Jane Langdale's guest appearances

Jane Langdale

Finding Genius Podcast

Long Now: Seminars About Long-term Thinking

FutureTech Podcast

Paul Ehrlich

Stephanie Schnorr

Jacob Koffler

Aric Prather

Andrew Walker

Michael Skinner

Allison Rosen

Aaron Ferguson

Zach Rhoads

Michael Garfield

Indra Cidambi

Michael Breus

Stephen Ekker

Mark Russell

Valter D. Longo

OwlTail

Early land plants didn’t have leaves. At a certain point, they evolved. In fact, the anatomy found in C4 leaves evolved 60 times, and leaves themselves evolved at least twice but probably no more than 6 times, essentially independently from one another. Now, this is a complex genetic change we’re talking about. How did this happen? That’s what Jane Langdale is trying to figure out. The whole of Jane Langdale’s research is about shoot development in plants. When a shoot develops, it can either turn into more stems or into a leaf. The leaves then, more or less efficiently, convert sunlight into usable energy. The interesting thing is this: a small minority of plants have a specialized anatomy that allows them to convert sunlight more efficiently. The goal is to engineer that anatomy into crops like rice or wheat. “And if we could do that, then it’s predicted that we could increase yield by about 50%.” Hit play to hear more about Jane Langdale’s research. Subscribe, review, and if you can, consider donating some BitCoin. Every little bit helps.

Early land plants didn’t have leaves. At a certain point, they evolved. In fact, the anatomy found in C4 leaves evolved 60 times, and leaves themselves evolved at least twice but probably no more than 6 times, essentially independently from one another. Now, this is a complex genetic change we’re talking about. How did this happen? That’s what Jane Langdale is trying to figure out. The whole of Jane Langdale’s research is about shoot development in plants. When a shoot develops, it can either turn into more stems or into a leaf. The leaves then, more or less efficiently, convert sunlight into usable energy. The interesting thing is this: a small minority of plants have a specialized anatomy that allows them to convert sunlight more efficiently. The goal is to engineer that anatomy into crops like rice or wheat. “And if we could do that, then it’s predicted that we could increase yield by about 50%.” Hit play to hear more about Jane Langdale’s research. Subscribe, review, and if you can, consider donating some BitCoin. Every little bit helps.

Jane Langdale – Designing More Efficient Leaves

Early land plants didn’t have leaves. At a certain point, they evolved. In fact, the anatomy found in C4 leaves evolved 60 times, and leaves themselves evolved at least twice but probably no more than 6 times, essentially independently from one another. Now, this is a complex genetic change we’re talking about. How did this happen? That’s what Jane Langdale is trying to figure out. The whole of Jane Langdale’s research is about shoot development in plants. When a shoot develops, it can either turn into more stems, or into a leaf. The leaves then, more or less efficiently, convert sunlight into usable energy. The interesting thing is this: a small minority of plants have a specialized anatomy that allows them to convert sunlight more efficiently. The goal is to engineer that anatomy into crops like rice or wheat. “And if we could do that, then it’s predicted that we could increase yield by about 50%.” Hit play to hear more about Jane Langdale’s research. Subscribe, review, and if you can, consider donating some BitCoin. Every little bit helps.

Three billion people—nearly half of us--depend on rice for survival.  What if you could adjust rice genetically so 1) it has a 50% greater yield, 2) using half the water, 3) needing far less fertilizer, 4) along with higher resilience to climate change?  It would transform world agriculture.All you need to do is switch rice from inefficient C3 photosynthesis to the kind of C4 photosynthesis employed by corn, sugarcane, and sorghum.  That switch has been made in plants 60 independent times by evolution, so we have models for how to do it.  In 02008 the International Rice Research Institute in the Philippines, funded by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, set in motion a consortium of 12 labs worldwide working on developing C4 rice.One of the major leaders of the work is Professor Jane Langdale at Oxford University’s Department of Plant Sciences.  Former Long Now speaker Charles C. Mann (who is writing about C4 rice) recommended her highly.If C4 rice proves successful, it could lead to similar radical improvement for other inefficient crops such as wheat.  Decades of focussed research could produce centuries in which ever less land provides ever more food, leaving ever more of the planet to nature.

Three billion people—nearly half of us--depend on rice for survival. What if you could adjust rice genetically so 1) it has a 50% greater yield, 2) using half the water, 3) needing far less fertilizer, 4) along with higher resilience to climate change? It would transform world agriculture. All you need to do is switch rice from inefficient C3 photosynthesis to the kind of C4 photosynthesis employed by corn, sugarcane, and sorghum. That switch has been made in plants 60 independent times by evolution, so we have models for how to do it. In 02008 the International Rice Research Institute in the Philippines, funded by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, set in motion a consortium of 12 labs worldwide working on developing C4 rice. One of the major leaders of the work is Professor Jane Langdale at Oxford University’s Department of Plant Sciences. Former Long Now speaker Charles C. Mann (who is writing about C4 rice) recommended her highly. If C4 rice proves successful, it could lead to similar radical improvement for other inefficient crops such as wheat. Decades of focussed research could produce centuries in which ever less land provides ever more food, leaving ever more of the planet to nature.

Jane Langdale: Radical Ag: C4 Rice and Beyond