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Realizing increased photosynthetic Efficiency for sustainable increases in Crop Yield

Project: Research

Description

Realizing Increased Photosynthetic Efficiency (RIPE) is a multi-institutional effort to increase the yield of staple food crop in developing countries by improving C3 photosynthesis through several combined steps and working pipelines.

At Lancaster we focus on the sub-objective entitled: Transplanting Rubiscos.

The first enzyme involved in carbon fixation is Rubisco. This enzyme is important, but also inefficient because it can bind with oxygen instead of carbon dioxide, resulting in wasted carbon and energy in photorespiration.

A way to overcome the limitation of Rubisco in modern crops is to search for a Rubisco among natural plants that has a higher specificity for CO2, meaning that that it is less likely to bind to oxygen. RIPE is searching a range of algae and wild plants for a better Rubisco with higher specificity and faster binding rates. These will then be engineered into crops to replace the current, less efficient enzyme.
StatusFinished
Effective start/end date1/09/15 → 31/10/17
Linkshttp://ripe.illinois.edu/

Funding

  • Gates Foundation: £445,632.00

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