In 2013, farmers in the highlands of Ethiopia began to notice something unsettling: a familiar variety of wheat was failing in an unfamiliar way. Stems weakened, plants collapsed, and fields that had ...

Famine may be largely a thing of the past but in recent years the re-emergence of a disease that can kill wheat - which provides a fifth of humanity's food - has threatened food security; now a ...

Backed by the Gates Foundation, the Wheat Disease Early Warning Advisory System is on the front lines, looking for early signals of crop-killing rust infections. When Dave Hodson walked through wheat ...

The discovery of a DNA marker for two key rust resistance genes is enabling plant breeders around the world to breed more effective rust resistant wheat varieties. The genes, Lr34 and Yr18, are ...

As the world’s population continues to grow, so does its appetite for cereal grains, which include such dietary staples as wheat. This growing demand has driven agricultural scientists to develop ...

CSIRO Plant Industry scientists and international collaborators have discovered the key to overcoming three major cereal diseases, which in epidemic years cost wheat growers worldwide in excess of ...

ST. PAUL, Minnesota, June 13, 2011 (ENS) – New and virulent forms of a fungus called stem rust that attacks wheat are spreading quickly across the world, borne by wind beyond the handful of countries ...