Research Shows Promise for Drought Tolerant Crops

Scientists at the John Innes Centre together with colleagues at the University of Jordan have developed barley plants which have four times the drought tolerance of their parent stock. Dr. Wendy Harwood worked on the malting barley Golden Promise, which is a heritage variety generally grown in Scotland for the brewing industry.

Using genetic modification, Dr. Harwood and colleagues worked on a gene responsible for opening and closing tiny pores on the surface of the barley leaves. They put the naturally-present gene which controls this process into overdrive, and they were able to develop barley plants with stomata which closed more readily when water was scarce, retaining the plant's water content and making them more resilient in drought conditions. Unusually, there was no ‘trade-off' associated with this change as the plants grew as well in water-abundant soils as their non-modified counterparts. Dr. Harwood said, "This shows that making a single stress-responsive gene more active can have quite a big effect, which is encouraging."

For more information, read the news release at http://www.jic.ac.uk/news/2014/06/drought-tolerant-crops/.