#striga — Public Fediverse posts

#Sorghum's resistance to #Striga: Two key #genes fight against #crop #parasites.

#parasites #strigolactone #transporters #hormones #SbSLT1 #SbSLT2 #AI #crops #agriculture

https://phys.org/news/2025-02-sorghum-resistance-striga-key-genes.html

New publication: The role of #strigolactone structural diversity in the host specificity and control of #Striga, a major constraint to sub-Saharan #agriculture. #microbiome #fungi #parasiticplants #sorghum #sulfotransferase
https://doi.org/10.1002/ppp3.10549

New NIOO publication: The soil #microbiome modulates the #sorghum root #metabolome and cellular traits with a concomitant reduction of #Striga infection. #parasiticplant #pseudomonas
https://doi.org/10.1016/j.celrep.2024.113971

Really a good work. Sorghum is one of the very important crops that receive way too little attention. And this passage blew my mind

'When sorghum plants find themselves in low-phosphate soil, they release chemicals from their roots to attract fungi that help them acquire phosphate. Unfortunately for sorghum, witchweed has evolved to respond to this same signal.  
“This parasitic plant has hijacked the signaling so that its seeds germinate when they perceive that same signal from the root, said Brady."'

-> Probably somebody will try to find a 'commercial' solution based on some microbes raised in a lab to be sold to farmers. Notwithstanding, these findings underscore mainly the importance of an abundant and diverse microbial community. But the real solutions are probably more related to agricultural management taking soil health into account.

@sflorg

#Agroecology #RegenerativeAgriculture #SoilMicrobiology #Mycorrhiza #Striga #Sorghum

Researchers identify #microbes that help #plants thwart #parasite.

#agriculture #Striga #sorghum #fungi #signalling #kairomone #genomics #metabolome

https://phys.org/news/2024-03-microbes-thwart-parasite.html