Study measures early detection of aging in seeds

Aging is a part of life, and plants are no exception. The life cycle of a plant is felt in gene banks that store plant materials, such as seeds. Plant materials in gene banks may be accessed by farmers, researchers, conservationists, ...

The dawn of a new era for genebanks

Biodiversity goes beyond species diversity. Another important aspect of biodiversity is genetic variation within species. A notable example is the immense variety of cultivars and landraces of crop plants and their wild progenitors. ...

Scientists put citrus in "deep freeze" to preserve it

U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) scientists are creating a backup storage site or "genebank" for citrus germplasm in the form of small buds, called shoot tips, which have been cryopreserved—that is, plunged into liquid ...

Sequencing without PCR reduces bias in measuring biodiversity

DNA barcode sequencing without the amplification of DNA by PCR beats the problem of false positives which can inflate estimates of biodiversity, finds a study published in BioMed Central and BGI Shenzhen's open access journal ...

World's blueberries protected in unique, living collection

Familiar blueberries and their lesser-known wild relatives are safeguarded by U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) scientists and curators at America's official blueberry genebank. The plants, collected from throughout the ...

St. John's wort collection mined for its medicinal value

A unique collection of St. John's wort (Hypericum) curated by Agricultural Research Service (ARS) scientists in Ames, Iowa, is providing university collaborators with genetically diverse, well-documented sources of this herb ...