Improving Vietnamese rice

Speaking on the sidelines of the discussion “Innovation in Agriculture and Food” within the framework of the VinFuture 2025 Science and Technology Week, Professor Raphaël Mercier - molecular geneticist, Director of the Department of Chromosome Biology at the Max Planck Institute for Plant Genetics, Germany, shared his perspective on increasing sustainable and resilient food production in the near future.

Technology helps increase productivity by 20-30%

Professor Raphaël Mercier's research focuses on the molecular mechanisms of meiosis, in particular the regulation of crossover formation and distribution, and how these processes shape genetic diversity in plants. He has identified key genes such as FANCM, RECQ4, and FIGL1, which act as anti-crossing factors, providing new strategies to regulate recombination and promote crop improvement.

He also pioneered the development of the MiMe system (mitosis instead of meiosis), which turns meiosis into a mitosis-like cell division, allowing the production of asexual seeds, a breakthrough that has had major implications for maintaining hybrid vigor in crops such as rice.

Professor Raphaël Mercier, Director of the Department of Chromosome Biology at the Max Panck Institute for Plant Genetics, Germany.. — Professor Raphaël Mercier, Director of the Department of Chromosome Biology at the Max Panck Institute for Plant Genetics, Germany.

Sharing specifically about the solution of creating asexual seeds to improve crop productivity, Professor Raphaël Mercier said: In nature, some plants do not need fertilization or pollination to produce seeds, such as dandelions. Its petals help disperse seeds, this mechanism can be useful for agriculture.

Asexual reproduction is based on mitosis, which does not include meiosis and fertilization as traditional but "transforms the meiosis division process into a simpler process" to create 2 copies of genes. F1 hybrid plants are strong, there is no need to control the quality of the parent plants, only the quality of the hybrid.

Asexual reproduction allows the preservation of desirable characteristics and the rapid generation of pure lines, which can be used for a wide range of crops, helping farmers. In particular, the creation of asexual seeds helps maintain hybrid vigor without the need for re-breeding over many generations. When applied to agriculture, it can increase productivity by about 20-30%.

Application to Vietnamese rice plants

Vietnam is one of the few leading rice exporting countries in the world . Professor Raphaël Mercier believes that we should continue to take advantage of all available technologies to improve quality, increase productivity, and apply new agricultural models.

“I think new technologies should be researched, adopted and adapted to Vietnamese agriculture to improve productivity and quality,” said Professor Raphaël Mercier.

In the lab, Professor Raphaël Mercier and his colleagues are working primarily with a small plant called Arabidopsis (a member of the mustard family). The team has also applied the technology to rice, and is conducting some field trials to evaluate its real-world effectiveness. This is the final step before putting the technology into practical use.

Having spent 15 years researching the transition from natural to asexual varieties, Professor Raphaël Mercier sees a trend towards making more efficient use of hybrid varieties. Plants will grow more vigorously, giving higher yields. As a result, farmers can use less land or less fertilizer to produce the same amount of food. In other words, thanks to the high yield determined by the plant's genes, the environmental impact can be reduced while maintaining the same output.

Hybrids are also more tolerant of fluctuations, such as fluctuations in temperature or water availability. They are more resilient, meaning they can maintain high yields even when conditions are less than ideal.

Compared to purebred varieties, hybrid varieties give about 30% higher yields. That is, just switching to hybrid varieties can immediately increase yields by about 30% compared to purebred varieties. And the environmental impact of production is indirectly reduced because with higher yields, people can produce the same output but with less land and less fertilizer.

However, this expert also affirmed that this is just one technology in a large 'toolkit' that we need to combine to solve the challenges ahead. We need to use all the technologies that can serve science to achieve goals, such as a 70% increase in productivity. For example, AI helps farmers reduce effort while making more accurate decisions.

In order for this technology to be applied in Vietnam, Professor Raphaël Mercier said it would be great if there was cooperation between scientists working right here, with specific needs and conditions, thereby improving the efficiency of the technology.

Thu Huong

Source: https://daidoanket.vn/cai-tien-cay-lua-viet-nam.html

Comment (0)