As the world’s population continues to grow, the planet’s ability to support life is being stretched to its limits. In fact, models on Earth’s carrying capacity suggest that the planet cannot sustain current growth rates. If changes are not made, food and water shortages will span the globe in the near future. Some scientists believe that the only way to avoid such crises is through a second Green Revolution, in which global food production significantly increases.
To assist in the efforts of increasing food production, researchers at University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign have created a computer model that can simulate the planting of different soybean crops and then determine the resulting production and cost of each crop. These researchers, lead by Praveen Kumar, a professor of civil and environmental engineering at the University of Illinois, claim that a crop designed by the computer model can increase food production by nine percent and simultaneously reduce water consumption by 13 percent. Furthermore, these crops will be able to reflect 34 percent more radiation into space.
How can one crop accomplish all these goals? Surprisingly, the answer lies in the shape of a plant. In an evolutionary schema, plants develop a leaf branching distribution that will block out other plants that may compete for water and nutrients. While this has helped many varieties of plants survive in the wild, such leaf distribution is rarely necessary in an agricultural setting. Thus, farmers can forgo this evolutionary trait for more agriculturally-efficient distributions.
Increasing the leaf distribution on a plant will allow farmers to pack plants closer together. This can reduce the amount of water that is lost from empty soil evaporation. Additionally, if the leaves are distributed evenly, light can penetrate the plant more deeply. This allows the plants to carry out a higher degree of photosynthesis and therefore harvest a greater amount of light energy.
The researchers at the University of Illinois further discovered that, by decreasing the density of the canopy, they could decrease water usage while preserving the productivity of the plant. A dense canopy causes the plant to lose water through evaporation and, therefore, lead to a higher amount of water usage. Interestingly, canopy-sparse plants not only help reduce water usage, but they can also help offset potential changes in climate. By manipulating the angle of the leaves, researchers increased solar radiation reflection of each plant. Such reflection alleviates global warming processes.
The benefits offered by the computer model are strikingly apparent. Modeling crops with different characteristics allows researchers to see how each change affects food production, water usage, and the overall climate. By selecting desirable traits, these researchers can help the agricultural industry support the increasing world population.
However, these models aren’t simply creations on a computer screen: Many of the manipulated traits exist in living crops. Therefore, the simulated crops can be created through cross-breedings of existing crops.
