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www.ncl.ac.uk/afrd
Newcastle University School of Agriculture – Our activities and potential for collaborative projectsNewcastle University – Hainan Province Linkage Visit
Dr. Julia Cooper, Lecturer in Soil Science
November 2010
www.ncl.ac.uk/afrd
About us
• Part of Faculty of Science, Agriculture and Engineering (SAgE)
• Approximately 60 academic staff
• Also approximately 40 technical, administrative and farm staff
• Main building on Newcastle University campus and two farms outside the city
Nafferton Farm- 360 ha Estate- cereals, oilseed- dairy, beef, lamb
www.ncl.ac.uk/afrd
What do we do?
www.ncl.ac.uk/afrd
Undergraduate teaching
– Agriculture
– Animal Science
– Agribusiness Management
– Countryside Management / Rural Studies
– Environmental Science
– Food and Human Nutrition
www.ncl.ac.uk/afrd
MSc Programmes
– Agricultural and environmental Science
– Wildlife conservation and management
– Marketing
– Medicinal plants and functional foods
– Ecological farming and food production systems
– Animal behaviour and welfare
www.ncl.ac.uk/afrd
Six research groups in the School of Agriculture
1. Soils, Crops and Environment
2. Integrated Animal Science
3. Food Quality and Health
4. Food systems consumption and marketing
5. Science and technology studies in food and environment
6. Rural Development
www.ncl.ac.uk/afrd
Multi-disciplinary research groups and centres
• The Centre for Rural Economy
• Nafferton Ecological Farming Group
• Human Nutrition Research Centre
• Food security network• At University level, the Newcastle Institute for Research
in Sustainability (NIReS)
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Research Highlights – Nafferton Ecological Farming Group
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Results from long term organic versus conventional field trials
• factorial design• 2 levels of crop rotation – organic and conventional•2 levels of fertility management - organic and conventional• 2 levels of crop protection – organic and conventional
Crop Yields WheatSource P-value
Fertility management ns
Crop protection 0.0051Fertility management x Crop protection 0.014
95%70%76%
Pesticide residues Wheat 2004
0
50
100
150
200
250
300
CCC(μg/kg)
Crop protection Org (-P) Conv (+P) Org (-P) Conv (+P)
Fertilisation Organic (-MF) Conventional (+MF)
P= pesticide and CCCMF= Mineral NPK Fertiliser
Interaction p=0.0001
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Crop management effects on protein expression in potatoes
Reference gel
Total >600 spots
284 spots93 Highly
significant (p<0.01)
191 Significant (p<0.05)
Crop management effects on protein expression in potatoes
Soil assessments in organic and conventional systems
Molecular techniques for soil biodiversity studies
• Less than 1% of all bacteria can be cultured.
• Polymerase chain reaction (PCR), denaturing gradient gel electrophoresis (DGGE), quantitative polymerase chain reaction (qPCR) and BIOLOG plates were used to analyse the nifH and total eubacterial community.
DGGE is a method used to examine the diversity of the microbial population that has a certain gene.
qPCR is used to quantify the amount of a certain gene in the population.
BIOLOG Ecoplates show the metabolic fingerprint of the sample.
DGGE results – nifH gene (free-living N fixers)
Potatoes/winter barley Potatoes/beans
MarchMarch June June SeptemberSeptember
F Org Con Con Org Org Con Con Org Org Con Con OrgP Org Org Con Con Org Org Con Con Org Org Con Con
Figs 3 and 4. DGGE gels showing the separation of nifH PCR products over a 35-55 % denaturing gradient.
Fully organic
Fully conventional
Conventional protection Organic health
Organic protection Conventional health
F Org Con Con Org Org Con Con Org Org Con Con OrgP Org Org Con Con Org Org Con Con Org Org Con Con
Principal Component Analysis of DGGE Gels – nifH gene
Fig. 5. Principal Component Analysis of June potato/winter barley soils
Orange = fully organicRed = fully conventionalGreen = conventional fertility organic healthBlue = organic fertility conventional health
qPCR results nifH gene- the effect of pre-crop & date
P=0.0124 P=0.0063
P=0.0004
Factor P-value
Date 0.0012
Pre-crop <0.0001
Fertility management 0.0099
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Nutrient Use Efficient Crop Production Trials
• New European Union Project
• Includes partners at CAAS in Beijing
• Focussed on NUE maize, wheat, oilseed rape and potatoes
• Nafferton wheat trials COMMUNITY RESEARCH
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NUE-CROPS wheat variety trials
• 8 varieties of wheat – short straw and long straw
• 5 fertility treatments – 0 N, 85 kg fertilizer N/ha, 170 fertilizer kg N/ha, 85 kg compost N/ha, 170 kg compost N/ha
• Deep soil sampling – nitrates
• Leaf sampling – proteomics and transcriptomics
• Yield sampling – biomass partitioning, grain yield, protein
P value
N <.0001
Variety <.0001
NxVar <.0001
NUE-CROPS wheat variety trials 2010 results
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Summary of AFRD Research Expertise
• Expertise is multidisciplinary
• Full food chain analysis from “field to fork”
• Including crop, soil, nutritional, marketing and consumer behaviour
• Linking molecular scale –omics methods with field scale measurements
• Focus on resource efficient and environmentally friendly food production systems
www.ncl.ac.uk/afrd
Acknowledgements
• Newcastle University – Hainan link
• Students and staff who have contributed – Prof. Carlo Leifert, Dr. Catherine Tetard, Leo Rempelos, Mftah Almadni, Caroline Orr, Dr. Stephen Cummings
• We gratefully acknowledge funding from the European Community under the Seventh Framework Programme for Research, Technological Development and Demonstration Activities, for the Integrated Project NUE-CROPS.
COMMUNITY RESEARCH
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NUE-CROPS CAAS Partners
A team from 2 CAAS/CAS Institutes and 2 Universities will be involved in NUE-CROPS via the CAAS:•Institute of Agricultural Resources and Regional Planning (IARRP-CAAS) led by Prof. B Zhao (BZ) which is based at the CAAS complex in Beijing will be the lead participant.•Institute of Genetics and Developmental Biology, Chinese Academy of Science (IGDB- CAS) in Beijing•China Agricultural University (CAU, Beijing)•Shandong Agricultural University (SAU, Shandong)
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