Video & Audio Library

An overview of the new Perennial Atlas project from The Land Institute’s Civic Science program.

Dr. Lee DeHaan, Lead Scientist of the Kernza Domestication Program at The Land Institute, joined WORT 89.9FM in Madison, WI to discuss the timeline and process behind perennial grain breeding. In this radio feature, he joins host Douglas Haynes to provide an overview on Kernza, agricultural sustainability, and perennial polyculture. Also joining the program is Erica Schoenberger, a graduate student in Agroecology at UW-Madison, who studies nutrient management for Kernza as part of a research lab led by research collaborator Dr. Valentin Picasso.

An introduction to perennial wheat, the factors affecting its perenniality, and its role in the community learning process for the 2023 Civic Science season.

An introduction to silphium, its characteristics, and its role in the 2023 Civic Science season.

The Podcast Sustainable Asia featured The Land Institute’s Tim Crews and research collaborators from Yunnan University, Cornell University, the Chinese Academy of Agricultural Sciences, the Arkansas Rice Growers Association, and the Sichuan Academy of Agricultural Sciences in their recent episode that details the benefits of perennial rice and the importance of this collaborative milestone between “food superpower” nations, the United States and China.

The Kansas Black Farmers Association (KBFA) recently hosted Amy June Breesman, Land Relations Specialist at The Land Institute, on their podcast to share her story and unique insight on programs and initiatives to add value to farmers and discuss perennial grain agriculture, opportunities for collaboration, and more.

Civic Science collaborator Ellie Irons documents progress and shares insights from her experience working with the perennial oilseed Silphium integrifolium to illustrate how storytelling, photography, and data collection all connect to the broader social and ecological context of this prairie plant and its habitat, particularly in its journey to disrupt dominant lawn monocultures in the US.

Jacob Jungers, Kernza perennial grain research collaborator and Assistant Professor of Agronomy and Plant Genetics at the University of Minnesota, recently spoke on a webinar with the North Central Region Water Network about Kernza’s ability to greatly reduce nitrate leaching that stems from row crop production in the Upper Midwest and Great Plains regions of the US. In this webinar, Jacob also draws attention to the policy and market support measures that have developed in tandem with Kernza research.

Perennial grain research collaborator Sandeep Nain from Gateway Research Organization in Alberta, Canada, recently spoke on the Peace Country Beef and Forage Association podcast about the beneficial aspects of perennial grains in multi-crop agriculture systems. Topics of discussion include the benefits of sainfoin in intercropping configurations, the ability of perennial grains to adapt to variable weather conditions, the dual-purpose (food & forage) nature of Kernza, and more.

At the 2023 Eastern Nebraska Soil Health Conference hosted by the University of Nebraska – Lincoln, graduate student Roberta Rebesquini presented research on Kernza related to its benefits to soil health, the ecosystem services it provides, and the reason why farmers are interested in growing this perennial grain. Roberta works on the KernzaCAP project under the supervision of Dr. Andrea Basche in the Resilient Cropping Systems Lab within the university’s Department of Agronomy and Horticulture.

NPR’s weekly science podcast Short Wave recently featured a story on perennial rice, which took place during the 2023 Annual Meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) in Washington, DC. Short Wave’s Scientist in Residence Regina G. Barber spoke with Tim Crews, Chief Scientist at The Land Institute, and research collaborator Eric Sachs about the environmental and socioeconomic benefits of this perennial grain.

Our team of science collaborators has developed a new R package, “uafR,” that automates the process of identifying chemicals from gas chromatography-mass spectrometry (GC/MS) data.

Researchers can use this package to identify large chemistry datasets in hours rather than weeks or months, as was previously required. This software will help researchers quickly measure and identify natural chemical compounds in diverse perennial grain plants that could be used in organic pest management, thus allowing them to deploy natural plant chemistry tactics to manage pests that limit perennial grain crop growth and agricultural production.

The developers of the package explain how it came to be and what it does.

To download the uafR package and learn more about its functions, please visit: https://github.com/castratton/uafR

*Note: This package does not run on Linux systems.