene into a susceptible plant.

In experiments, the protein called Sr62 fought off all tested strains of the wheat killer.

Ongoing studies are now investigating how it functions to engineer the mechanism to be more efficient.

The researchers plan to employ the new gene as part of a stack bred into commonly used wheat varieties - using modification technology.

They predict more resistant genes will be identified in, and cloned from, populations of Aegilops sharonensis and other wild grasses using their methods of gene discovery and deployment.

Aegilops sharonensis is known to possess many traits of agricultural importance such as resistance to major diseases including rusts.

But its long generation time, tough seed coat, and the difficulties of crossing it with wheat cultivars have made it less tractable than other species of wild grasses being mined for useful genetic traits.

This makes the findings even more valuable. Co-author Prof Brian Steffenson from the University of Minnesota, said: "Given the great difficulties in crossing Aegilops sharonensis to wheat, we were fairly certain the rust resistance genes discovered in the wild species would be novel."

Aegilops sharonensis has a very narrow habitat range along the coastal plain of the Mediterranean Sea.

Prof Steffenson said: "It is therefore timely and important that efforts were made to collect and characterize accessions of this species before they are lost to urbanization.

"It is our hope the resistance gene cloned in this research will, when combined with other genes, confer long-lasting resistance in wheat varieties, thereby reducing the threat of the stem rust disease."

In Latin America, GM wheat engineered for drought tolerance has been approved.

It potentially paves the way for traits to be bred into wheat more widely in the face of the climate crisis.

The search for resistance against stem rust has become more urgent.

Epidemics are becoming more frequent - and climate change threatens to further increase its spread.

Dr. Wulff added: "Pathogens like stem rust, already reduce the yield of wheat by 21 percent.

"Not only is the grain itself lost or damaged by the pathogen, but also the energy that goes into production - an equivalent of 420 billion kilowatts - enough to power 300 million homes in the developing world is wasted.

"If we can intervene with genetics, by recruiting the resistance found in this wild-wispy looking grass then that would be an amazing contribution to agriculture and climate change."