science matters : spring 2011

matters

An integrated approachThis issue recognizes the importance of integrated crop solutions to help farmers around the world to grow more from less

Filling the rice bowls of the future

Soybean under attack from insects and diseases

Sweet success with sugar beet and sugar cane

Giving customers a better flower

Winning ways with wheat

Special article an external perspective on 100 important questions facing agriculture

sciencemattersKeeping abreast of Syngenta R&D Spring 2011

03 Integrated crops Sandro AruffoHead of Research and Development Sandro Aruffo talks about our new strategy and how we are providing integrated solutions to the grower.

04 Good news about food (and fuel and flowers) Ian JepsonThis issue of Science Matters is dedicated

to new developments in improving the crops which feed the world. Ian Jepson sets the scene introducing the science we are delivering to provide integrated solutions for our customers.

06 Filling the rice bowls of the future Stuart HarrisonRice is the worlds number one staple

crop. As the worlds population increases this century, so rice production will have to keep pace, with very little increase in the land devoted to growing it. That might just be possible thanks to innovations from Syngentas rice R&D, as Stuart Harrison explains.

08 WIZZARDTM casts a winter spell over sugar beet Thomas Kraft & Jan Gielen Sugar beet is a major

global crop 250 million tonnes are grown annually from which is extracted 30% of the worlds sugar. Thomas Kraft and Jan Gielen show how research at Syngenta has found ways in which the plant can be modified so that it can be sown in autumn rather than spring and thereby greatly increase its yield.

10 Designer genes of the future will be shaped by computer Laura Potter & Mike Nuccio

Syngentas team of scientists are combining their expertise in bioinformatics with trait and crop knowledge, aiming their combined skills at more challenging targets, as Laura Potter and Mike Nuccio explain.

12 Soybean alert number one fungus attack! Fernando Gallina & Sergio Paiva

More than 100 million tonnes of soybean are grown every year, but a few years ago the Brazilian crop was under threat from an insidious fungus disease which has since spread rapidly. Syngentas Priori Xtra now provides an answer, as Fernando Gallina and Sergio Paiva discuss.

14 Soybean alert number two aphid attack! Virgil SparksSyngenta can celebrate an industry first: an

integrated approach to controlling soybean aphids which blight this key crop. Virgil Sparks explains that the secret weapon is a combination of an aphid-resistant native trait and a targeted systemic insecticide which does not threaten beneficial insects.

16 Innovation, art and science give customers a better flower experience Sabine Lorente

& Dick van KleinweeIn Syngenta Lawn & Garden, they are asking if the art of flower breeding can come together with todays science to give our customers an even better ex-perience. Sabine Lorente and Dick van Kleinwee show how they are bringing innovation, art and science together to breed beautiful new flowers.

18 Syngenta has PleneTM to talk about Ian Jepson Ian Jepson talks about how innovation in

adjacent technologies and a partnership with John Deere has transformed the sugar cane business with a new approach to planting called PleneTM.

Contents

Science Matters is a magazine supported by the Syngenta Fellows a leading community of Syngenta scientists whose aims include recognizing and promoting Syngentas excellence in science. Here is an overview of the articles in this issue:

20 Winning ways with wheat Derek Cornes Seed choice is one of the most important

decisions a cereal grower makes it is the key to higher yields and better quality grain. However, wheat breeding is still largely traditional and productivity is variable. Derek Cornes explains how Syngenta is planning to change things.

22 Making melons resistant to Fusarium fungus Bruno Foncelle Melons are grown

around the world but in many countries they are threatened by a soil-borne disease which causes the plants to wilt. Syngenta has developed a resistant strain and this year it looks set to conquer a large section of the market. Bruno Foncelle explains.

24 Syngenta turns its big guns on a deadly menace Phil WegeThe Innovative Vector Control Consortium

(IVCC) is funded by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. Its aim is to help find new tools to kill insects that transmit human diseases such as malaria. Syngenta has been a leading collaborating partner since 2006. Phil Wege explains more.

26 External Perspective 100 questions facing agriculture Jules PrettyThis external perspective focuses on the challenges facing agriculture. Jules Pretty from the University of Essex, discusses the output from a Foresight Group of 55 experts who generated 100 questions facing agriculture today.

28 Out and About Snippets Carolyn RichesReporter Carolyn Riches writes about scientific snippets from across the world on an integrated crops theme.

30 Editors comments Stuart John DunbarStuart reviews the output of the survey from the last edition.

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Agriculture has never been more central to the worlds social, political and economic development.

To enable a projected global population of 9 billion in 2050 to live well and within the limits of the planet, agriculture must achieve a doubling of world food production while conserving water and energy. This can only happen through a holistic and long term vision of the way we grow food. This vision is reliant on scientific innovation and its adoption by farmers, the food value chain and consumers.

Syngenta is working hard to make this vision a reality. In February 2011, we introduced our new strategy, which is based on three core objectives: Integrate, Innovate and Outperform. Our aim is to bring together Crop Protection and Seeds to develop a fully integrated offer on a global crop basis. We will use the best technologies in chemistry, genetics, and adjacent technologies either alone or in combination to address the challenges of growers worldwide and drive agricultural productivity to a higher level in a sustainable way.

We are already seeing the tangible results of our integrated approach. For example, Plene is a breakthrough technology in sugar cane planting, combining chemistry, plant genetics and application technology to provide a truly integrated solution. With Plene there is a shift from manual to mechanical planting, which will improve convenience and safety. Plene will also allow for more frequent re-planting and therefore higher overall yields with less impact on the environment.

We are further expanding our integrated offer with the introduction in India of Tegra, a solution for small-scale rice growers. This solution consists of planting high quality seed coated with seed treatment, followed by a new system of mechanical transplantation of the seedlings to reduce labor input and improve yields.

This edition of Science Matters is dedicated to Syngentas integrated approach to provide better solutions for the challenges faced by growers. It highlights some of the innovative approaches our scientists are developing for the major staple crops of rice, wheat, soybean and sugar cane. It also looks at how our new WIZZARD breakthrough technology might transform sugar beet production, how we have developed a new fungus resistant melon strain and how the latest innovations in flower breeding will give our customers a better experience. In addition, you will learn more about the role of bioinformatics in designing the genes of the future and how our science, via our collaboration with the Innovative Vector Control Consortium, is having a positive impact in related fields such as the development of insecticides to kill the mosquitoes that transmit malaria.

Sandro AruffoHead of Research & Development

Our integrated approach

Science Matters Keeping abreast of Syngenta R&D Spring 2011

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This issue of Science Matters is dedicated to new developments in improving the crops which feed the world. Ian Jepson sets the scene introducing the science we are delivering to provide integrated solutions for our customers.

Good news about food(and fuel and flowers)

The number of humans on this planet increases by around 80,000 every day. This year it will increase by 30 million, and by the middle of this century the world population will reach 9 billion. We will all need food. Hopefully, no one will go hungry, and ideally all will be adequately fed from existing farm-land and without encroaching on wildlife habitats. This can be done, but it will need the skills

of agribusiness companies like Syngenta if it is to be achieved. Few companies can offer the range of skills we have at our disposal both in terms of our crop protection assets and our breeding and bio-technology capabilities. Through a closer working relationship between them we are bringing about remarkable advances in crop yield via an integrated approach.

While our competitors have generally focussed on crop protection chemicals or the development of seeds and biotechnology products, Syngenta has established strong capabilities and infrastructure in both areas. In the past we may have focussed on marketing a single active ingredient or variety, but now we are increasingly offering integrated crop products such as our seed treatments, our herbicide tolerance packages of traits, germplasm, and


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Ian Jepson

Sugar Cane R&D

Business Partner

Syngenta

Biotechnology Inc.

North Carolina

USA

Ian graduated with a BSc in biology from the

University of Durham and has a PhD in Molecular

Genetics from the University of Birmingham. He

joined ICI Seeds at Jealotts Hill in 1989, and has

held a number of management positions in Seeds

and Crop Protection: Bioscience Manager; Head

of Trait Research; Biotechnology Traits Portfolio

Leader; and Head of Enzymes R&D. Currently he

is Sugar Cane R&D Business Partner for both Crop

Protection and Seeds and is based at Syngenta

Biotechnology Inc., North Carolina, USA.

Contact: [email protected]


By the time you have read this article more than 80 people have been added to the world, all needing food, fiber and fuel without any additional land being available. An integrated approach will be essential to help provide for their needs.Sugar cane is becoming increasingly important as a vital source of both food energy and biofuel energy

herbicides, and our lawn and garden products. In this edition of Science Matters, we will see the power of chemistry and genetics being harnessed to bring a range of innovative solutions to farmers.

Rice, wheat, and soybean are three of the worlds staple crops on which the population depends for its daily intake of calories and nutrients. Rice is the number one staple, but can it keep pace with the rising population? Stuart Harrison has some good news to report. Wheat is number two, and Derek Cornes recounts the efforts being made to improve its yields.

Sugar is also a key agricultural commodity, and a vital source of both food energy and biofuel energy. It is grown both as sugar cane and sugar beet. Our efforts to boost sugar cane productivity in Brazil is described in my article on the novel planting technology PleneTM. This offers the grower germplasm, chemistry and new planting technology, the last of these is in association with John Deere, the worlds leading manufacturer of farming equipment. Thomas Kraft reports on sugar beet with news of

a revolutionary approach which will increase production by 25%.

Another major crop is soybean and it too can be used both as food or fuel, yielding either edible oil and protein, or bio-diesel. Syngentas new variety provides an answer to the fungal disease which is threatening it, as Fernando Gallina and Sergio Paiva report, while Virgil Sparks explains about Syngentas integrated approach to pest management that is designed to protect this crop against aphids.

Effort has also been directed at protect-ing a fruit crop, namely melons, which are attacked by a soil fungus. Bruno Foncelle has news about the work to develop a strain that can resist this and which is now about to come to market. Gene technology can, in theory, solve many of the problems concerning food crops. The first wave of commercial products have been relatively simple gene traits such as herbicide resist-ance. Future products will require more sophisticated methods to discover ways to influence traits such as drought-resistance, and this requires advanced computing skills which Laura Potter and Mike Nuccio are developing.

Nor should we forget that while hunger stalks the world in some places, in others it is the mosquito which takes the biggest toll on young lives. Syngenta is now involved with the Innovative Vector Control Consortium (IVCC), funded by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, whose aim is to eradicate malaria. Philip Wege is our man behind that project.

Although beautiful blooms may not be an essential requirement when it comes to enjoying what the earth can yield, the pleasure of growing and showing flowers can be very rewarding. Dick van Kleinwee and Sabine Lorente are designing ones which they hope will one day win first prizes at garden festivals.

So welcome to this edition of Science Matters, and discover some remarkable advances that are being made by Syngenta people.

John Deere is a trademark of Deere & Company.

Rice is the worlds number one staple crop. As the worlds population increases this century, so rice production will have to keep pace and ideally with very little increase in the land devoted to growing it. That might just be possible thanks to innovations from Syngentas rice R&D, as Stuart Harrison explains.

Filling the rice bowls of the future

Life without rice would be unthinkable in many countries, especially in Asia where it forms the backbone of the daily diet and where its production represents the livelihood of much of the population. More than three billion people eat rice every day, and 90% of that produced in Asia is consumed as food.


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In the Asia Pacific (APAC) region rice is grown on 140 million hectares, an area five times larger than Vietnam or the Philippines. Three quarters of this is produced in South and South East Asia where it feeds a population of two billion that is growing fast and it is the main source of food calories, so a drive to increase its productivity is vital. Yet rice yields there have reached a plateau and the area devoted to rice cultivation is likely to remain unchanged.

Keeping pace with populationAssuming no further land becomes available for rice production, then to keep pace with population growth, the yield per hectare will have to increase from the current average of 4.3 tonnes per hectare to 5.3 tonnes per hectare by 2020. The current rate of increase will attain only half this yield, so clearly innovation is needed. The increase will have to come from the intensification of production, and essential to this will be hybridization and trait technologies. Syngentas technology teams in India, Vietnam, Philippines and China are destined to play a critical role.

Stuart: Over the next decade, Syngenta will focus on several innovations in rice. From a seed perspective, developing hybrid rice containing the critical biotic and abiotic traits will be key. Our research projects are in the early stages of discovery, but already several innovative products are emerging from our work in Hyderabad, India.

The current breeding program is aimed at unlocking the genetic potential of rice, and the breeding programs and technology platforms have made a significant start.

Once the genetic potential of rice has been unlocked, and the benefits of the new varieties have been shown to boost yields, then farmers will be offered a robust crop-care program as part of an integrated package. Hybrid rice is an essential component of any rice offer as far as Asian growers are concerned. Combined with other technologies, it will go a long way to ensuring that the rice basket of Asia remains full for the rest of this century, and that Syngenta products will be there to help.

The science behind Syngentas hybrid rice

Syngenta has built its research efforts around a 3-line hybrid platform utilizing a stable cytoplasmic male sterility (CMS) system. Current hybrid breeding globally utilizes 10 CMS lines which limits the value added traits that can be incorporated. The physical characteristics of these 10 CMS, or female lines, is having a huge impact on the ability of hybrid rice to penetrate the market because their agronomic and grain qualities are not applicable to all markets. The key backbone of the Syngenta breeding program is to focus a significant breeding effort in generating additional female lines with a range of durations (time of plant to maturity), grain types, as well as having resistance to infections such as bacterial leaf blight.

Although rice is a field crop, it needs to be considered more like a vegetable when it comes to R&D. Like vegetables, the characteristics of rice that define local eating and grain quality are extremely diverse across Asia. Variability in grain shape, aroma and stickiness (which depends on its amylose content) are all important for the consumer.

In addition there are characteristics demanded by the processors, such as low cracked grain content and thresholds in head rice recovery. The number one target for the trait program is to meet the quality needs of the milling and consumer market. Initial efforts have focused on a panel of phenotypic assays for key critical characteristics, screening the germplasm and incorporating these screens into the hybrid selections.

The program is now evolving to include metabolic and carbohydrate profiling to understand how the constituents of rice grains that contribute to quality traits can be paired with the genetic information which underlies diversity.

sm

Stuart Harrison

R&D Lead APAC

Stuart studied biochemistry at the University of

Queensland in Australia where he graduated with

a BSc Hons and then went on to do a PhD in

Biochemistry and Molecular Biology. His first

employment was at the John Innes Centre in

Norwich, UK, studying recessive resistance genes

to viruses, before joining Zeneca Mogen in 2000

as project leader of the Fungal Control (GM) group.

Currently Stuart is R&D Lead APAC and is based

in Singapore.



Rice in brief

Domesticationofriceranks as one of the most important developments in history.

Ricehasfedmorepeopleoveralonger period than any other crop.

Riceisrichinnutrientsand contains a number ofvitamins and minerals.

Itisanexcellentsourceofcomplexcarbohydratesthebestsource of energy. However,a lot of these nutrientsare lostduring milling and polishing, which turns brown rice into white rice by removingtheouterricehuskandbran to reveal the white grain.

Twospeciesofriceare considered important as food species forhumans: Oryza sativa, grown worldwide; and Oryza glaberrima, grown in parts of West Africa.

Bothofthesebelongtoabiggergroup of plants (the genus Oryza) that includes about 20 other species.

Forthousandsofyearsdifferentparts of the rice plant have been used in religious and ceremonial occasions, as medicine, and as inspiration and medium for a great numberofartworks.

Further information

For more details on rice we can recommend

the website of the International Rice Research

Institute at http://irri.org/

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Sugar beet is a major global crop 250 million tonnes are grown annually and from which is extracted 30% of the worlds sugar. Research at Syngenta has found ways in which the plant can be modified so that it can be sown in autumn rather than spring and thereby greatly increase its yield. Known as WIZZARDTM, this has the potential to transform the sugar beet industry.

WIZZARDTM casts a winter spell over sugar beet

Sugar beet is a biennial plant. In nature it needs to experience a cold winter followed by long day-light hours, a process known as vernalization, before it will bolt and produce flowers. This is undesirable in the commercial crop because bolting draws on the sugar stored in the root, leading to yield losses, which is why sugar beet has to be sown in spring. In that way the crop remains vegetative, unless a late cold spell causes early bolting. To date, drilling in autumn is not an option, because then the sugar beet crop would inevitably bolt and set seed in the early spring. Would it be possible to develop a sugar

beet that could be sown in autumn as winter beet and which would not bolt? That was the challenge which faced Syngenta researchers in Sweden, and stepping up to the mark were Thomas Kraft, Elizabeth Wremerth Weich, Jan Gielen, and Pierre Pin.

Controlling the master switchUntil recently, it was poorly understood at the all-important molecular level why beet is biennial and what genetic factors control its bolting. The Syngenta team have now found the reason, and they did this working in conjunction with Professor Ove Nilsson and his team at the Ume Plant Science Centre. This is Swedens renowned centre

of excellence in plant biology. Together they have discovered the master switch that sugar beet uses to regulate bolting and flowering. The results were published in the leading journal, Science, last December, testifying to the quality of the research and to the benefits of outside collaboration (see separate box).

In addition to transgenic applications, the research on flowering time has also delivered advances in marker-assisted selection which can replace expensive and time-consuming greenhouse and field tests. Allelic variation of the key genes can now be exploited, leading to more efficient in-house breeding.


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The science in the Science paper* Thispaperreportstheresearchthat has thrown new light on the way that the interplay between two paralogs of the FLOWERING LOCUS T(akaFT)genescontrolsthe regulation of flowering time in Beta vulgaris ssp. vulgaris.TheFT1gene behaves as an inhibitor that prevents the plants from bolting and flowering prior to vernalization, whiletheFT2genepromotes flowering in response to photo- periodandvernalization.Theinter-actionofbothFTgenesiscrucialfor the vernalization response in beet.Thefindingssuggestthat beet has evolved a different strategy with regard to vernalization relativetoplantslikecerealsandBrassicaspeciesincluding Arabidopsis, which is a model plant commonly used to study plant genetics and plant genomics.

Thesenovelfindingsopenarangeof opportunities for flowering time controlinsugarbeet.Bothgenesare currently the subject of a Syngenta patent application which will be an outstanding addition to the companys intellectual property portfolio.

*AnantagonisticpairofFThomologs

mediates the control of flowering time in sugar

beet,P.A.Pin,R.Benllock,D.Bonnet,

E.WremerthWeich,T.Kraft,J.J.L.Gielen,and

O. Nilsson, Science,vol.330,p.1397,2010.

sm

Jan Gielen

Program Leader for

Applied Genomics

Jan graduated from the Agricultural University

at Wageningen in the Netherlands, and joined

Syngenta Seeds in 1987 to become project leader

for Transgene Biotechnology. In 1994 he moved

to France, to take the position of program leader

for Applied Genomics.



sm

Thomas Kraft

Genetics Projects

Lead for sugar beet

Thomas got his PhD in genetics from the University

of Lund in 1999, and then took up a position as

a data analyst at Syngenta in Landskrona,

Sweden. From 2002 to 2010 he was head of the

sugar beet marker lab, and he is now Genetics

Projects Lead for sugar beet and is responsible

for native trait research.


WIZZARDTM brings necessary focusWithin Syngenta, the R&D project goes under the name of WIZZARDTM, and its manager is Elisabeth Wremerth Weich. Its key objective is to transform the sugar beet industry, especially in Europe, where it might one day become a major source of biofuel. WIZZARDTM was registered in 2004 and the same year collaboration began with Sdzucker, the worlds largest producer of sugar from beet.

Pierre Pin is the Research Lead and he fully supports the way WIZZARDTM is working. It brings together a truly global team in an integrated and complementary way, each contributing their strong expertise in the area of plant functional biology, he says.

Native trait project leader Thomas Kraft sees their work having wider implications for marker-assisted breeding for flowering time control. Thomas: We have only scraped the surface so far.

For example, normally we check the extent to which commercial beet seeds have been contaminated with annual wild beet by sowing a seed sample in the open and counting the number of bolters. That takes time. Now that we know the genes that make the difference between the two, we can do this assessment much more easily and much earlier by means of markers.

The magic from WIZZARDTM has only just begun.

The benefits of a winter beet crop will be to boost yields by 25%, but additional benefits are antici-pated regarding the ecological balance, especially by way of better nitrogen and water efficiency.

Bybeingabletoplantearlysignificantyieldincreasesarepossible

Winter beet Spring beet

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Simple methods of genetic engineering have had their successes in delivering herbicide tolerance and making plants insect resistant. However, more complex approaches are now needed if we are to tackle traits like drought resistance and crop yield. Syngentas team of scientists are combining their expertise in bioinformatics with trait and crop knowledge, aiming their combined skills at more challenging targets, as Laura Potter and Mike Nuccio explain.

Designer genes of the future will be shaped by computers

The first generation of plant genetic engineering was based on the simple concept of one gene defining one trait. This approach led Syngenta to the development of some successful corn varieties, namely the insect-resistant Bt-11 which was approved for use in Europe in 2004, the herbicide- tolerant GA21 which was approved in 2006, and VipteraTM which provides resistance to lepidopteran corn pests, and which received approval in the US in 2010.

However, the one gene, one trait approach has not proven as successful for other positive traits like water optimization, improved plant response to the environment, and increasing crop yields. While some success has been reported by Syngenta and others, it now appears that introducing such traits requires several genes. Indeed, we now

know that traits such as flowering time involve the interactions of more than 50 genes. So-called quantitative trait loci (QTL) analysis of many different complex traits bears this out.

Recognizing biological complexityThe new generation of plant genetic engineering recognizes the biological complexity which underlies traits that we would like to improve. Many opportunities exist, and Syngenta Biotechnology Inc. (SBI) has three research groups Bioinformatics, Omics, and Agronomic Traits working to develop and integrate experimental and computational biology tools that will enable multi-gene traits to be engineered.

Mike: Computational biology extends our ability to address complex trait development, and the technology is constantly improving. We have access

to faster, more powerful hardware, and there are new, more efficient, algorithms. Data visualization tools are becoming more user friendly.

The Syngenta team is now able to undertake trait dissection, which involves integrating and interrogating complex data sets for insights into the biological processes which underlie complex traits. It is now possible to develop new, and testable, hypotheses around trait components and even to predict individual or combinations of genes for manipulation in trait improvement projects, a particularly powerful capability.

Narrowing the number of solutionsThe cost of testing constructs in stable transgenic plants is quite high. This constrains the ability to test trait development ideas. Because the number of gene candidates can be

Thedevelopmentofplantsresistanttodroughtwillallowfarmerstogrowmorecropsusinglesswater


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sm

Laura Potter

Team Leader

Pathways and

Networks team,

Bioinformatics

Laura graduated in 2001 from North Carolina

State University in the USA. She worked as a

mathematical modeller at GlaxoSmithKline before

joining Syngenta in 2008 as a senior computational

biologist. Currently she leads the Pathways and

Networks team in the Bioinformatics group.



The complex science of genetic modelling New and powerful data generation technologies are now being developed and deployed, such asnextgenerationsequencing, and high throughput gene and metaboliteexpressionprofiling.Complexbioinformaticsalgorithms,

Maize Drought NetworkThemaizedroughtnetworkisanintegrated set of interactions between genes and small moleculesinthecontextofdroughtstress.Drought-specificinteractionsweremanually curatedfromthescientificliteratureon Arabidopsis thaliana and computationally translated to maize.

sm

Mike Nuccio

Principal Research

Scientist, Agronomic

Traits group.

Mike graduated in 1997 from Texas A&M University

in the USA. He then did post-doctoral work in plant

metabolic engineering for three years before joining

Syngenta in 2000 as a research scientist supporting

the pathway engineering group. Currently he is a

Principal Research Scientist in the Agronomic

Traits group.


large, the use of computational biology techniques, particularly computer modelling, makes it possible to narrow the number of solutions down to a manageable few that can be tested.

Laura: In many cases there is a large number of possible combinations of 2, 3 or 4 genes, and it is difficult to analyze how groups of genes might interact with each other to affect the phenotype. Heres where mathematical models of key biological pathways can help to predict gene combinations that might improve the trait phenotype.

The powerful combination of advanced data generation and computational excellence now available to Syngenta researchers is enabling the company to probe such issues at levels previously thought impossible to understand.

More than anything, trait development is a quest for knowledge. There is a need to understand how plants interact with the environment and with each other and thats proving to be a much more complex issue than previously thought.

mathematical models, and sophisticated software applications are being developed to manage and mine these data. Combined with advances in precision phenotyping, Syngenta scientists are in a good positiontotacklecomplextraits.

Recentadvancesinthesetechniqueswill generate mountains of data,

leaving biologists with the enormoustaskoforganizingandusingthosedataeffectively.Itisunlikelythattraitdevelopmentwillremain a simple genetics activity. While in the past the focus was on the gene, now it is the pathway, thenetwork,andeventhe genomewhicharecentrestagesee illustration.

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An effective fungicide was now essential and the Brazilian Government moved quickly and granted registration to five fungicides that were already used in Brazil for other diseases, and which were used to control rust in other crops around the world. Two of them were the Syngenta fungicides Priori and Score. However, these were not ideal agents for SAR control, so Syngenta scientists had to come up with an alternative solution to the problem and they did.

Taking a preventative approachOne suggestion from the R&D people was to change the modus operandi for dealing with the disease. This was in contrast to the normal advice that was being given which was to apply fungicide only after rust was observed in the crop. That may have been more economical, but Syngenta suggested that this would not be the best way to deal with the disease and promoted

Soya became an important crop in Brazil in the 1970s. It was relatively free of fungal diseases, at least until the turn of the century, and what little infection there was could be controlled by growers with one application of fungicide. Then disaster struck in the form of a much more powerful invader.

The fungus Phakopsora pachyrhizi (aka soya Asian rust, SAR) was first observed in Brazil in 2002, but it spread rapidly and when it reappeared a year later the soybean growers in Bahia state suffered very high losses caused by it. Within weeks it prompted a crisis for the soya business; growers were dealing with something they had never experienced before. Phakopsora is highly aggressive, it infects rapidly, it is difficult to control, and it is more destructive than any other disease which affects soya. Soon it was to be found all across Brazil.

the idea of preventative treatment as being more effective.

Sergio: While it seemed to some to be advice that was self-serving in terms of increased sales, it was in fact the right suggestion and proved to be one of the most successful ways to control the disease and it is still being followed.

What Syngenta R&D also observed was that soya is most vulnerable to attack by Phakopsora when the plant is changing from the vegetative growth state, when it produces new leaves, to the reproductive stage, when it forms soya grains. That is the time to apply a fungicide if it is to have maximum effect.

At the time SAR arrived in Brazil, Syngenta was in the process of developing a fungicide mixture based on the strobilurin azoxystrobin and


Soybean alert number one fungus attack!More than 100 million tonnes of soybean are grown every year, but a few years ago the Brazilian crop was under threat from an insidious fungus disease which has since spread rapidly. Syngentas Priori Xtra now provides an answer, as Fernando Gallina and Sergio Paiva explain.

Thispictureclearlyshowshowthecropontheleft hasnt reached its full potential due to fungal disease whereas the treated crop on the right is much healthier.

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Sergio Paiva

Product Biology

Manager for

Fungicides,

Latin America

Sergio graduated in 1982 from the University of

So Paulo. He then went to work on his MSc,

before joining Syngenta in 1984 as a field

agronomist. Currently he is Product Biology

Manager for Fungicides, Latin America.


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the triazole difenoconazole, and while this worked well against leaf spots, it was not the most effective against rusts. As the SAR crisis deepened, the R&D people reformulated a new mixture and the result was Priori Xtra which is a suspension of azoxystrobin and cyproconazole.

Providing early warningMeanwhile, the Syngenta Technical Support team developed a simple but effective method of fighting Phakopsora and this they launched as Syntinela. It consisted of planting small plots of soya 30 days in advance of the main crop. These then alerted growers that a SAR attack was imminent. Syntinela was a huge success and soon there were more than 1,000 such plots around the country, and it received official approval when it was adopted by government research institutes.

Registration of a new chemical in Brazil takes up to three years. The government knew that SAR was an emergency, and offered a faster track for products that were proved to be effective against the disease. The Syngenta regulatory team put together all the Priori Xtra information needed for a submission and registration was granted in a record time of four months. Growers soon

May 1 May 6


This integrated approach, where we are developing a range of new soybean varieties and chemical solutions, gives us an advantage with our customers, the growers.

The devastating spread of rustThe images below show how in a matter of weeks a soybean crop can be devastated by rust.

May 13 May 27

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Fernando Gallina

Soybean R&D

Business Partner

Fernando graduated in Agronomy from the

University of Pelotas, in Brazil, in 1981.

He joined Syngenta in 1982 as a field agronomist.

Currently he is Soybean R&D Business Partner.


discovered that Priori Xtra was the best fungicide with which to fight Phakopsora. Up to the launch of Priori Xtra, marketing was based on the strategy of only selling Priori and Score if no SAR was present in an area.

Fernando: This policy clearly limited sales and Syngenta lost market share but we gained credibility as a result. Product recommendation for Priori Xtra was to apply it preventatively and it quickly established itself as the market leader and reference agent for soya rust control. Sales are now over $300 million per year.

Syngenta is unique in being able to provide integrated offers for soybean and it is paying dividends regarding our customer relationships.

Fernando: Our focus now is on the development of new varieties of soybean with an inbuilt genetic defense against Phakopsora, and a new generation of seed care and foliar fungicides which, when combined, will ensure improved control and yield and differentiate Syngenta, thereby strengthening our market leadership.

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Steve Sanborn, Seeds Entomologist Mitch Meehan, and Seeds Trait Project Leader, Ju-Kyung Yu.

The first indication that the war might be won came when the University of Illinois announced that scientists there had found native trait resistance in three cultivars from the USDA germplasm collection. Thousands of cultivars in the collection had been screened and the first known resistance to aphids was discovered in cultivars Dowling, Jackson, and PI71506. Seeds of these cultivars were ordered and sent to

Aphids can multiply rapidly; a thousand aphids can become a million after only one month. If left untreated, soybean aphids can overtake soybean plants, spread viruses and reduce yields by 50 percent or more.

The challenge that faced the Syngenta team, headed by Virgil Sparks, was to find a way to clad all soybean plants in anti-aphid armor. To help him he recruited an army of specialists including Soybean Seeds Breeder Keith Bilyeu, Seed Care scientists Cliff Watrin and

Syngentas winter nursery in Oahu, Hawaii, where they were planted in December of 2003. The following February, the first cross was made with elite conventional proprietary soybean varieties.

Screening successesBecause the aphid resistance was contained in unadapted germplasm, it was necessary to do a number of backcrosses to high yielding parents. Working with the university, a screening method was developed to aid in breeding the trait into elite varieties.

Soybean alert number two aphid attack!Syngenta can celebrate an industry first: an integrated approach to controlling soybean aphids which blight this key crop. The secret weapon for season long control is a combination of an aphid-resistant native trait, a systemic insecticide and the maintenance of beneficial insect populations.

Aphids are being targeted in an integrated way to allow soybean crops to reach their full potential


sm

15

Virgil Sparks

Head of Corn

and Soybean

Product Evaluation

in North America

Virgil graduated in 1979 from Southeast Missouri

State University after which he worked for the

University of Missouri. In 1990 he was employed

by the Garst Seed Company, and then joined

Syngenta in 2004 as Regional Head of Soybean

Product Development. Currently he is Head of Corn

and Soybean Product Evaluation in North America.


Later, molecular markers were used to confirm the presence of the gene for aphid resistance (Rag1), and these would eventually prove to be the preferred breeding tool.

In 2006, testing began at several North American sites, including Arva, Ontario, where aphids had been a constant threat since 2002. Two important discoveries were made at that site. The first of which was that test varieties with Rag1 showed excellent resistance to the soybean aphids in the area. The second, and more surprising, was that border rows of soybeans around the aphid nursery showed little damage from aphids, even though that variety was susceptible. In fact the border rows had been treated with Cruiser-Maxx, Syngentas insecticide/fungicide seed treatment.

Beneficials help boost defencesClearly a systemic insecticide might offer some help as a second mode of action and its use with host plant resistance could provide season-long control. Because pests may develop resistant biotypes, there needs to be multiple modes of control. New genes and a combination of insecticide, crop rotation, and/or seed treatment would be needed to keep up the fight. It was later observed that the combination of host plant resistance and CruiserMaxx allowed insects that prey on aphids to increase their numbers and join in the battle as a third mode of control.

The exact method of aphid host plant resistance is not well understood, but it is likely to be antibiosis, in which the host plant interferes with the feeding or reproduction of the pest insect, or antixenosis, in which the host plant is not the preferred host. Whichever it is, we are now working with multiple modes of gene action to help us win the war against aphids.

The differences between susceptible (left) and resistant (right) are clear to see with the aphids avoiding the resistant crop


Now Syngenta has an integrated approach called the Aphid Management System (aka AMS) to fight these pests while at the same time reducing the likelihood of a biotype counterattack.

The science behind the new defences being built against aphids TheNativeTraitprojectleaderisJu-Kyung,anditisherroletointegratetheRag1geneintoSyngentas germplasm and select breedinglinesofRag1usingMAS(MarkerAssistedSelection).MASisan indirect selection process using molecularmarkerswithalinked allele associated with the gene and/or the locus of interest.

In2006,amarkerassistedselection program had been initiated with simplesequencesrepeats(SSR);markerswhichflanktheRag1geneandwereabout12cMawayfrom it(1cMisequaltoa1%chancethatamarkeratonegeneticlocuswillbeseparatedfromamarkeratasecond locus due to crossing-over inasinglegeneration).Todaywehave developed, highly accurate, single nucleotide polymorphism (SNP)markers,whichflanktheRag1gene(approximately1cMaway).

Ju-Kyung:TheNativeTraitsproject is now focused on integrating four new resistant genes into our germ-plasm using newly developed SNP markers.Weareexploringvariousgene combinations to determine theefficacyofeachcombination.We have found that some of the genestacksshowstronger resistance to aphids than the current Rag1geneandlikelyprovide separate modes of action in the control of soybean aphid. Native Traitsisnowtestingtheaphid-resistanceofstackedgenevarietiestreated with Syngentas seed treat-ment,CruiserMaxx,todevelopthenextgenerationofproductsfor theAphidManagementSystem.

AMSTM in brief Syngentaisthefirsttomarkettheindustrysfirstfully-integratedAphidManagementSystem(AMS)tohelp soybean growers safely and effectively control yield-robbing aphid infestations.

AMSisanenvironmentalsteward-ship approach using multiple modes ofaction.Thesystemcombines:

Soybeangeneticsandaphid resistant trait

CruiserMaxxBeansinsecticide/ fungicide seed treatment

Beneficialinsectactivity

Aninsecticidetreatmentif populationexceedseconomic threshold levels

Byutilizingmultiplemodesofactionand integrated pest management practices,AMSisdesignedtomaximizesoybeanyieldand performance and provide season-longaphidcontrol.Thecombinationof multiple technologies reduces theriskofresistancedevelopmentand increases plant vigor while protecting against seedling diseases and insects.

TheAMSassuranceprogramprovides growers with additional peace of mind and demonstrates that Syngenta stands behind its fully integrated system.

16

The orang-utan has become a symbol of

conservation in the forests of Indonesia

Balancing art and science is leading to innovation in the development of new flower varieties according to Sabine Lorente and Dick van Kleinwee.

Innovation, art and science give customers a better flower experience

For years, breeders have developed innovative new varieties in ornamental crops by selecting plants with desirable traits and making crosses to develop new and interesting flower breeds. Traditional flower breeding can result in practical benefits such as grower friendly habits or earlier and more continuous flowering. Aesthetic benefits such as more vibrant colors or bigger flowers can also be the result of this balance between art and science. All of these benefits move our consumers toward having a great flower experience.

Combining art and scienceIn Syngenta Lawn & Garden, we ask if the art of flower breeding can come together with todays science to give our customers an even better experience. Are there technological advancements available to allow Syngenta breeders the ability to offer high quality and predictable plants that are both beautiful and resilient that can fundamentally change the market and the way consumers interact with flowers? Our breeders certainly think so.

Sabine Lorente, Technology Flowers Scientist in Enkhuizen, Netherlands works every day to find the answers to these questions. In the past, crops were improved by simply selecting the best

plants within their natural population. However, by making specific crosses and continuing to select with ornamental value in mind, the resulting varieties can change a market. A good example of this would be Syngentas own Pelargonium (or geranium to the non-horticulturist). Todays geraniums look so much more different from their ancestors with brighter colors and bigger flowers, remarks Dick van Kleinwee, breeder for Syngenta flowers.

You would expect that, in todays world, genetic modification would be the most valuable tool to increase variation in ornamental crops. However, to date,


Syngenta breeders are combining innovation, art and science to breed better flowers

17

sm

Dick van Kleinwee

Senior Breeder

Dick studied plant breeding at the University of

Wageningen in the Netherlands and then went on

to become a lily breeder before joining Syngenta

in 2003 as a senior breeder. He has worked on

various bedding plant crops over the years.

Contact: dickvan.kleinwee@ syngenta.com

most ornamental breeding programs are still using old ways to create variation. Technology is mostly used to increase efficiency by applying physical or chemical treatments to plants, or in-vitro tissue culture, to produce a higher frequency of mutations and polyploidization. However, there is one technological advancement that Syngenta is using to deliver unique and valuable products to our customers, interspecific breeding.

What is interspecific breeding?Interspecific hybrids are bred by mating two species, normally from within the same genus. The offspring display traits and characteristics of both parent species. However, this is easier said than done. Breeders and scientists


The Interspecific Toolbox for breeders and scientists Combining different species of flowers to create new varieties is difficult.Thisdifficultystemsfromthe fact that nature would rather prevent movement of genes from onespeciestotheother.Below outlines some of the common challenges associated with inter-specificbreedingandhowourbreeders and scientists overcome these challenges to provide Syngenta with flowers that will help shapethemarketforyearstocome.

Pre-fertilization barriers mean that pollen may not germinate on the stigma or may not reach the ovules. Thiscanbeovercomebythe breederbyhavingaspecificcuttingstyle, using irradiated pollen or using a reciprocal cross, or makingacross,withthephenotypeofeachsexreversed,comparedwith the original cross, to test theroleofparentalsexon inheritance pattern.

Post fertilization barriers mean that thefertilizationhastakenplacebutthe embryo is aborted by the plant. Growingtheembryoonspecific artificialmediainthelabmayrescue this embryo and allow the breeding to continue.

Another barrier is sterility. Poly-ploidisationtechniques(doubling of chromosome number) in the lab may lead to restoration of fertility which is advantageous to the breeders.

It is a great example of how cultivated flower breeding can change a market and give consumers a better plant experience.

Further information

For an explanation of polyploidy visit

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Polyploidysm

Sabine Lorente

Plant Breeding

Scientist, Technology

Processes Depart-

ment, Enkhuizen

Sabine graduated in plant sciences and

ornamentals at the INH (Institut National

dHorticulture) in Angers, France, in 2009, after

doing her thesis within Syngenta. She was then

hired by the company and is now a plant

breeding scientist at the Technology Processes

Department in Enkhuizen.


Calliope is our number one selling Pelargonium. Bred to provide color all summer long, it is drought-tolerant and is a great example of innovation in flowers

meet huge challenges on their way to the creation of a successful new interspecific variety, such as embryo abortion and male sterility.

The challenges with interspecific breeding are clear, but to develop a resulting species that is resistant to a devastating disease or has other desirable qualities, is clearly worth the effort. The introduction of CalliopeTM Pelargoniums a few years ago is a stellar example of this marriage between science and art. This heat resistant Pelargonium with unique big red flowers has become our number one selling Pelargonium variety and signifies that we are well on our way to delivering that unsurpassed flower experience to our customers worldwide.

Our new Lanai Twister Pink verbena clearly shows that innovation, art and science can combine to provide a truly spectacular result

18

Brazil is the worlds largest producer of sugar and the second largest producer of the sustainable biofuel ethanol. Sugar cane is the source and now the introduction of Syngentas PleneTM technology is transforming this crop, as Ian Jepson explains.

Syngenta has PleneTM to talk about

When Shell Oil plans to invest $12 billion in a joint Brazilian venture to produce ethanol from sugar cane, then clearly they see this as one of the major transport fuels of the future. In fact is it the cheapest source of biofuel, costing around 50 cents per liter to produce. The crop from which it comes can be made to yield as much as 260 tonnes per hectare, although the current average is around 80 t/ha.

Growing importance of sugar caneHistorically, sugar cane was not a high priority crop for Syngenta. However, its growing importance in the worlds economy led to its being reviewed in 2008 and a number of unmet needs were identified. Two key ones were the relatively primitive planting methods and the increased impact of pests due to the phasing out of the crop-burning stage. Other issues to be targeted were the stress caused by drought, and the need to raise sugar and ethanol yields.

Brazil was clearly the country to concentrate on see box and one pressing need was a more efficient planting system. To this end, in 2008 Syngenta announced its intention to develop PleneTM technology.

Conventional planting of sugar cane is either done manually, costing overall about $2,600 per hectare, or mechanically, costing about $2,800 per hectare. The former method is labor intensive, the latter method causes


19

Specially developed planting equipment is helping to establish a good sugar cane crop


sm

an Jepson

Sugar Cane R&D

Business Partner

Syngenta

Biotechnology Inc.

North Carolina

USA

Ian graduated with a BSc in biology from the

University of Durham and has a PhD in Molecular

Genetics from the University of Birmingham. He

joined ICI Seeds at Jealotts Hill in 1989, and has

held a number of management positions in Seeds

and Crop Protection: Bioscience Manager; Head

of Trait Research; Biotechnology Traits Portfolio

Leader; and Head of Enzymes R&D. Currently he

is Sugar Cane R&D Business Partner for both Crop

Protection and Seeds and is based at Syngenta

Biotechnology Inc., North Carolina, USA.


Sugar cane is now a strategic crop for Syngenta, and the company has applied integrated technology solutions to meet the various challenges.

Brazil is big when it comes to sugar and ethanol Brazilistheworldslargest producer of sugar cane, harvesting 590milliontonnesannually,morethan a third of global production.

Brazilproduces38milliontonnes of sugar per year with around 26milliontonnesbeingexported.

Brazilhas8.5millionhectares (21millionacres)oflandgrowingsugarcane,andexpectedtoreach13.5millionby2020.Noneof this will impinge on the Amazon rainforest.

Thedemandforethanolisdrivingtheexpansion,and10newsugar/ethanolmillswerebuiltin2010.

Brazilproducesaround27billionlitersofbio-ethanolayearandexports2billionliters.(Onehectareof sugar cane can produce 4,000 liters of ethanol, enough to run the average family car for two years).

Serendipity science What caused Syngenta to became a major force in sugar cane started out as an entirely different project. In2007thecompanybegantostudy the effect of the insecticide thiamethoxamonvariouscrops,one of which was sugar cane. As part of the test, the sugar cane was cut into small pieces each containing one bud sett. What theresearchershadntexpectedto see was just how vigorous and strong rooting these proved to be.Thisbecamethefocusofaninvestigation and resulted in a completely new approach to plantingthismajorcrop.More than200testfieldswereinvolvedand from this there followed a processoffinetuningoftheactiveingredients,packaging,storage,and transportation.

PleneTM results in stronger crops from the roots upwards

soil compaction because of the heavy equipment used. PleneTM is very different. It involves the mechanical planting of single bud setts using much lighter equipment reducing soil damage.

The setts are treated with Syngenta products to protect them against termites, nematodes and fungal pathogens. PleneTM offers growers the elimination of nurseries, and a reduction in the amount of planting material needed (only 2 tonnes per hectare) which is also healthy stock and genetically pure. More efficient

mechanical equipment is employed, and there are fewer operations involved.

The planting equipment has been developed in partnership with John Deere. Thanks to PleneTM, the expansion in sugar cane is more sustainable and not limited by the lack of labor in some regions.

PleneTM was launched in April this year and sales are expected to contribute significantly to the growth of Syngenta business in Latin America over the next five years.

To complement the PleneTM planting technology, Syngenta is enhancing the crop protection portfolio to address the rise in biotic pressures which are increasing in Brazil due to the phas-ing out of pre-harvest burning. Recent product launches include the insecticide EngeoTM Pleno targeting a broad spectrum of insect pests and the fungicide Priori Xtra (to protect against orange rust, which is a relatively new pathogen in Brazil).

To meet the needs not addressed by crop protection chemistry, Syngenta also began a Seeds (biotechnology and breeding/markers) program in 2009. So far there has been excellent technical progress with a number of traits performing well in field trials. This work has been assisted by external partner-ships which allow access to enabling technologies as well as to traits of commercial interest including sugar and second generation biofuels technology.

John Deere is a trademark of Deere & Company.

20

Winning ways with wheat


Seed choice is one of the most important decisions a cereal grower makes it is the key both to higher yields and better quality grain. However, wheat breeding is still largely traditional and productivity is variable. Derek Cornes explains how Syngenta is planning to change things.

21

breeders derives from royalties, so it is difficult to generate income for R&D. Witness to this is the cereals seeds royalties market of $300 million compared to the crop protection market of $6.8 billion.

Derek: Growers tend to be passionate about seed choice and having leading varieties can be the way to capture their interest.

By understanding their needs, Syngenta will combine the best varieties with our crop protection products so that we can ensure growers get a rewarding return on their investment. Syngenta is already using state-of-the-art technology to ensure our leadership in breeding over the short to mid-term. However, the future of wheat will be hybrids, which bring higher yields and guarantee uniformity. They also provide an income for breeders, because seed must be purchased every year. The company has had success with one cereal crop: barley. It recently introduced the only commercially available barley hybrid into Europe. It outperforms all conventional varieties and growers appear willing to make the switch. Producing wheat hybrids is more difficult. Wheat is a hexaploid species (i.e. it has three sets of paired chromosomes per cell) and it resulted from the hybridization of

Wheat is the most widely grown crop covering an area of 225 million hectares worldwide. 70% of the crop goes into foods like bread and pasta making it the worlds second most important food crop after rice.

Wheat productivity is variable with some countries producing an average of only 2 t/ha while others produce 8 t/ha. The highest ever recorded yield for wheat at 15.6 tonnes per hectare (t/ha), produced in 2010 by a New Zealand farmer, is five times the global average! The differences in productivity are partly due to unavoidable factors such as soil type, climate, moisture, and the length of the growing season. However, poor farming practices and lack of investment in technology are also reasons for low yields and this is where Syngenta can play a key role. The company is unique in having both a cereals seed business and a crop protection business, being number one in cereal seeds and number two in cereal agrochemicals. This allows us to design integrated solutions spanning the entire growing cycle from seed to harvest.

To keep pace with population growth, wheat yields need to increase annually by 2.1%. Currently yields are increasing, but the rate has slowed over the past 10 years to around 1%, and lags behind crops such as corn, where yields are increasing by 2% or more. The reason wheat lags behind is mainly due to a lack of investment in breeding.

Wheat remains a traditional crop with farmers saving seeds from one year to sow the next. Consequently the seed market is weak. Moreover there are no wheat hybrids or GM (genetically modified) traits, and the income for

three wild grass species, making its genetics very complicated. Moreover it is normally self-pollinated and as its pollen is relatively heavy it does not travel very far, making out- crossing difficult.

Derek remains positive that success will come: Our experience in producing barley hybrids convinces us that commercially viable wheat hybrids are also possible. It may take 8 to 10 years to reach the goal but we are currently leading the race.

Other research is directed towards traits such as better use of water, better use of nutrients, disease resistance, herbicide tolerance, and grain quality All of these are ways in which wheat can be improved. However, because so many people are suspicious of GM cereals, the focus in the short to mid-term has to be on introducing native traits. Syngenta researchers are using the best technology available, such as marker-assisted breeding and doubled haploids, to track the desired traits in our breeding programs.

Developing countries are a growth area for cereals and Syngenta has entered into a strategic partnership with the International Maize and Wheat Improvement Center (CIMMYT or Centro Internacional de Mejoramiento de Maz y Trigo) to extend its reach into such countries and to access diverse germplasm collections. Through its network, CIMMYT can demonstrate to smallholders the benefits of integrated systems and thereby improve production. CIMMYTs mission is to lift farmers out of subsistence agriculture and there is every likelihood those farmers will one day become customers.


Derek: Cereal growing is on the cusp of a dramatic change, particularly in the seeds area. This is where Syngentas unique understanding of cereal seeds, chemicals, and integrated solutions gives the company an edge and one we are determined to maintain. sm

Derek Cornes

R&D Crop Lead

for Cereals Crop

Protection

Derek graduated in Applied Biology from the

University of Bath in the UK. He joined the company

in 1984 as a trials officer working at Whittlesford

and moved from there to Basel into global

development in 1993. He has recently become

R&D Crop Lead for Cereals Crop Protection.


2222 Science Matters Keeping abreast of Syngenta R&D Spring 2011

The orang-utan has become a symbol of

conservation in the forests of Indonesia

Melons are grown around the world and come in many different types and sizes, but in many countries they are threatened by a soil-borne disease which causes the plants to wilt. Syngenta has developed a resistant strain and this year it looks set to conquer a large section of the market. Bruno Foncelle explains.

Making melons resistant to Fusarium fungus

Melon is one of the worlds most widely cultivated fruits. The native species, Cucumis melo originated in Asia, but today it is grown around the world and as a result of selective breeding down the centuries it exhibits considerable diversity in terms of size, color and taste see box left.

A limiting factor to melon production worldwide is vascular wilt, caused by the fungus Fusarium oxysporum f.sp. melonis (Fom). This affects growers particularly in France, Italy, Japan, and China. The fungus develops during a cold spring and plants that are invaded display a characteristic wilt. Once it has entered the plants vascular system,

it rapidly colonizes the host, resulting in underdeveloped fruits with low sugar content.

Fom is difficult to control because the fungus can survive for extended periods in the soil as thick-walled spores and it remains active even in the absence of the host roots. Although long crop rotations are used, it can still colonise the roots of other plants without causing symptoms. At one time the soil fumigant methyl bromide was used to defeat it, but this has now been phased out and no other chemical treatment is currently available for growers to use. Long rotation periods (up to 5-10 years) are leading growers to rent new fields far away from their packing facilities

Therearemelonstosuitevery tasteandclimate.Thepopularvarieties are:

CharentaisinFrance, PieldeSapoinSpain, HamiandhoneydewinChina, Italo-americanmeloninItaly and the USA, WesternShipperalsointheUSA, YellowandGaliainBraziland aroundtheMediterranean.

23Science Matters Keeping abreast of Syngenta R&D Spring 2011

and warehouses, a situation that imposes extra costs and limits profitability.

One method of controlling the disease is grafting on interspecific hybrids C. maxima X C. moshata which are resistant to Fom and, while this can enhance productivity, it can have a negative effect on melon taste. This method is also expensive and used mostly under plastic, whereas open fields are the main growing areas for melon. Public institutes and seed companies have worked extensively on genetic resistance to this disease see box right.

Syngentas Charentais and Italo- american melon breeding program is based in Sarrians near Avignon in Southeast France. Bruno has been greatly assisted in the research by two colleagues, Marc Oliver, who is Genetic Project Lead, and Stphane Le Caro, who is area Product Manager for Charentais melon.

Bruno: We scouted the period 19962000 where we found hundreds of Far East attempts to find alternative

sm

Bruno Foncelle

Melon Breeding

Project Lead

Bruno graduated with a degree in horticulture

engineering in 1985 from INH (Institut National

dHorticulture) in Angers, France. He then worked

on the Ivory Coast on banana tissue culture before

joining Syngenta in 1989. He moved to melon

breeding in 1993. Currently he is the Melon

Breeding Project Lead.


sources of resistance to Fusarium. We also collected entries from germplasm banks and we did artificial fusarium tests in phytotron (sealed greenhouse) conditions.

As a result of their research they selected two interesting entries and started introgressing the resistance into Charentais and Italo-american elite lines in 2000. They focussed mainly on one source of resistance which was not linked to fruit shape problems. Nevertheless, it was tightly linked to green flesh color and so they had to break that linkage because their target was to introgress the resistance in orange flesh types.

In 2006 hybrid prototypes with this new resistance were validated in the field under natural infection conditions, and in 2008 a patent was filed. In 2009, sales and marketing teams developed a new brand, QualifuzTM, to emphasize Syngenta melons unique combination of Fusarium resistance and fruit quality. In 2011, sales of their Godiva and Pendragon melons are expected to account for 25% of turnover.

The science behind the fight against Fusarium Basedonthehostresistance genes associated with Fom infection, four physiological races havebeenidentifiedand designatedas0,1,2,and1.2. Twodominantresistancegenes,Fom-1 and Fom-2, control resistance to races 0 and 2 and 0 and1respectively.Fom isolates classifiedasrace1.2areabletoinduce disease in melon lines or hybrids carrying the described resistance genes.

Manysourcesofresistanceto Fomraces0,1,and2havebeen reported. However, partial resistancetorace1.2controlledby polygenic recessive was only detectedinafewFarEastern accessionswhichareexternally and organoleptically (i.e. taste and smell) far from the melons acceptedbyWesternmarkets.Theseaccessionsallowedbreedingof partially resistant lines to Fom race1.2suchasIsabelle,whichwasdevelopedbyINRA(InstitutNationaldeRecherche Agronomique)duringthe1970s.

Breedingcompanieshavebeen developing varieties using this source of resistance to Fom race 1.2.buttheseresistancefactorsaretightlylinkedtofruitmisshapingcharacteristics. Such varieties were showing intermediate resistanceinthefieldbuthadareducedmarketableyieldandonlyslow genetic progress was made.

Bruno:Arecombinantinbred line population was developed and used for the molecular characterization of Fomrace1.2resistance of our new source. Phenotypic and genotypic data enabled us to identify three major resistance factors located on chromosomes3,9and10.The effect of these was validated, anddiagnosticmarkerassays were developed and used in markerassistedbreeding. Success followed.

Like all crops, melons are threatened by diseases, insects, and drought. The major challenge for the melon breeding community is to develop cultivars able to cope with such stresses.

From field to fork, Syngenta is protecting

melons from Fusarium


The Innovative Vector Control Consortium (IVCC) is funded by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation and its aim is to help find new tools to kill insects that transmit human diseases such as malaria. Syngenta has been a leading collaborating partner since 2006 and is extending the partnership by searching for new insecticides to kill the cause of the disease: Mosquitoes. Phil Wege is leading the fight.

Syngenta turns its big guns on a deadly menace

Around three billion people in the world are at risk of malaria, and there are more than 240 million cases a year of this disease, resulting in almost a million deaths, mainly of children under five and mainly in Africa. When it comes to killing the mosquitoes that spread the disease, there are few with the firepower that Syngenta can bring to bear.

Syngenta is already committed to fighting malaria as reported in Science Matters number 3 (2008). The company developed the Icon Maxx treatment for mosquito nets which remains active even after 20 washings, and a range of other key products which are used to fight disease causing insects around the globe. Now the search is on for a new insecticide which can be deployed

as a new tool to fight mosquitoes that transmit disease.

The IVCC and Syngenta have already successfully partnered to create a new formulation, Actellic 300CS, which is due for launch in 2011 to control malarial mosquitoes resistant to the most commonly used insecticides. Additionally, brand new classes of

Mosquitoes kill nearly a million people each year by spreading malaria


sm

Phil Wege

Head of Biology

Support

Jealotts Hill

International

Research Center

Phil graduated from Bradford University with

a degree in applied biology, and University of

Newcastle-upon-Tyne with a further degree in

applied entomology. He worked for the Centre

for Overseas Pest Research in London and then

for Syngenta legacy companies since 1985 in

various roles in insecticide research and

development until moving to his present role

of Head of Biology Support in 2005.


Phil: Our expectation is that well find useful compounds beyond those active on mosquitoes, and it is our hope that these will find utility against insect pests of agriculture, floriculture, and in the urban and household environments.

Who are IVCC?

TheInnovativeVectorControl Consortium(IVCC)isaProduct DevelopmentPartnership(PDP)establishedasanotforprofit company and registered charity to overcome the barriers to innovation in the development of new insecticides for public health vector control and to develop information systems and tools which will enable new and existingpesticidestobeused more effectively.

TheIVCCwasestablishedin November2005witha$50.7m investmentfromtheBilland MelindaGatesFoundation(BMGF).

TheMissionoftheIVCCistoreduce transmission of insect borne pathogens through improved insect vector control with innovative products.Specificallytheyfacilitatethe development of improved public health pesticides and formulations, provide information tools to enable themoreeffectiveuseofexistingand new control measures, and workwiththediseaseendemiccountrystakeholdersandindustrytoestablishtargetproductprofilesfor new paradigms in vector control.

insecticides are needed to sustain long term control of mosquitoes and successful public health programs.

Over the years, chemists within Syngenta and its legacy companies created thousands of active chemical compounds, some with insecticide potential. Only a tiny fraction made it to the market place, while the rest of these biologically-active compounds languish in Syngentas chemical archives. Amongst this collection of more than one million compounds, there might be one or two which can do the job.

Searching Syngenta for the solutionThe IVCC has funded Syngenta to search its collections to see if any specifically worked against mosquitoes. The aim was to find one with a novel mode of action to overcome resistance, which in mosquitoes has developed towards the insecticides currently in use. The first step, however, was the successful negotiation of a collaborative agreement between Syngenta and IVCC, which would safeguard Syngentas commercial and intellectual property rights. Then under the guidance of Phil Wege, who is based at Jealotts Hill, one of the most comprehensive reviews of its insecticidal compounds was conducted.

The project has taken several routes: looking at current insecticide projects; trawling back through old books and reports; speaking to leading scientists; searching the databases of legacy companies; and computer modelling. Meanwhile, scientists in Stein developed a unique high throughput screening setup which can determine the level of activity of more than 450 compounds a week against adult mosquitoes. Of the 16,000 compounds screened so

Further information

Find out more about the IVCC

at www.ivcc.com

far, many hundreds of potent insecticidal compounds have been found among the collection which clearly show the potential to match the effectiveness of those currently used.

What are the requirements of a new mosquito insecticide?

1. It controls mosquitoes which are resistant to current insecticides.

2. It kills mosquitoes quickly and at low doses.

3. It meets human and environmental safety requirements.

4. It is cost effective to produce and it is patentable.

This last requirement might strike some people as surprising. However, the cost of developing a new product could be up to $180 million, and there is little commercial incentive to designing a specific mosquito insecticide from scratch which is exactly why the IVCCs product development partner-ship approach is so important.

The new active ingredient project aims to find an effective new insecticide that is deadly to mosquitoes, including the resistant strains which have developed in malarial areas. While that means a long and thorough program of research, to begin with the objective is to optimise the activity of the leading compounds uncovered so far and this will be the goal of the next phase of the project.

Syngenta and IVCC are committed to finding an answer to the misery that the malaria-bearing mosquito inflicts on the human population in tropical parts of the world. Under Phils guidance there is every hope that this will be achieved.


All scientists and policy makers now agree that world food production will have to increase substantially this century. No one is quite sure by how much, as population is still growing and consumption patterns still converging on the unsustainable levels typical in industrialised countries.

But there are very different views about how this increase of 70-100% should best be achieved. Some still say agriculture will have to expand into new lands. Others say food production growth must come through redoubled efforts to repeat the approaches of the Green Revolution, or that agricultural systems should become organic. Traditionally, agricultural intensification has occurred in three ways: increasing yields per hectare, increasing cropping intensity (i.e. two or more crops) per unit of land, and changing land-use from low-value crops or commodities to those that receive higher market prices.

It is also now understood that agriculture can negatively affect the environment through overuse of natural resources as inputs or through their use as a sink for pollution. What has also become clear in recent years is that the success of some modern agricultural systems has masked significant negative external issues, with

environmental and health problems documented and recently costed for many countries. These environmental costs suggest that alternatives which reduce negative external impact should be sought.

There is now growing acceptance that sustainable intensification is the way forward - producing more food from the same area of land while reducing the negative environmental impacts and at the same time increasing positive contributions to the environment (Royal Society, 2009; Foresight, 2011). In short more food from the same land but with no negative environmental impacts. But how can this be achieved, and what are the priorities?

Over the past year, the University of Essex on behalf of the Foresight project led a multi-disciplinary team of 55 agricultural and food experts from the worlds major agricultural organisations, professional scientific societies and academic institutions to identify the top 100 questions for global agriculture and food. The team was drawn from 23 countries and work in universities, UN agencies, international research institutes, NGOs, private companies, foundations and regional research secretariats. An initial list of 618 key questions was drawn up and then whittled down by the team to the final top 100. The findings were published in the International Journal

The Top 100 questions of importance to the future of global agriculture

of Agricultural Sustainability, in November 2010 (Pretty et al, 2010).

The 100 questions covered a wide range of themes:

1) Climate, watersheds, water resources and aquatic ecosystems; 2) Soil nutrition, erosion and use of fertiliser; 3) Biodiversity, ecosystem services and conservation; 4) Energy, climate change and resilience; 5) Crop production systems and technologies; 6) Crop genetic improvement; 7) Pest and disease management; 8) Livestock; 9) Social capital, gender and extension; 10) Development and livelihoods; 11) Governance, economic investment, power and policy making; 12) Food supply chains; 13) Prices, markets and trade; 14) Consumption patterns and health.

The agricultural sector is now at the heart of an unprecedented combination of threats, and evidence-based policy will be essential. These 100 questions will help in setting these priorities. Improved dialogue and information flow between policy makers and scientists is vital if agriculture is to overcome the challenges of dealing with population growth, dietary shifts, energy insecurity and climate change.

The challenges facing the worlds agriculture are well known, we have to grow more with less. This includes less water and less land, increasing population and urbanization, whilst adapting to climate change and reducing the impact of agriculture on global warming. These are huge challenges. A wide-ranging team of experts (including Syngenta) got together in 2010 to scope out the top 100 questions we have to address to feed the worlds population in a sustainable and equitable way in the future. In this External Perspective Professor Jules Pretty from the University of Essex, one of the authors of the resulting paper, highlights some of these questions for us all to think about providing solutions for. More details can be found in the full paper referenced at the end of the article.

Jules Pretty, University of Essex


EditorialcommentfromStuartJohnDunbar:Thetop100questionslistedinthe paper, some of which are illustrated in this panel, are important for all of us in agricultural research and indeed societyingeneral.Therearenoeasyanswers,noquick-fixes.However,aswe begin to address the challenges associated with food security, we will need to use our science to influence policymakerstoensureweaddressthe challenges laid down in these top 100questions.Syngentaiswellplacedto engage in this with our integrated cropstrategyandwillbeakeyplayerin answering the challenge.

Q2: What would be the global cost of capping agricultural water withdrawals if environmental reserves were to be maintained?

Q14:Whataretheworldsstocksandreserves of phosphate, and are they sufficienttosupportfoodproductiongloballyforthenextcentury?

Q17:Whataretheenvironmental consequencesofdrought-resistantcrops in different locations?

Q24:Whatwillbetheriskofmassmigration arising from adverse climate change, and how will this impact on agricultural systems?

Q34:Whatarethebenefitsandrisks of embracing the different types of agricultural biotechnology (environ-mental impacts; sensitivity/resistance to environmental stressors such as heat, drought, salinity; dependence on/independencefrominputs;risks of accelerated resistance; food safety, human health and nutrition; economic, social and cultural impacts)?

Q35: What are the advantages and disadvantages of organic production systems in terms of biodiversity, ecosystem services, yield and human health, particularly in resource-poor developing countries?

Q36:Whatpracticalmeasuresareneeded to lower the ideological barriersbetweenorganicandGM, andthusfullyexploitthecombinedpotentialofbothGMcropsand organic modes of production in order toachievesustainableintensification of food production?

Q45:Whatistheefficiencyof different ways to genetically-improve thenutrient-useefficiencyofcrops and simultaneously increase yield?

Q51:Howcanintensivelivestocksystems be designed to minimise the spread of infectious diseases amongst animalsandtheriskoftheemergenceof new diseases infecting humans?

Q55: What are most effective policies and interventions to reduce the demand for animal products in societies with high consumption levels and how will they affect global trade inlivestockproducts?

Q60:Howmuchcanagricultural education,extension,farmer mobilisation and empowerment be improved by the new opportunities afforded by mobile phone and web-based technologies?

Q64:Whatistheimpactof agriculturalsubsidiesinOECD countries on the welfare of farmers in developing countries?

Q72:Whowillbefarmingin2050, and what will be their land relationships (farm ownership, rental or management)?

Q73:Whatwillbetheconsequences to low-income countries of the increased political roles of countries with growing economic and purchasingpower(e.g.Brazil, China,India,Indonesia)?

Q78:Whatstepsneedtobetakento encourage young people to study agricultural science?

Q80:Whereisfoodwastegreatest in food chains in industrialized and developing countries and what measurescanbetakensignificantly to reduce these levels of food waste?

Q89:Asenergypricesrise,how canagricultureincreaseitsefficiencyand use fewer inputs and fertilizers, yet still feed a growing population?

Q99:Howeffectiveareexperiential and outdoor learning programs in promoting child nutrition, healthy child development, and prevention of obesity and diabetes?

1 The full paper is available free to access at www.earthscan.co.uk/?tabid=503. It is available open access so that readers and researchers across the world can download the paper.

Full link: www.ingentaconnect.com/content/ earthscan/ijas/2010/00000008/00000004/art00001

Professor Jules

Pretty OBE

Vice-Chancellor

University of Essex

Jules Pretty is Pro-Vice-Chancellor at the University

of Essex, and Professor of Environment and

Society. His 18 books include This Luminous Coast

(2011), Nature and Culture (2010), The Earth Only

Endures (2007), and Agri-Culture (2002). He is

a Fellow of the Society of Biology and the Royal

Society of Arts, former Deputy-Chair of the

governments Advisory Committee on Releases

to the Environment, and has served on advisory

committees for a number of government

departments. He was a member of the Royal

Society working group that published Reaping

the Benefits (2009) and was a member of the UK

government Foresight project on Global Food and

Farming Futures (2011). He received an OBE in

2006 for services to sustainable agriculture, and an

honorary degree from Ohio State University in 2009.

More details can be found at www.essex.ac.uk/pvc/

sustainability and www.julespretty.com.

Examples of some of the top questions

References

Foresight. 2011. The Future of Food and

Farming. Government Office of Science,

DBIS, London

Pretty J, Sutherland W J, Ashby J, Auburn J,

Baulcombe D, Bell M, Bentley J, Bickersteth S,

Brown K, Jacob Burke, Campbell H, Chen K,

Crowley E, Crute I, Dobbelaere D, Edwards-

Jones G, Funes-Monzote F, H. Godfray C J,

Griffon M, Gypmantisiri P, Haddad L, Halavatau

S, Herren H, Holderness M, Izac A-M, Jones

M, Koohafkan P, Lal R, Lang T, McNeely J, Mu-

eller A, Nisbett N, Noble A, Pingali P, Pinto Y,

Rabbinge R, Ravindranath N H , Rola A, Roling

N, Sage C, Settle W, Sha J M, Luo Shiming,

Simons T, Smith P, Strzepeck K, Swaine H,

Terry E, Tomich T P, Toulmin C, Trigo E,

Twomlow S, Vis J K, Wilson J and Pilgrim S.

2010. The top 100 questions of importance to

the future of global agriculture. International

Journal of Agricultural Sustainability 8(4),

2192361

Royal Society. 2009. Reaping the Benefits.

London

28

Carolyn Riches has been tracking down scientific snippets from across the world on an integrated crops theme. Thanks go to everyone who has contributed to ideas, text and images for this edition of Out and A

science matters : spring 2011

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