chemical for protecting crops from drought
01 Jul '13 20:361 edithttp://phys.org/news/2013-07-crop-yields-world-extreme-weather.html
the chemical works by mimicking a natural plant hormone that partly protects the crop plants from drought because the plants have been inadvertently bred to lack that natural hormonal response.
The results look impressive but it seems to me a better and more long term solution would be to genetically engineer the crop plants to have the same hormonal response as closely related wild plants thus giving them the same good natural resistance to drought and without having to use any hormone mimic.
the chemical works by mimicking a natural plant hormone that partly protects the crop plants from drought because the plants have been inadvertently bred to lack that natural hormonal response.
The results look impressive but it seems to me a better and more long term solution would be to genetically engineer the crop plants to have the same hormonal response as closely related wild plants thus giving them the same good natural resistance to drought and without having to use any hormone mimic.