Innovation in agriculture and food

QAAFI annual report 2017 showcase

High impact science for sustainable agriculture and food

We are a research institute of The University of Queensland, one of the world’s leading research providers in tropical and sub-tropical agriculture and food production. We work across crops, horticulture, animals, and nutrition and food sciences, and are supported by industry and the Queensland Government.

Our mission is to significantly improve the competitiveness and sustainability of the tropical and sub-tropical agriculture and food sectors through high-impact science.

Our vision is sustainable agriculture and food achieved through science and innovation.

We aim to be a world leading research institute in plant science, animal science, and nutrition and food sciences, delivering outcomes in discovery, learning, and engagement.

2017 QAAFI Annual Report cover

2017 QAAFI Annual Report cover

Vice-Chancellor’s message

With the global population rapidly approaching eight billion and particular pressure being experienced in the tropics and subtropics, the work of the Queensland Alliance for Agriculture and Food Innovation (QAAFI) is of the utmost priority.

QAAFI is a stand-out generator of innovation and impact in tropical and sub-tropical agriculture and food sciences. Its people strive not only to improve the competitiveness and sustainability of Queensland’s tropical and sub-tropical agriculture and food sectors, but also to help meet the growing global demand for sustainable, nutritious and safe food.

Harnessing the collective strengths of the Department of Agriculture and Fisheries and The University of Queensland (UQ), QAAFI forges direct links to the agriculture and food industries and with local and global not-for-profits.

Since 2009 it has contracted $280 million to invest in research, and in 2017 attracted $40 million.

During 2017, QAAFI and UQ established a new Centre for Horticultural Science to meet the growth in demand for vegetables, fruit and nuts. The new centre will build on Queensland’s strengths in the banana, avocado, citrus and macadamia food industries, and help create new industries.

Another significant achievement of the year was the international conference in tropical agriculture, TropAg2017, which attracted to Brisbane 720 delegates from 44 countries.

QAAFI’s proven capacity to deliver globally-significant solutions by generating new knowledge and partnered innovation is among the many factors that make it a significant contributor to UQ’s strategic objectives.

The quality of its endeavour is reflected in the University’s high global rankings, which include first in Australia and fifth in the world in the field of agriculture. (Performance Ranking of Scientific Papers for World Universities 2017, rank by field)

I congratulate and thank Professor Robert Henry and the diverse QAAFI team for their many successes in 2017. I also thank our colleagues in the Queensland Government, and our industry and philanthropic collaborators, for their on-going support for QAAFI’s brilliant initiatives.

Professor Peter Høj
Vice-Chancellor and President

QAAFI statistics for 2017

QAAFI statistics for 2017

QAAFI statistics for 2017

Research themes

Agriculture and food sciences at UQ are helping to meet the growing global demand for sustainable, nutritious, safe food. QAAFI plays an important role building industry partnerships in Queensland and globally, and in developing research solutions and new technologies to improve decision making, increase productivity and better predict climatic change. We have world-leading research capabilities across crop, horticulture, animal and food sciences.

Director’s column

In 2017, QAAFI continued its growth and established two new UQ research centres – the Centre for Horticultural Science, and the Centre for Crop Science.

Formed from the former Centre for Plant Science, the new centres will build UQ and Queensland’s R&D capacity in these industries.

The new Centre for Horticultural Science was fortunate to secure agricultural biotechnology innovator Professor Neena Mitter as the inaugural Director, while Professor Graeme Hammer continues at the helm of the Centre for Crop Science.

We also welcomed other key appointments in 2017, including a theme leader for Animal Welfare research, Professor Alan Tilbrook, one of the country’s most eminent animal welfare researchers and Director of the National Animal Welfare Biomarkers Consortium.

Mr Stephen Williams joined us in 2017 as Deputy Director for Strategy and Engagement and has already made a significant contribution to QAAFI’s operations.

In 2017, once again a QAAFI student won UQ’s prestigious and highly competitive all- Institutes 3-Minute Thesis final and I extend my congratulations to Anahita Mizani – and to all the QAAFI RHD students who participated in an event that has become one of our Institute’s annual highlights.

One of QAAFI and UQ’s most significant achievements in 2017 was the highly successful UQ-led global conference on tropical and sub-tropical agriculture and food – TropAg2017. A key feature of this year’s TropAg conference was support for the event from an alliance of northern Australia research providers – QUT, James Cook University, CQU and USQ.

Another important TropAg2017 initiative was collaboration with the Queensland Government to host their AgFutures agricultural technology conference as a theme within TropAg, enabling both organisations to leverage opportunities to engage high profile speakers and showcase Queensland’s agricultural industries on the global stage.

The quality of QAAFI’s research is reflected not only in UQ’s global standing of agricultural science but also in QAAFI’s record income in 2017 of $40 million, demonstrating the world-leading capabilities of QAAFI’s scientists, and their capacity to work collaboratively with industry to meet challenges of importance to the agricultural and food sectors.

It only remains for me to thank all QAAFI staff and students for their outstanding efforts in 2017.

Professor Robert Henry
Professor of Innovation in Agriculture
Director of the Queensland Alliance for Agriculture and Food Innovation (QAAFI)

Professor Robert Henry is co-author of a landmark global study published in Nature Genetics that maps divergences in the rice genome. The comprehensive study of the rice family tree confirms that wild Australian rice is the most directly related species to the ancient ancestor of all rices. Professor Henry says northern Australia’s wild rices contain a wealth of untapped genetic diversity and at least two species are very closely related to domesticated rice, which means valuable traits such as drought tolerance and pest and disease resistance can be bred into commercial rice strains.

Message from the Minister
Hon Mark Furner 

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Professor Robert Henry - Director of QAAFI

Professor Robert Henry - Director of QAAFI

Professor Robert Henry - Director of QAAFI

Professor Robert Henry - Director of QAAFI

RESEARCH HIGHLIGHTS

Predicting crop yields from space funded under a joint Queensland-China scheme Predicting crop yields from space funded under a joint Queensland-China scheme

CAPTION: Predicting crop yields from space funded under a joint Queensland-China scheme

CAPTION: Predicting crop yields from space funded under a joint Queensland-China scheme

New centre will grow tomorrow’s horticulture

A new Centre for Horticultural Science will be launched at The University of Queensland in 2018, to respond to the demand for plant-based foods, vegetables, fruit and nuts that improve human health.

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The science of more mangoes

QAAFI continues to have a strong showing in UQ’s 3 Minute Thesis competition. Congratulations to Ms Anahita Mizani (Principal advisor Associate Professor Jim Hanan) for her success at the all-Institute’s 3 Minute Thesis final and competitive performance in the UQ Final. In Ms Mizani’s presentation, she shared her research on developing smaller mango trees for higher yields and profit.

View video

ABC’s Country Hour broadcast live at QAAFI

QAAFI hosted a delicious visit from ABC Radio’s Queensland Country Hour, who broadcast their program live from our headquarters on 31 October 2017.

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Dr Lee Hickey wins Queensland Young Tall Poppy of the Year Award

The Tall Poppy Campaign was created in 1998 by the Australian Institute of Policy and Science to recognise and celebrate Australian intellectual and scientific excellence and to encourage younger Australians to follow in the footsteps of outstanding achievers.

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Food scientist recognised as AIFST Fellow

Professor Mike Gidley, Director of the Centre for Nutrition and Food Science, was named an Australian Institute of Food Science & Technology (AIFST) Fellow at the AIFST 50th Anniversary Convention in Sydney in July 2017.

China collaboration on crop yield prediction

A UQ project to improve methodology for predicting crop yields from space received funding from a prestigious joint Queensland-China scheme in 2017.

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Tick conference a biting success

QAAFI’s Professor Ala Tabor was the conference Chair for the 9th Tick and tick-borne pathogen (TTP9) conference held in conjunction with the 1st Asia- Pacific Rickettsia Conference in Cairns from 27 August to 1 September 2017.

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Plum award for Australian native food industry collaboration

A powder extracted from the Kakadu plum to extend the shelf life of frozen ready-made foods has earned a UQ researcher and her team a national award for community engagement.

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Ms Anahita Mizani

Ms Anahita Mizani

ABC’s Country Hour broadcast live at QAAFI

ABC’s Country Hour broadcast live at QAAFI

Dr Lee Hickey pictured with Hon Leeanne Enoch, Queensland’s Minister for Environment and the Great Barrier Reef, Minister for Science and Minister for the Arts.

Dr Lee Hickey pictured with Hon Leeanne Enoch, Queensland’s Minister for Environment and the Great Barrier Reef, Minister for Science and Minister for the Arts.

Professor Mike Gidley, Director of the Centre for Nutrition and Food Science

Professor Mike Gidley, Director of the Centre for Nutrition and Food Science

Predicting crop yields from space funded under a joint Queensland-China scheme

Predicting crop yields from space funded under a joint Queensland-China scheme

QAAFI’s Professor Ala Tabor was the conference Chair for the 9th Tick and tick-borne pathogen (TTP9) conference

QAAFI’s Professor Ala Tabor was the conference Chair for the 9th Tick and tick-borne pathogen (TTP9) conference

“The Kakadu plum is only the size of an olive but is packed with Vitamin C, antioxidant and antimicrobial properties.” - Said Dr Sultanbawa

“The Kakadu plum is only the size of an olive but is packed with Vitamin C, antioxidant and antimicrobial properties.” - Said Dr Sultanbawa

“We developed a puree and a powder that can be added to foods including frozen ready-made meals to extend shelf life up to 18 months, which is very significant advantage,” Dr Sultanbawa said.

“We developed a puree and a powder that can be added to foods including frozen ready-made meals to extend shelf life up to 18 months, which is very significant advantage,” Dr Sultanbawa said.

DISCOVERY

World-first technique to double Queensland's avocado production and ease global shortage World-first technique to double Queensland's avocado production and ease global shortage

World-first technique to double Queensland's avocado production and ease global shortage

World-first technique to double Queensland's avocado production and ease global shortage

Smashing the avocado production bottleneck

In a world-first, University of Queensland researchers have invented a method of supplying 500 times more avocado plants to industry than is possible using current methods.

The new stem cell multiplication method could double avocado production in Queensland, as well as reducing the time it takes for new avocado varieties to reach commercial orchards from 10 years to three years or less.

“At present, to supply new trees, the avocado industry follows the same process they have for the last 40 years, which is to take cuttings from high quality trees and root them,”
said Professor Neena Mitter from the Queensland Alliance for Agriculture and Food Innovation, who leads the project.

“However, this is a cumbersome, labour and resource intensive process, as it takes about 18 months from the cutting stage to having a plant for sale which creates a huge bottleneck for nurseries across the globe in the number of trees that they can supply to growers.”

Queensland produces 50 percent of Australia’s high-value avocado crop, worth $460 million a year. However, the industry is hampered by a shortage of high-quality planting material and there is a backlog of plant orders until 2020.

With funding from the avocado industry and Department of Agriculture and Fisheries, Professor Mitter’s team successfully developed a stem cell tissue-culture system that can supply 500 times more plants. The technology is non-GM and environmentally-friendly, requiring less land, water, fertilisers and pesticides.

“Ten-thousand plants can be generated in a 10 square-meter room on a soil-less media,” said Professor Mitter.

“This is a potential game changer for the avocado industry across the globe.”

The Queensland-owned technology involves a secret recipe of media, light, temperature and other factors to grow and root multiple avocado plants from the shoot tip of an existing plant.

Professor Mitter’s team are now working with banana growers in Tully who are looking for heatadapted avocado trees to grow alongside bananas, as a way of diversifying their income.

Avocado growers in Central Queensland, New South Wales and Western Australia are also collaborating on the project.

With new funding from the Queensland Government’s Advance Queensland Innovation Partnerships and in collaboration with Anderson Horticulture the first 200 avocado plants developed by the new tissue culture multiplication method will be tested in regions across Australia, with growers capturing performance data on the growth, flowering and fruiting of the trees.

“From an initial investment of less than $2 million from government, universities and industry, we should see an annual return of $335 million, with benefits flowing across the production and supply chain in Queensland,” Professor Mitter said.

The project also involves collaboration with the University of Southern Queensland and Central Queensland University. Professor Mitter said the avocado multiplication technology would establish Queensland as a world leader in avocado clonal propagation.

“It would substantially boost exports, and create growth and jobs in the regions.”

Northern focus on fertility

UQ beef researchers are taking on the ambitious task of DNA sampling 30,000 cows and heifers in their quest to boost the fertility of northern herds.

QAAFI scientists aim to develop a DNA test to predict the value of an animal’s genetics for fertility.

The ambitious project is supported by the MLA Donor Company (with investment matched by the Australian Government) and the Queensland Department of Agriculture and Fisheries.

Project leader Professor Ben Hayes said fertility was a critical trait for northern producers. “Fertility is the main driver of productivity and profitability of northern beef producers, but weaning rates – an indication of fertility – can be as low as 40 per cent in some herds,” he said.

“Lifting the reproductive performance of breeding herds is challenging for producers who manage extensive enterprises, (because) annual or biannual mustering limits the opportunity to record performance and track fertility traits across generations.”

The answer, he said, was the genomic equivalent of an estimated breeding value (EBV). EBVs are already widely used in the beef industry to assess an animal’s performance traits compared to the breed average. A DNA test, however, would provide a highly accurate prediction tool of true genetic merit. This would enable young bulls with excellent fertility genetics to be identified and used early in life.

DNA tests for fertility have been commercially used in the dairy industry for more than five years but the physiological differences between, for example, a Holstein and a Brahman, mean they are not transferable. There is a useful genomicbased breeding value for days to calving, but only for the Brahman breed.

Importantly, this project is commercially focused and aims to develop DNA tests that are not limited to a specific breed, so researchers are DNA-sampling different breed compositions – including crossbred cattle – across Queensland, the Northern Territory and Western Australia.

Many genes affect the trait of fertility, so Professor Hayes and his team have set out to record fertility traits for a large number of animals, drawing on female stock from collaborating herds across northern Australia.

To date, they have identified 15,000 cows and heifers and have DNA sampled and scanned 3000 to record the key fertility traits of: Age of puberty: heifers that cycle early can produce more calves in their lifetime. (Previous work by the Beef Cooperative) Research Centre found this to be a highly heritable trait.)

Postpartum anoestrus: determines how easily a cow can fall pregnant again after her first calf.

The first round of scanning will assess whether heifers have cycled or not as an indication of age of puberty, and will take a tail hair sample for DNA testing. Later in the project, cattle will be assessed again for fertility after their second joining and their temperament will be measured and correlated with fertility.

“At the end of the project, in five years’ time, our aim is to have a highly accurate genomic breeding value for fertility,” Professor Hayes said. “Northern producers can use this as a tool when choosing bulls, to assess what animals will contribute genetically to their fertility goals.”

Herd fertility lifts profits
Producer case Study

Wambiana: Michael and Michelle Lyons, with Michael’s parents John and Ronda Lyons
Location: 70 kilometres south-west of Charters Towers
Area: 23,500 hectares
Enterprise: Breeding and fattening
Livestock: 3,000 to 3,500 head of cattle
Pasture: Mostly native pastures augmented with introduced pastures of Urochloaand Buffel plus introduced legumes of Stylos and Desmanthus
Soil: Loams on the Campaspe River frontage to grey cracking clays to light sandridges
Average annual rainfall: 650 millimetres

Beef producers are playing a critical role in research to develop the accuracy of genomic predictions for profitable traits.

Wambiana Station at Charters Towers is one of the beef businesses collaborating with the QAAFI project.

Michael and Michelle Lyons, together with Michael’s parents John and Ronda, operate a beef breeding and fattening operation on the 23,500-hectare property. They will provide up to 350Brahman heifers for the Northern Genomics Project.

Mr Lyons believes fertility – a key profit driver listed in benchmarking by industry organisations such as MLA – is one of the most important traits northern producers can select for in their herd.

“In our business, I find the cows that wean a calf in April-May and calve again in November-December each year are very profitable,” Mr Lyons said.

The Lyons beef enterprise has a two pronged approach to selecting for fertility:

Breeders: Cows that are adapted to their environment and consistently calveeach year with minimal inputs stay in the herd. Those that don’t are culled.

Bulls: Michael selects bulls with above average estimated breeding values (EBVs) for days to calving and scrotalsize, and looks for bulls from dams which have produced a natural calf each year for at least four years. 

“Some of the bulls we have produced from our IVF program are from dams that have had up to 14 calves in 14 years,which is an amazing feat in the north,” Mr Lyons said.

Culling non-performing cows and selecting bulls with superior genetics was a critical strategy to improve the overall fertility of Wambiana’s herd. 

“We are a low-input business, so if we can genetically improve our fertility and get more calves on the ground without having to increase inputs to our breeders, it will lead to greater profitability.”

Mr Lyons said a DNA test for fertility would provide more accuracy to the existing EBVs and greater predictability of reproductive performance. 

Published in MLA Feedback magazine,Feb/March 2018

Naturally Nutritious

New findings were announced from from Hort Innovation’s $10m research project to discover new ‘superfoods’ with health benefits. The Naturally Nutritious project is co-funded by the University of Queensland and the Queensland Government, and headed by QAAFI’s Dr Tim O’Hare.

Purple maize

QAAFI scientists are developing purple sweetcorn varieties with the horticulture industry to help growers respond to increasingly health-conscious consumers. With funding from the grower-owned research and development company, Hort Innovation, the new varieties are being developed through natural breeding programs.

Head researcher, QAAFI’s Dr Tim O’Hare, said his team were focussed on developing sweetcorn with high levels of specific phytonutrients for human health.

“Not only is purple corn fun, the actual pigments in the varieties we are developing are phytonutrients and they have different health benefits to that of a traditional yellow corn,”
Dr Tim O’Hare

“The anthocyanins have been shown to be linked to cardio-vascular health and by that we mean lowering blood pressure or reducing atherosclerosis, reducing the chance of having a heart attack.”

Consumer and professional ‘taste testing’ panels are assessing the flavour, smell and texture of the varieties, to help the scientists confirm that any alteration does not harm the flavour and quality of the products, and how these new types compare to traditional sweetcorn.

Hort Innovation chief executive John Lloyd said Australia is fortunate to have plenty of access to home-grown, healthy produce.

“Everyone loves Australian sweetcorn. It is extremely healthy and second to none with consistent quality making it sought-after both here and overseas,” he said.

“What this project aims to do is build on that success, and offer growers more varieties to help diversify their product range and respond to the rising uberhealth- conscious-consumer pocket of the market.”

The new corn varieties are being investigated as part of the $10M Naturally Nutritious project, using Hort Innovation’s Health, Nutrition and Food Safety Fund.

This project is supported by the Department of Agriculture and Fisheries and The University of Queensland and Hort Innovation.

New supercharged strawberry a sweet find

QAAFI scientists have discovered an ‘alpha strawberry’ that is very sweet in flavour and has folate levels that may be up to three times higher than standard strawberries.

Folate is an important B-group vitamin which is critical for a range of biological functions in adults and children, including the production of DNA and other genetic material. It is also essential for the healthy development of the foetus in early pregnancy and can help to prevent neural tube defects such as spina bifida.

The strawberry research is funded as part of a $10M Hort Innovation program aimed at developing naturally nutrient-dense food, and delivered and co-funded by QAAFI, and the Queensland Government.

Hort Innovation chief executive John Lloyd said while the strawberry is yet to undergo taste testing through consumer panels to see if it is as good as conventional breeds, the finding is exciting.

“This is essentially an ‘alpha strawberry’. It contains way more folate than we would expect to see in a standard berry, based on folate levels of standard strawberries reported in the literature” he said.

Mr Lloyd said the variety was developed to help growers meet consumer demand.

“Consumers are becoming more health conscious and are looking for the maximum amount of nutrients in their food,” he said. “Conversely, research has also shown that four out of five Australian adults are not getting the recommended daily intake of fruit and vegetables a day to get the nutrients they need.

“This new strawberry variety could help growers continue to tap into that healthconscious market through a novel offering.”

QAAFI lead researcher, Dr Tim O’Hare said his team had identified a number of high folate strawberries so far in the Naturally Nutritious project, but this yet-to-be-named variety appears to be particularly high.

“High folate is generally found in dark green leafy vegetables, so having this folate dense strawberry variety is really novel,” Dr O’Hare said.

“If people ate a 250g punnet of these high folate strawberries, it would give them their recommended daily intake of folate.”

Dr O’Hare said the new strawberry was discovered by analysing the unknown biochemical properties of various strawberry lines.

“The next step will be to see how well the folate in this strawberry is absorbed by the body and also how well it grows in a production setting and, most importantly, to ensure that consumers like its taste.”

Strawberries are grown in all states of Australia by an estimated 500 growers concentrated in the Sunshine Coast area of Queensland, the Yarra Valley and the Mornington Peninsula in Victoria, Wanneroo and Albany in WA, the Adelaide Hills in SA and Launceston in Tasmania.

Flour power: wheat discovery to increase flour yields

QAAFI researchers have discovered how to make more flour from the same amount of grain – a finding that could help avert food shortages around the world.

The world faces a looming food security crisis given increasing pressure from population growth and climate change. Of particular concern is an anticipated shortfall in the world’s supply of wheat flour – the staple that supplies an estimated 20 percent of the total calories and proteins consumed worldwide.

The situation has triggered research efforts on an unprecedented scale to prevent shortages as the world heads towards peak population in about 2050. Researchers in Australia are at the forefront of some of this work, leading and participating in many local and international research programs.

Research led by QAAFI Director Professor Robert Henry has developed a new strategy to increase the world’s supplies of flour that does not require growing more wheat or decades-long roll-out times for research and development.

Professor Henry’s team discovered new information and is developing the tools needed to extract more flour during milling from the same amount of grain.

The discovery is based in wheat genomics. The researchers examined levels of gene expression in maturing grain, comparing 30 wheat varieties that are genetically programmed to produce grain with different milling properties.

Milling genes

Two genes were identified that determine how much flour can be extracted from grain – a trait called the ‘flour yield’. These belong to a larger family of genes that encode fasciclin-like arabinogalactan proteins (FLAs). The two genes play a structural role that affects the rigidity of a compartment within the grain, which in turn affects how easily grain breaks up during milling.

Wheat grain has three main components – endosperm (the source of flour), bran (which needs to be separated from the endosperm to make flour) and germ (the embryo for a new wheat plant).

“The FLA genes affect the rigidity of the interface between endosperm and bran,” Professor Henry says.

“We showed that when expressed at low levels, the resulting grain breaks up more easily during milling, resulting in more flour.

“That means we can select for higher flour yield by breeding wheat that is genetically programmed to express FLAs in the grain at low levels.”

The finding has important food security implications. Currently, recovery of flour from dry milling usually ranges between 70 and 80 per cent of the wheat grain, which is below the theoretical maximum of 85 per cent. Existing testing techniques have made it extremely difficult for wheat breeders to target greater flour yield.

The new insight into the two FLA genes will allow DNA markers to be developed to easily, cheaply and quickly compare hundreds, even thousands, of breeding lines for their potential flour yield.

This kind of DNA marker-assisted screening technology, which could identify whether the relevant FLA genes are strongly or weakly expressed, can be used on minute amounts of plant material, sourced even from seedlings. This bypasses the need to produce large quantities of grain for a milling-based test to estimate flour yield.

The potential knock-on effect could considerably improve the general productivity of the wheat industry.

Yield and flour boost

Professor Henry believes it is already possible to breed wheat that produces extremely high quantities of grain, but the grain is usually unsuited to milling and is consequently used as feed for livestock.

“We now have the option to silence FLA gene expression in high-yielding but feed-grade wheat using gene editing techniques,” he says. Adding milling quality to the genetics of what are currently feed wheats would increase the amount of premium-grade grain reaching mills and allow a jump to ultra-high flour yields.

Combining all the potential applications of this new selective breeding capability could quickly provide one of the yield ‘quantum leaps’ needed to meet future demand for wheat, he says.

Particularly attractive to Professor Henry is the potential to add more flour into the supply chain without the need to cultivate more land or use more water, soil nutrients or fertiliser.

Software shines a light on crop simulation

Crop scientists have developed an online application that predicts how crop growth is affected by photosynthetic changes at the molecular, cellular or leaf level of plants.

Food production depends on photosynthesis, the process by which plants capture sunlight and convert it into plant growth, biomass and grain. In the next decades, the world population is expected to reach 9.5 billion and food demand ill increase significantly, so improving photosynthesis has become a global research priority.

“Enhancing photosynthesis has the potential to increase crop yields, but the link between photosynthesis and crop productivity is not straightforward because it crosses multiple scales of biological organisation,” said Dr Alex Wu, a researcher with the ARC Centre of Excellence for Translational Photosynthesis (CoETP) at QAAFI.

“We created modelling tools that help us navigate through these complexities to identify targets that have the greatest impact on crop yield,” he said.

This online “crystal ball” of crop growth, a small part of the cross-scale model, is designed to show researchers what would happen to a crop canopy with changes in photosynthesis under variable environmental and canopy conditions such as radiation, temperature, levels of CO2, canopy size and amount of nitrogen in leaves.

“By developing simulation tools like these, we are working towards connecting labbased research and discoveries, at the leaf or molecular level, with crop productivity under variable environmental conditions,” Dr Wu said.

CoETP’s Chief Investigator Professor Graeme Hammer, Director of QAAFI’s Centre for Crop Science, said that researchers could now use the online application and see how their work is having an impact on crops in the field, which will radically accelerate the discovery process.

“They can also incorporate high temperature or high CO2 conditions to test effects of climate change,” Professor Hammer said.

The Diurnal Canopy Photosynthesis Simulator (DCaPS) online application, calculates diurnal (period from sunrise to sunset) canopy CO2 assimilation and daily biomass increment for a crop under wellwatered conditions. DCaPS is now publicly available at www.dcaps.net.au.

This study was published in the journal Functional Plant Biology in October 2017, and was funded by the Australian Research Council (ARC) Centre of Excellence for Translational Photosynthesis and the Queensland Alliance for Agriculture and Food Innovation (QAAFI) at the University of Queensland.

Cracking the genetic code for complex traits in cattle

A large global consortium of beef and dairy cattle researchers have analysed the genomes of more than 57,000 cattle to pinpoint the genes which influence the complex genetic trait of height, opening the door for other important complex traits to be mapped.

In a world first, the team demonstrated that the genes responsible for height in cattle also influence the trait same in humans and dogs.

Professor Ben Hayes from The University of Queensland who heads the 1000 Bull Consortium comprising 57 researchers from 30 institutes from around the world, said up to now it has been a major challenge for researchers to identify variants in the genome affecting complex traits such as height or fertility, due to the variation that occurs within multiple genes and through different behavioural and environmental factors.

To tackle this, the consortium pooled large genomic datasets and phenotypes collected for 57,000 individual cattle from around the world, in order to gain the clearest picture yet of cattle genetics.

“We needed to access to vast resources of data in order to demonstrate, with a high degree of accuracy, that the genes affecting a complex trait like height, or stature, as it is referred to in the science, can be accurately identified from an animal’s DNA,” Professor Hayes said.

The Consortium’s research showed that even for highly complex traits like height, the genes influencing the trait in cattle could be accurately identified.

Professor Hayes said by applying the same collaborative big data approach, it was now possible to identify genes associated with high value complex traits for the industry, such as beef and milk production, feed efficiency and reduced methane emissions.

When the team applied their findings to the genetic datasets collected for humans and dogs, they were surprised to find that there was a high degree of overlap.

“The same genes influencing height in cattle, also influence the trait in other mammalian species,” Professor Hayes said.

“This is something that has never been demonstrated before.

“It opens up the possibility for researchers working in cattle and human genomics to share data on traits like body fatness and temperament.”

The 1000 Bulls consortium also validated their findings on height by analysing the genetic material of miniature cattle, and the DNA sequenced from a bone of a 6,500 year old wild auroch.

“Aurochs are an extinct species of large wild ox, and the ancestor to all cattle breeds,” Professor Hayes said.

“We were able to predict how tall this animal would have been from analysing its DNA, and then validating this with what we know from Auroch skeletons.”

Aurochs were domesticated by ancient humans about 10,000 years ago and bred to be shorter, a trend which continued through to the middle-ages. In more recent times cattle have been selected to be taller, and the team demonstrated that variants affecting height have recently increased in frequency in many breeds.

Another key finding from the consortium’s research is that the mutations which control traits like height are not located in the genes themselves, but in regulatory elements of DNA that control how the genes are turned on and off, and expressed.

“This helps explain why it is that cattle and fruit flies both have around 20,000 genes, yet cattle are so much more complex,” Professor Hayes said.

“The regulatory elements of the human genome enable genes to be expressed in different ways which adds to the complexity.”

IMPACT

Speed breeding Speed breeding

Speed breeding: NASA provides inspiration for plant-breeding advance

Speed breeding: NASA provides inspiration for plant-breeding advance

UQ and QAAFI deliver return on investment

Queensland possesses a world-class research and development capability. UQ is rated the number one agricultural research institution in Australia, and is among the world’s top five agricultural research institutions in the 2017 NTU rankings. UQ and the Queensland government’s investment in QAAFI builds upon the capabilities of both organisations, to deliver substantial returns on investment across Queensland’s agricultural industries.

Investment in sorghum:

Grain sorghum is a major summer crop, produced at the moment largely as a feedgrain for the Australian domestic market –although new markets for Australian sorghum are opening up in China for use in fermentation of alcoholic spirit, and in the gluten-free human food market.

Genetics is one of the principal factors contributing to the current upward trend evident in Australian grain sorghum yields.

The Queensland Government, along with the Grains Research and Development Corporation, the Department of Primary Industry in New South Wales and UQ, have for the past 20 years supported improvement and innovation in a sorghum pre-breeding program run out of Hermitage Research Facility.

The cost-benefits of the research mainly stem from yield gains,estimated at 2.1 per cent a year. This estimate is based on Australian Bureau of Agricultural and Resource Economics and Sciences (ABARES) data that shows average sorghum yields increased from about 2 to 3.5 tonnes per hectare between 1996 and 2015.

The pre-breeding program has licensed nearly 3000 sorghum lines to the international sorghum industry since 1989, which is around 10 times the amount of plant breeding material than in all the other public sorghum breeding programs around the world – combined.

The economic analysis of this investment over this period which totalled $78.4 million shows this has delivered a gross gain of$696.5 million to Australian sorghum growers.

This equates to a cost-benefit of $8.90 for every $1 invested by the research funders.

Investment in beef:

The Queensland Government, QAAFI and Meat & Livestock Australia via the MLA Donor Company will invest $6.2 million over the period of years ending June 2017 to June 2021 to improve the genetic rate of gain of beef cattle in the northern beef industry.The overall aim of the UQ project is to accelerate genetic gain for increasing productivity in northern Australia beef cattle herds to improve profitability of Australian northern beef enterprises.Other benefits may include reduced methane emissions, increased regional employment and incomes, and continuous improvements in animal welfare – for example, to accelerate breeding for hornless or polled cattle.

Banana biosecurity:

The Australian banana industry is a major horticultural industry with an annual farm gate value of around $600 million. It is Australia’s largest single horticultural industry by farm gate value.

Banana production in Australia is dominated by areas in the north of Queensland with other significant areas in south east Queensland and northern New South Wales.

However, the banana industry worldwide is subject to serious disease events, with Australia being no exception.

A focus for investment by the Queensland Government into the banana industry has been on banana disease detection, diagnostics and capacity to respond to disease outbreaks.

The impacts of investments made by The University of Queensland, the Queensland Department of Agriculture and Fisheries, Horticulture Innovation Australia Limited, and QAAFI over the period 2007 to 2017 has delivered improved diagnostics for several key banana diseases as well as ongoing surveillance, testing and technical capacity and advice that has maintained (and potentially improved) industry capacity to detect and respond to disease outbreaks in the Australian banana industry.

While it is difficult to quantify the range of impacts of this investment in protecting Queensland’s banana industry, the total investment of approximately $9.2 million (present value terms) has been estimated to produce total net benefits of approximately $70.8 million (present value terms) providing a benefit-cost ratio of approximately $7.7 to $1 of research investment funding.

Resilience, reliability improves sorghum returns for growers

From the lab to the paddock, organic grower Paul Murphy says genetic improvements have recast sorghum as a more productive and profitable option for his farm business.

Research over the past 20 years has delivered a lift in long-term average yields and grain quality on Mr Murphy’s 2000-hectare property in Queensland’s Central Highlands region. He farms with his family in a marginal cropping area 40 kilometres south-east of Capella.

The combined yield and quality benefits stem from genetic traits developed through the sorghum program at The University of Queensland and the Queensland Department of Agriculture and Fisheries, now delivered through QAAFI at the Hermitage Research Facility in Warwick.

In particular, Mr Murphy says resistance to midge pests now bred into modern sorghum cultivars has prevented midge-related yield losses of almost 40 per cent on his property.

“In past situations where we staggered our sorghum planting using cultivars susceptible to midge, we found there was no seed in the heads of late-sown plants,” he said.

Since making the switch to midge-resistant varieties, however, he estimates yield losses caused by the insect have declined to just five per cent of the crop.

Such genetic resistance is an important consideration for the Murphys because the farm’s certified organic status precludes them from using insecticide to control the mosquito-like pest.

The stay-green trait is another example of genetic improvement that has “made sorghum a more reliable crop”. Mr Murphy says there are fewer crop failures, leading to higher average long-term yields.

Sorghum plants with the stay-green trait maintain green leaves and stems when water is limited during the grain-filling period. This results in higher grain yield,larger grain size and increased lodging resistance with no cost or yield loss in favourable environments.

The stay-green drought-resistance trait has made Mr Murphy’s crop better able to with stand moisture stress and lodging – a key consideration for the mainstay summer crop, which accounts for one-third of the family’s cropping program.

Stay-green has also helped boost overall grain quality in terms of seed size and appearance. “Without the benefit of stay green, drought-stricken plants tend to produce grain that is pinched or smaller in size,” Mr Murphy said.

“This is difficult to process because it is prone to cracking and has less nutritional value.

“From a visual perspective, large, plump grains are easier to market, especially in high-value export markets for baijiu (sorghum wine).”

Putting the profitability of the stay-green edge into perspective, Mr Murphy said standard grain quality could mean being paid $400 a tonne instead of $500 a tonne in premium organic markets. It has also allowed his family’s enterprise to avoid a price penalty of up to $40/t incurred for organic grain containing more than eight per cent pinched grain.

“We haven’t delivered sorghum containing more than four per cent pinched grain for the past five years, and I think that is certainly because of genetic gains in sorghum,” Mr Murphy said.

Paul is also seeing the benefits of a new hybrid cultivar, Agitator, which he has been growing on his property for the past two years. It has been produced by the grower owned seed company Radicle Seeds Australia, using genetic material licensed to it from QAAFI.

Mr Murphy is the chief executive officer of Radicle Seeds and says this low-tillering cultivar has two main advantages: high yield potential and climatic resilience.

“Reduced tillering means the plant doesn’t grow extra vegetative biomass so it can channel more of its energy into grain production. The pre-breeding program has tested these tough, low-tillering lines as part of its trial program and provided data on parent lines, which we then use to commercially develop hybrid sorghum cultivars through Radicle Seeds Australia.”

Looking to the program’s future, Mr Murphy says sorghum germplasm to decrease lodging and deliver resistance to charcoalrot disease are high on his wish list.

Queensland’s sorghum success story

Of all the world’s cereal crops, productivity gains in Australian sorghum are unparalleled, and the industry’s growth ranks among the highest globally.

This success is due to Queensland’s world class genetic improvement program at the Hermitage Research Facility in Warwick.

Funded by the Queensland Department of Agriculture and Fisheries (DAF), the Grains Research and Development Corporation (GRDC), and UQ, the sorghum genetic improvement program has delivered a cost benefit of $8.90 for every $1 invested in sorghum RD&E.

Underpinning the program’s success is the link between integrated research drawing on a range of scientific disciplines, such as plant physiology, molecular biology and entomology, and collaboration with the private sector.

Every grain of Australia’s sorghum crop contains at least some elite germplasm bred by this group.

Average sorghum yields increased from about 2 to 3.5 tonnes per hectare between 1996 and 2015.

Sorghum is the main summer grain crop grown for most Queensland regions, and plays a key role in providing feed grains to the beef, dairy, pig and poultry industries.

New markets are opening for Australian sorghum in China to make Baijiu, the world’s top selling liquor and with its gluten free status, demand is increasing for the product in the human health food markets.

The program has licenced nearly 3000 sorghum lines to the global sorghum industry since 1989 – around 10 times the amount of plant breeding material than all the other public sorghum breeding programs around the world combined.

The next steps in the research effort aim to develop a suite of adaptive traits for better root architecture, water use efficiency, heat tolerance and grain quality.

Sorghum – the new gluten-free superfood?

Findings from a QAAFI study adds more value to Australian sorghum for human food markets.

Results from a QAAFI study show the bran fraction of Australia’s only white coloured sorghum hybrid, Liberty,contains a broad range of ‘healthy’ phytochemicals– raising the grain’s potential for human health food markets.

While the gluten-free status of sorghum was already known, there has been minor interest by the Australian food sector, despite sorghum being a food staple in many other countries, including India, and Ethiopia.

But QAAFI research, led by Dr Glen Fox, has revealed potential health benefits in the high concentration of phytochemicals in some sorghum varieties, especially antioxidants, in the bran layer.

The QAAFI study, which also included chickpea and soybean products from a Queensland gluten-free flour mill, were compared to shop-bought rice and rice bran,oat and oat bran, psyllium husks and quinoa.

Results showed higher concentrations of a number of compounds including phenolic acids and flavonoids in the sorghum bran fractions. In some specific phytochemicals, these concentrations were twice the concentration to other products, such as psyllium husks, which is considered a high fibre health product.

In the white sorghum tested in this project, there was no tannin present using a standard lab test. However, psyllium bran had the highest amount of tannin in the grains tested.

To better understand the potential value of the sorghum bran in human health, a laboratory in-vitro assay comparing the sorghum bran against whole sorghum meal and pearled sorghum showed a significant reduction in the rate of glucose release,suggesting a positive control on glucose in the diet.

Dr Michael Netzel, a Senior Research Fellow at QAAFI, said that the polyphenolic compounds in white sorghum bran exert an inhibitory effect on starch digestibility resulting in a significantly lower glucose release. This could present an important nutritional benefit of sorghum and sorghum bran if confirmed inhuman studies.

It should be noted that the results from this study only relate to the samples supplied by the industry partner for the project. It is known that bioactive compounds such as polyphenols and carotenoids in plant material (and subsequently derived processed products) can vary depending on the geographical location,environmental conditions and genetics.

To generate scientific evidence and to substantiate the observed in-vitro results of the present study, additional research through human trials, using selected sorghum products to measure the actual bioavailability and metabolism of the main bioactive compounds and subsequently bioactivity (potential health benefits) are required.

Industry partner, Ron Plant from Maralong Milling said the preliminary investigation provides a better understanding of the phytochemical composition and potential nutritional value of the mill’s products “We now have the scientific knowledge to put forward to potential customers, the nutritional and health benefits of this ancient grain compared to other similar grains in the market place,” Mr Plant said.

This project was jointly funded by the Australian Department of Industry and Science, and Maralong Milling through the Innovation Connections program.

Edited story source: GRDC’s GroundCover™ newspaper,Issue 133, March-April 2018

Baijiu sorghum
Opportunities for Australian sorghum

The national drink of China Baijiu is the biggest selling alcoholic spirit on the planet. 

Baijiu is a distinctive white spirit (between 40-60% alcohol by volume) which is distilled mainly from sorghum that has been fermented in mud pits or earthenware jars.

Baijiu has a history dating back centuries and is a central part of Chinese culture and tradition.

The main grain used for baijiu is sorghum,although other grains may be used. China did not import sorghum in volume until 2013 and is now importing up to 10 million tonnes annually for animal feed and baijiu production. The majority of imported sorghum (8mt) is sourced from the United States, while about 1.6mt comes from Australia.

The Australian Export Grains Innovation Centre (AEGIC), together with QAAFI’s Dr Glen Fox, and the Functional Grains Centre at Charles Sturt University, are examining opportunities for increasing the value of Australian sorghum in China.

With support from Austrade China researchers are working in China with key baijiu manufacturers to improve Australia’s understanding of the quality attributes required for the manufacture of baijiu.

Like many other spirits, baijiu is distilled from fermented grains (primarily sorghum, however other grains including wheat, rice and corn may be used in varying amounts).

There are several baijiu production methods across China depending on the style. Baijiu production usually employs a unique style of fermentation which distinguishes it from other types of spirits.

Western-style spirits such as whisky go through several distinct steps before distillation. Grain is usually malted to extract sugars and then fermented in a separate tank using yeast, before being distilled and aged.

With traditional baijiu, a starter culture unique to the region is added to a mixture of steamed grains and water in an earthenware jar or an underground mudpit. Unlike whisky, the sugar conversion and fermentation occurs at the same time in the same container. The resulting mixture is then distilled and aged.

NASA provides inspiration for plant-breeding advance

Crop improvement rates are lagging behind expected growth indemand, but a UQ innovation is set to make it easier to close the gap.

Development of speed breeding protocols led by UQ are a game-changer for global plant breeders.

Not since Norman Borlaug’s shuttle breeding technique – that made possible two generations of wheat a year – has there been such excitement worldwide about the recent publication of these protocols in ‘Nature Plants’ on January 1, 2018.

With speed breeding, however, the number of generations possible has been upped to six for bread wheat, durum wheat, barley and chickpea. That amounts to just six weeks to cycle from seed to seed in one generation. Canola is currently at four generations a year and more protocols are under development, including for lentils.

The accelerated generation times are achieved by “leaving the lights on” in the glasshouse for 22 hours a day. Once optimisations are made for light intensity,wavelength, temperature and nutrients,the photo period induces plants into the reproductive phase and flower faster than normal.

Speed breeding is an Australian innovation and one of the researchers who played a pivotal role in its development is QAAFI’s Dr Lee Hickey, who developed speed breeding as his PhD topic at UQ, and with support from GRDC’s scholarship program.

Dr Hickey said it took 10 years to refine the protocols. Over that time, the protocols benefitted from input from other researchers, including Professor Robert Park of the University of Sydney and the team led by Professor Brande Wulff at the John Innes Centre in the UK.

“The technique will likely work for many crop species that respond to longer daylight hours, such as sunflowers,” Dr Hickey said.

“It will, however, require additional refinements for short-day species, such as maize, sorghum and rice."

Lighting the way

It was NASA that first tried using continuous light to grow wheat in outerspace, inspiring Dr Hickey to contemplate anew way to grow plants on planet Earth.

“The cool thing about this story is that when we first proposed working with continuous light, people thought we were crazy and that it absolutely would notwork,” Dr Hickey said.

“The success we had shows the value of thinking outside the box, no matter how outlandish the idea may seem to conventional beliefs.”

So far speed breeding has led to the faster development of mapping populations for trait discovery, it has fast tracked trait selection, and accelerated trait stacking into elite germplasm. It is even being used in the Netherlands to boost tomato production from glasshouses by 30 per cent.

Breeding companies in Australia were quick to trial and adopt the technique, with LongReach Plant Breeders and Dow AgroSciences working directly with Dr Hickey and his speed breeding facilities.

Tackling grain dormancy

Already, a milling wheat variety called DS Faraday has been developed that was speed bred at QAAFI to incorporate grain dormancy genes.

This new genetic material suppresses damage to grain quality from pre-harvest sprouting. The variety is described as especially suited to the northern growing region.

“I view speed breeding as just one tool in the shed that can be used in conjunction with many others to accelerate the delivery of improved cultivars that are capable of boosting crop productivity,” said Dr Hickey.

“In my opinion, the really big gains for the industry will come from integrating speed breeding with trait-related technologies, including gene editing or by making it far easier to tap the genetic diversity in genebanks, similar to what we did to develop DS Faraday.”

Currently, Dr Hickey is working with LongReach Plant Breeders to use speed breeding to rapidly stack (or combine)disease resistance traits in to their elite breeding lines.

But he warns that glasshouse growth will not always reflect performance in the field: “Speed breeding does not diminish the importance of testing new cultivars over several seasons in the field,” he said.

Speeding up research

Speed breeding is now being used to accelerate the discovery rate of new and valuable traits by pre-breeding researchers,including root architecture traits that have the potential to better adapt wheat cropsto drought, barley resistance to foliar diseases (namely powdery mildew, potblotch, net form net blotch, spot form netblotch), and resistance to barley leaf rust.

Speed breeding accelerates the creation of mapping populations. These are developed by crossing plant lines that provide the maximum contrast possible for the desired trait, such as fully disease susceptible versus resistant. This contrast makes it possible to locate sites in the genome responsible for the trait.

Dr Hickey said the speed breeding protocols are scalable, flexible and can incorporate technological advances, for example in LED lights. He is especially keen on solar panel innovations that could power glasshouses while letting through wavelength of light that plants need to grow. In addition, Dr Hickey has been working with the International Maize and Wheat Improvement Center (CIMMYT) in Mexico to help them trial the use of speed breeding. The CIMMYT wheat breeding program was responsible for the Green Revolution and it continues to provide wheat cultivars to the world that are known for their broad resilience under variable growing conditions.

“The current rate of improvement ofimportant crops is inadequate to meetfuture demand and long generation timescontribute to the problem,” Dr Hickey said.

“With speed breeding, the hope is that we can shorten generation times to accelerate breeding and research programs globally.”

Source: GRDC’s GroundCover™ newspaper, Issue133, March-April 2018

Dr Lee Hickey

Dr Lee Hickey

New project targets pimelea poisoning

A new QAAFI research project aimed at producing a preventative probiotic for cattle to mitigate poisoning from the potentially fatal pasture plant, pimelea, received funding from Meat & Livestock Australia (MLA) in 2017.

Improving beef production through management of plant toxins is led by QAAFI’s Associate Professor Mary Fletcher.

MLA identified the impact of poisonous pasture plants on the health and productivity of grass fed cattle as a priority area, through the organisation’s regional consultation process with producers.

Pimelea are small native herbs that are mainly found in inland areas of Australia,below the Tropic of Capricorn, with livestock poisoning primarily associated with native rice-flower (Pimelea simplex), and flaxweed (Pimelea trichostachya).

Pimelea poisoning affects cattle, sheep and infrequently horses, however it is potentially fatal for cattle. It can be caused by ongoing, accidental consumption of toxic plants or inhalation of dry plant dust and is most common in south-west Queensland, northwest New South Wales and northern South Australia.

It is also known as St George disease, Marree disease, and flaxweed poisoning.

MLA General Manager – Producer Consultation and Adoption, Michael Crowley, said the new project aimed to produce a rumen inoculum containingmicrobes able to detoxify plant toxins, but initial work will concentrate on the pimelea toxin, simplexin.

“The project will also investigate absorbent or slow-release systems for the rumen that would have broad use across a range of plant toxins,” Mr Crowley said.

“The approach of this project is to devisestrategies to enable toxin breakdownin the rumen before absorption intothe bloodstream and impact on animalproductivity.

“Currently, there is no effective vaccine or antidote for pimelea poisoning and management strategies to reduce contact between toxic plants and susceptible stock are the only options open to beef producers to avoid potentially devastating poisoning events.

"Production and reproductive inefficiencies are a major cause of economic loss in the northern Australian beef cattle industry.
A better understanding of the impact of poisonous pasture plants like pimelea will enable the development of management strategies to address a currently under recognised factor contributing to these losses.”

Battling the pimelea scurge Enterprise snapshot

John and Queenie Kilpatrick, Kylie Savidge and TJ Moroney Location: ‘Southampton’, 110 kilometres north-west of St George 
Area: 
11,000 hectares 
Livestock: Up to 700 breeders, Santa Gertrudis and Hereford-based crossed with Santa Gertrudis, Hereford, Droughtmaster and Angus sires 
Rainfall: 425mm 
Soil: Open red box country interspersed with sand ridges and rough mulga country 
Pasture: Buffalo and native grasses, mulga

South-western Queensland producer Kylie Savidge knows all too well the devastating impact pimelea can have, with her family’s grazing enterprise still recovering from an outbreak of the toxic native plant at the start of 2017.

She believes new research to develop a ninoculum to pimelea will finally give beef producers a tool to reduce or prevent poisoning and alleviate the emotional and financial stress associated with stock fatalities and decreased production.

Kylie runs ‘Southampton’, an 11,000-hectare property 110 kilometres south-west of St George, with her parents John and Queenie Kilpatrick, her partner TJ Moroney and her children Jack (17), Ben (14) and Meghan (12).

Dry conditions in 2016 were exacerbated by the resurgence of pimelea growing across about 8000ha of the property.

The most favourable growing conditions for the species are when a wet winter follows a dry summer – dealing a harsh blow to producers who have managed cattle through tough seasons only to face poisoning concerns when conditions improve.

Kylie describes the pimelea as “looking like we had sown it”, such was the prevalence of the plants in spring 2016, after a wet, warm winter followed several dry years. However, as the green plants are not palatable, the real impact was not felt until paddocks started to dry off in January/February 2017.

“As the grass hayed off, we started seeing the effects of pimelea poisoning– affected animals had swollen brisket sand heads, rough coats, weight loss and terrible diarrhoea,” she said.

Older cattle were not as badly affected, and the worst cases of poisoning occurred with first-calf heifers, weaners and introduced stock, including bulls.

Pimelea management strategies at ‘Southampton’ included removing stock from affected paddocks and onto mulga country where there was less risk, and weaning calves earlier (four to five months instead of seven to eight) to reduce pressure on breeders.

Severely affected stock were carefully moved to yards to reduce stress (cattle can die if they are exerted after exhibiting early signs of poisoning) where they were given three doses per day of Frusemide (a diuretic) and fed a high-protein diet with mineral supplements. (Dry ureabased loose lick is also available year roundto stock on ‘Southampton’.)

At any given time there could be up to 60 head in the yards in various stages of treatment and recovery – a labour intensive and stressful process. “Some of these cattle lived and some didn’t, but we gave them all an equal chance. It was heartbreaking at the end of an intensive five days to then have to euthanise an animal we fought to save, knowing we could not do anything else except end their suffering,” Kylie said.

“I estimate that we had around a 50:50 success rate in our attempts to treat the sick animals, with costs per animal ranging between $250 to more than$1000 per head.”

The family have lost at least 70 head to pimelea, including 12 of 18 bulls, the majority of which were only purchased in 2016 to replace older sires.

The economic cost of pimelea has been significant, with medical and feeding costs compounded by lost productivity.There is also a chance the fertility of affected animals is compromised, so surviving bulls will be semen-tested.

“It has been exhausting – not only physically but emotionally, mentally and financially,” Kylie said, with the issue taking its toll on the family, including her three children who have been involved in all aspects of managing the outbreak.“

My kids won’t ever forget this experience– none of us will. It might be years between pimelea outbreaks but it is something that has a lasting impact on the producers who experience it.

“The knowledge that there could be an inoculum available in the next few years is encouraging. It would be a weight off our shoulders if we could go into the next pimelea outbreak knowing we had a tool that could protect our livestock.”

Article published in MLA Feedback February/March 2018

ENGAGEMENT

Sorghum inspected by farmer Sorghum inspected by farmer

Working with the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation

QAAFI forges strategic industry partnerships to tackle local and global challenges in tropical and sub-tropical agriculture and food production. We work with the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation on key projects to boost food and nutrition security in tropics and sub-tropics.

Gates Foundation visit to discuss crop improvement research Dr Jeff Ehlers, Senior Program Officer at the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation visited UQ on October 5, 2017 to review ongoing projects between the Gates Foundation and UQ. 

Plant breeding boost in Africa and Asia

"This is a very exciting project because it will contribute to making a real difference to millions of resource-poor farmers worldwide.”
– Dr Chris Lambrides

The University of Queensland is implementing the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation’ Breeding Program Analysis Tool (BPAT).

UQ School of Agriculture and Food Sciences project leader Dr Chris Lambrides said the project would identify ways of improving breeding programs, leading to greater genetic gains and on-farm profitability.

“We will be using the BPAT tool developed by the Gates Foundation across key public sector plant breeding programs in Africa and Asia for sorghum, rice, maize, wheat, cowpea, chickpea,common bean, groundnut, yam, sweet potato, cassava, and banana,” Dr Lambrides said.  

Project co-leader, QAAFI’s Professor David Jordan, said sorghum was a great example of the gains that can be achieved by effective plant breeding even in difficult dryland cropping environments.

The BPAT project involves developing a website to act as an information hub and encourage organisations to conduct selfassessments using the tools available online.

The project is reviewing breeding programs in 11 key African and Asian geographic regions – Mali, Burkina Faso, Nigeria, Ghana,Ethiopia, Uganda, Tanzania, Bangladesh and the Indian states Bihar, Orissa, Uttar Pradesh.

Growing more sorghum with less water

“It’s crucially important to food security in Africa as sorghum is grown in the drier and resource poor areas, where its capacity to better tolerate drought, high temperatures and low fertility make it a preferred crop to maize.”
– Professor David Jordan

Professors David Jordan and Graeme Hammer of QAAFI’s Centre for Crop Science first received support from The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation in 2012, to build capacity and productivity for sorghum breeding programs in sub-Saharan Africa and other water-limited environments. 

This was followed by a four-year $4.6-million project investigating problems common to sorghum growers in low-rainfall regions across the globe, involving one of the largest drought tolerant sorghum research projects ever undertaken.

Sorghum is the world’s fifth most important cereal and a staple food crop for half a billion people in the semi-arid tropics, including Asia and Africa. The project involved the use of sophisticated computer modelling to exploit new marker technologies, which allow rapid development of new varieties.

“We’re looking at things like root architecture and designing rootsystems for sorghum plants that access water deeper down in theprofile,” Professor Hammer said.

“We’re also looking at transpiration efficiency – that’s the efficiency with which a plant uses water to make grain – and there’s quite a variation with sorghum for both those traits.” The project investment supported development of advanced phenotyping platforms to evaluate large numbers of plant varieties in order to generate a step-change in information to enhance research into crop growth, water use efficiency and drought adaptation.

The future of BioClay

“We can target any virus – or combination of viruses – that cause crop losses without killing insects and with no toxic effects to humans or the environment.”
- Professor Neena Mitter

UQ researchers from QAAFI and the Australian Institute of Biotechnology and Nanotechnology (AIBN) have made a discovery that could help conquer one of major threats to global food security – pests and diseases in plants.

With initial support from The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, BioClay – an environmentally sustainable alternative to chemicals and pesticides – has potential to be a gamechanger for crop protection.

Viruses are part of the pest and pathogen burden that reduces food production globally by 20% to 40%, affecting an estimated 795 million people – one in nine – without enough food to lead a healthy, active life.

“Not only are viruses causing food losses, the chemicals we use to control their insect vectors have toxicity issues to human health,to our waterways from run-off, and to the environment,” Professor Mitter says.

Her new approach involves boosting the plant’s own defences, priming them in the manner of a vaccine to naturally attack specific viruses.

A spray of nano-sized degradable clay is used to release doublestranded RNA that protects plants from specific disease-causing pathogens. The technology reduces the use of pesticides without altering the genome of the plants.

Eradicating bunchy top from Australia to Africa

“The project will look to Southeast Asia, where many bananas and their diseases originate, to identify wild species of seeded bananas that may have natural resistance to bunchy top.”
– Associate Professor John Thomas

Queensland scientists are tackling one of the world’s worst threats to banana crops – bunchy top disease – with help from the Bill& Melinda Gates Foundation in the form of a $US5.7 million investment.

Led by QAAFI’s Associate Professor John Thomas, the research aims to tackle bunchy top disease by strengthening the ability to control and eradicate the disease globally. The project involves controlling bunchy top in Nigeria and Benin, and looking for sources of resistance in Southeast Asia – the ground zero of banana disease.

First identified in Fiji in 1889, bunchy top has since spread around the world. Although not native to Africa, bananas have become an important food source for over 100 million people in sub-Saharan Africa and a source of income for over 50 million small-holderfarmers.

In Africa the project aims to rehabilitate lost production areas at a community level in Nigeria and Benin and to search for wild species of seeded bananas that may have natural resistance to bunchy top.

“The virus is controllable and with considerable effort you can get rid of it in a defined area, but history shows us that once the disease is established in one place it usually stays there, so this work may provide the breakthrough we need to get on top of this disease once and for all,” said Associate Professor Thomas.

TropAg2017
Science to nourish the world

The heat is on agriculture and food production in the tropics. With the global population expected to reach nine billion by 2040, the greatest pressure will likely be experienced in the world’s tropical zone which is home to half the world’s population, including more than half of its young people, and many of its fastest growing economies.

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Food Evolution movie screening

The TropAg2017 conference kicked off with a free screening of the Food Evolution movie, a documentary looking at public attitudes to GMO foods.One of the stars of the film, US-based beef biotechnology specialist Dr Alison Van Eenennaam was a guest on a panel discussion immediately following the film’s screening. Other panellists included QAAFI’s Professor Robert Henry, technology communications specialist Dr Craig Cormick, and was hosted by GM advocate, QAAFI’s Dr Lee Hickey.

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Regulation and market access of gene-edited and GMO food and products

As part of TropAg2017 and National Agriculture Day, QAAFI partnered with the Rural Press Club to host a breakfast seminar on GMOs and gene-edited food and products.

Panellists discussed the work being done with gene editing inAustralian agriculture, the market status and global regulatoryenvironment for gene-edited livestock and crops, how gene editingdiffers from GMOs, and what consumers think.

Facilitator: Neil Lyon, Editor, Grain Central hosted the discussion.
Panel speakers were:
- Kevin Diehl, Director Regulatory Strategy and IndustryAffairs, DuPont Pioneer, USA
- Professor Robert Henry, Director, Queensland Alliance for Agriculture & Food Innovation
- Stuart Armitage, President, Queensland Farmers’ Federation & Darling Downs cotton grower

NanoBio Innovation in Agriculture

Creating innovative solutions for productive sustainable agriculture.

Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk launched a new UQ agricultural nanotechnology initiative, the Nano Bio Innovation in Agriculture hub, at the International BIO2017 conference in San Diego, USA, in June 2017.

Substantial challenges face the future of agricultural production and the global agricultural sector needs to grow more food with less resources while facing new threats from climate change and bio security.

Radical new approaches and disruptive technology can mitigate these challenges.

The Hub for NanoBio Innovation in Agriculture (HNIA) is a unique bridge between scientific discovery and agricultural application. UQ expertise in this field means HNIA has the delivery systems, expertise, and facilities to validate and bring to market new technologies that transform agricultural products and practices.

With commercial partners, outcomes-focused research, and accelerated translation, HNIA is creating advanced materials based solutions that will seed a sustainable future for communities worldwide.

Starch structure supplies new clues for human health

A recent discovery about the role of debranching enzymes in starches will have major implications for nutrition and human health, according to Professor Bob Gilbert, Research Professor at The University of Queensland.

Professor Gilbert is one of Australia’s most cited polymer chemists and was one of the first non-Chinese recruited under the Chinese Government’s prestigious 1000-Talent scheme. He divides his time between Brisbane and China’s College of Agriculture, Yangzhou University.

Professor Gilbert heads a research program on the relationship between starch and glycogen structure, and nutrition, diabetes and obesity.

Professor Gilbert said the debranching enzymes discovery was the culmination of more than 10 years of work.

His group have used a range of new experimental and theoretical techniques to investigate what it is about the structure of starches that influence their digestibility.

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(L-R) Professor Graeme Hammer, Director, Centre for Crop Science at QAAFI; Professor Robyn Ward, Deputy Vice Chancellor (Research) at UQ; Gates Foundation’s Dr Jeff Ehlers.

(L-R) Professor Graeme Hammer, Director, Centre for Crop Science at QAAFI; Professor Robyn Ward, Deputy Vice Chancellor (Research) at UQ; Gates Foundation’s Dr Jeff Ehlers.

QAAFI researcher at UQ's Hermitage facility

QAAFI researcher at UQ's Hermitage facility

Professor Dave Jordan at UQ's Hermitage facility

Professor Dave Jordan at UQ's Hermitage facility

Sorghum

Sorghum

Professor Neena Mitter

Professor Neena Mitter

BioClay

BioClay

BioClay Reseachers

BioClay Reseachers

Attendees of TropAg2017

Attendees of TropAg2017

Kevin Diehl, Director, Regulatory Product Strategy, Scientific Affairs and Industry Relations, DuPont Pioneer, United States, talks to media at TropAg

Kevin Diehl, Director, Regulatory Product Strategy, Scientific Affairs and Industry Relations, DuPont Pioneer, United States, talks to media at TropAg

Professor Robert Henry and Dr Beth Woods at TropAg2017

Professor Robert Henry and Dr Beth Woods at TropAg2017

Food Evolution movie poster

Food Evolution movie poster

Rural Press Club to host a breakfast seminar

Rural Press Club to host a breakfast seminar

Leeanne Enoch (Minister for Environment and the Great Barrier Reef, Minister for Science and Minister for the Arts) with Professor Robert Henry (Director, QAAFI)

Leeanne Enoch (Minister for Environment and the Great Barrier Reef, Minister for Science and Minister for the Arts) with Professor Robert Henry (Director, QAAFI)

L-R Professor Robert Henry; Professor Neena Mitter; Hon Annastacia Palaszczuk, Premier of Queensland; Professor Michael Yu, Professor Alan Rowan

L-R Professor Robert Henry; Professor Neena Mitter; Hon Annastacia Palaszczuk, Premier of Queensland; Professor Michael Yu, Professor Alan Rowan

Professor Bob Gilbert's (R) with his students in QAAFI's Centre for Nutrition and Food Sciences

Professor Bob Gilbert's (R) with his students in QAAFI's Centre for Nutrition and Food Sciences

QAAFI's Centre for Nutrition and Food Sciences students

QAAFI's Centre for Nutrition and Food Sciences students

LEARNING

Cécile Godde is a PhD student with CSIRO and QAAFI at The University of Queensland.

Cécile Godde is a PhD student with CSIRO and QAAFI at The University of Queensland.

Dr Caspar Roxburgh

Dr Caspar Roxburgh

Oliver Meldrum

Oliver Meldrum

Why I am going to Antarctica

Cécile Godde studies sustainable grazing system intensification and is passionate about creating a healthier planet. This passion has taken Cécile from the tropics and sub-tropics to Antarctica, where she took part in the Homeward Bound initiative, which seeks to heighten the influence and impact of women with a science background on the decision-making that shapes our planet.

The science of growing food in Africa

For most of the world’s poorest people, ‘how to grow food’ is a question of life and death. UQ research is helping to change lives.

Waste not, want not

Up to half the world’s food is never eaten. QAAFI PhD student Oliver Meldrum believes packaging could be the solution.

Read the full 2017 QAAFI Annual Report

  • Research staff Honorary and Adjunct Appointments Affiliates and Operational and technical staff
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