Excited for a second #GreenHorizons training session with undergrads on #PlantScience that feeds the world! Today we’ll learn about the new tools that are transforming plant breeding, and what the future could look like for wheat. 🌾 🌱 #STEMCareers #FutureOfFood

We're still buzzing after yesterday’s session with 95 amazing students diving into plant science, food security, and sustainability. Their enthusiasm and questions show that the next generation of scientists is ready to make a difference. 🌾🌱

🌾 Excited for today’s training session with undergraduates exploring food security, wheat research & careers in plant science. #GreenHorizons #PlantScience #FoodSecurity #WheatResearch #Sustainability #STEMCareers #FutureOfFood

Team JIC are having a cracking time in the “Future of Farm and Agriculture” @farmersweeklyuk.bsky.social zone at New Scientist Live @newscientist.com this weekend 🌟🌾 We’re here on Monday too - come along and see stomata down a microscope and our wonderful wheat varieties!! @dsw-isp.bsky.social

“MARTi has its origins in software we developed for really rapid identification of #pathogens in preterm infants, but we’ve since adapted it to use in a wide range of settings...including in agriculture, and biosurveillance..." A powerful new tool for real-time analysis of #nanopore #metagenomics 👇

Super excited to see our bioRxiv paper out! It furthers our understanding of an FHB resistance locus in timopheevii with some DON resistance too!

💬 “It’s operationally very lightweight, you can use it in-field for taxonomic classification on a standard laptop, or undertake larger, complex analysis using HPC.” 💻🧬 Scientists at Earlham Institute introduce MARTi, a new tool for real-time #nanopore #metagenomics. @genomeresearch.bsky.social

High fibre white flour developed at Rothamsted passes the taste test - Genetic differences in wheat varieties have been used to develop lines with naturally higher dietary fibre - and bread fans love it! 🍞👍 @uniofreading.bsky.social Full story 👇 www.rothamsted.ac.uk/news/high-fi...

PhD studentship Come help us understand the wheat rhizosphere at the Earlham Institute 🦠 Working at the interface of fungal antagonists & pathogens (@rowenahill.bsky.social @neilhall.bsky.social ), host genetic diversity (Simon Griffiths -JIC) and bacterial community diversity (Jacob Malone -JIC)

With partners @ibotcz.bsky.social Rothamsted has uncovered how a family of genes that regulate plant hormones in wheat fine-tunes the plant’s growth and grain development - could help breeders produce bigger harvests. 🧬🌱 Full story 👇 www.rothamsted.ac.uk/news/key-whe...

📃 New research published today in @natcomms.nature.com from the Earlham Institute and @helmholtzmunich.bsky.social presents the first wheat pan-transcriptome - revealing layers of hidden diversity spanning our modern wheat variations. 🧪 ➡️ buff.ly/ZDIRnFW @wheatinitiative.bsky.social @ukri.org

BLOG - Women in wheat event provides training to address gender bias in wheat research This July saw the latest #WomenInWheat event, where 25 early career women researchers attended a JIC training event focused on addressing gender bias in the UK and internationally www.jic.ac.uk/blog/women-i...

DSW Newsletter July 2025 🌱🌾

📢New paper! The fungal pathogen Fusarium uses a specialized protein to weaken plant immune defences & cause head blight - discovery could lead to bio-engineered disease-resistant grains @iubiology.bsky.social @plantdisease.bsky.social Read the full story 👇 www.rothamsted.ac.uk/news/fungal-...

We've been in the field this week visiting our Breeder's Toolkit trial sites! Thank you Elsoms Seeds, DSV UK, KWS, RAGT, Syngenta, NPZ UK and Limagrain for hosting us.

I'm excited to share our work investigating transcriptional compensation in polyploid wheat 🌾 It was fun to work on this project led by @philippaborrill.bsky.social and myself, with key contributions from @emilieknight.bsky.social and @simmojsimmo.bsky.social The key take-aways, a 🧵

🌾June 2025 newsletter🌾

Congratulations to Dr @philippaborrill.bsky.social and ‘Breaking the Wall of Epigenetics in Crop Breeding’ for being shortlisted for the Falling Walls Foundation Science Breakthrough of the Year 2025! 🌟 falling-walls.com/breakthroughs

Great week in the field collaborating with Malcolm Hawkesford's team at @rothamsted.bsky.social as part of the @dsw-isp.bsky.social project 🌾 Special thanks to Nicolas Virlet and March Castle for welcoming us and for all the hard work! @lancasterplantbio.bsky.social

Collected 1-meter-deep soil cores for our Delivering Sustainable Wheat @dsw-isp.bsky.social project. The cores will be scanned using X-ray CT for soil structural and root architectural analyses. @uniofnottingham.bsky.social @rothamsted.bsky.social

May 2025 newsletter

If you missed the @wheatgenome.bsky.social webinar yesterday with @simongriff.bsky.social "Breeding: Why we need to start over again" watch it here: www.youtube.com/watch?v=X0kZ...

🔔 Final Countdown! Just days left until Simon Griffiths @johninnescentre.bsky.social webinar on wheat breeding innovation. 💡 Discover why we need to start over and how genomics is rewriting the future of wheat. 🌱 Secure your spot now: tinyurl.com/2k78bmmh

Our wheat researchers @dsw-isp.bsky.social visited the super powerful "microscope" @diamondlightsource.bsky.social to investigate where crucial nutrients like calcium sit within the grain 🔬🌱🍞 Read the full story👇 www.rothamsted.ac.uk/news/wheat-r...

💬 "Some #fungi can change their behaviour in different environments, so understanding how a changing climate might affect fungal behaviour – and what role Starships play in this – is vital.” Starships enable new frontier of fungal genome evolution 🚀 🧬 🌱

Expected papers so far span salt tolerance, floral adaptation & cutting-edge phenotyping 🌾📘 Feel free to share with your networks! @tweeticum.bsky.social @wheatinitiative.bsky.social @cristobaluauy.bsky.social @dsw-isp.bsky.social @wheatgenome.bsky.social #JXBspecialissues #PlantScience 🧪 (2/2)

📃 A new study from the Earlham Institute and @rothamsted.bsky.social reveals insights into large mobile #fungal #genome elements - Starships - and how they jump between fungal species and influence their evolution. 🖥️ 🧬 🧪 ➡️ buff.ly/R5SF9j8 @rowenahill.bsky.social #Transposons #PlantScience

📢New Paper! Genes regulating wheat growth hormones mapped. The findings could pave the way for new varieties that produce bigger grains and are better suited to the challenges of climate change @jxbotany.bsky.social academic.oup.com/jxb/advance-...

Congratulations Isabel!

Congratulations @katielong.bsky.social

Keynote @monogram-uk.bsky.social #monogramuk25 Breeding: why we need to start all over again? By Simon Griffiths

Really enjoying #Monogram2025 so far @ibers.bsky.social Great talk by @chen-ji.bsky.social on her latest work exploring gene expression patterns in wheat grains. So many interesting genes to characterise!

Hard-hitting talk with lots of data about chronic diseases from @ondrejkosik.bsky.social from @rothamsted at #MonogramUK2025 , and how we can combat them through cereal dietary fibre. @monogram-uk.bsky.social @ibers.bsky.social

Very interesting talk from Stephen Pearce of @rothamsted.bsky.social on novel dwarfing genes at #MonogramUK2025. @monogram-uk.bsky.social @ibers.bsky.social

Wonderful talk from @delfidorussen.bsky.social at #Monogram2025 about DNA methylation mutants in wheat. You can read the full MET1-1 mutant characterisation which was just published this week @jxbotany.bsky.social ⬇️

We are at #Monogram @ibers.bsky.social wonderful networking with the wheat and cereal research community. @johninnescentre.bsky.social @dsw-isp.bsky.social

NEWS - Does this breakthrough mark a new epigenetic chapter in crop breeding? Today is #WorldHealthDay. Did you know that #wheat is an incredibly important crop for human health? 🌾 Read our latest news story about an important epigenetic breakthrough in creating more resilient crops okt.to/sL9oKr

I’m very happy to share the published version of our paper on the role of MET1 in wheat 🌾 🧬 It’s been really exciting to discover more about DNA methylation in wheat and it’s huge polyploid genome doi.org/10.1093/jxb/...

Fantastic to welcome so many early-career female researchers from across the UK wheat community to undertake #WomenInWheat leadership training provided by @hfpconsulting.bsky.social at the JIC field station this week! 🌾 @ukri.org @thesainsburylab.bsky.social @rothamsted.bsky.social

Less than a week to go🌾 #MonogramUK25, Looking forward to this exciting programme. This year includes an ERC Skill-building workshop. www.aber.ac.uk/en/media/dep...

📢New Paper! Future crop breeding needs to consider future soils. @uniofnottingham.bsky.social with our own Malcolm Hawkesford & @johninnescentre.bsky.social published today in @natureplants.bsky.social www.nature.com/articles/s41...

A fantastic #proWeizen conference hosted at Julius Kühn-Institut in Quedlinburg, Germany. Really great to hear about the wheat research projects in @proweizen.bsky.social and @simongriff.bsky.social presented highlights from DSW research.

Contributing to @dsw-isp.bsky.social, the Grassroots Genomics platform developed at the Earlham Institute is helping the #cropscience community record, access, and share #genomic #data - improving research outputs, collaboration, and reproducibility.

At the Earlham Institute, we develop tools that help researchers share, access, and use large #genomic datasets. 🖥️🧬 One of those is Grassroots Genomics - an open-source platform supporting the plant genomic community. #FAIRdata #OpenScience ➡️ buff.ly/CRUNCDr @richardmleggett.bsky.social

📢New Paper - Smart roots! Plants modify roots to maintain strategically use water. When soils are drying, plants can decrease water use from topsoil whilst boosting uptake at greater depths. 🌱💧 @newphyt.bsky.social @uonresearch.bsky.social Full story 👇 www.rothamsted.ac.uk/news/smart-r...

Can wheat keep up with climate change and food security demands? 🤔 Simon Griffiths @johninnescentre.bsky.social will explore how precision breeding can transform the future of wheat genetics. 📅 Webinar: 15 May 2025 at 11 AM EDT! 🔗 Sign up today: tinyurl.com/2k78bmmh

A new paper published today in @bio-protocol.bsky.social presents a protocol for isolating High Molecular Weight DNA from fungi. Lead author @greymj.bsky.social collaborated with researchers at @rothamsted.bsky.social to modify protocols from two commercial extraction kits. buff.ly/M02HgvR

The final version of our paper on genomics of understudied fungal root pathogens/endophytes of wheat is now out! The result of close ongoing collab between @earlhaminst.bsky.social (@mcmullan0.bsky.social @greymj.bsky.social @neilhall.bsky.social et al) and @rothamsted.bsky.social rdcu.be/edlB9

Collaboration is essential to address the challenges facing global wheat production. Thanks to those who joined us for the DSW Annual Meeting at Rothamsted Research - bringing together wheat researchers from across the UK to discuss and share ideas for the future.

Great to hear about the success of the #WomenInWheat mentoring programme and the opportunities available. @dsw-isp.bsky.social