"We are already working in a detailed manner on a number of spices and are open to collaborations with these foreign scientists who can lend us their know-how to create value additions to our native spices like ginger and pepper," said E V Soniya, Scientist, RGCB.
Molecular plant biologists from nearly 20 countries including Canada, Belgium, Germany, Israel, Spain and Australia participated at a recently concluded four-day conference organised here jointly by RGCB and the European Molecular Biology Organisation (EMBO).
"My interest is in polyphenonyls and I have worked on tomato, a little bit of maize, potatoes and beans among other crops, testing to identify the beneficial compounds that can be used to cross breed and engineer disease resistant and stable crops.
"I am interested in extending it to spices like ginger and pepper among others as well," said Tohge.
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According to Jennifer Ann Harikrishna, Professor, Institute Of Biological Sciences, Malaysia, global climate change and various fungal diseases adversely affect the cultivation of banana crop in the world and researchers are now looking into native species of bananas.
"We don't have any ongoing collaborations, but will be interested for future.
Our current research is on how to grow saline tolerant bananas because while coconut and palm trees can grow in salt water, bananas cannot and people both in India and Malaysia are fond of their bananas," she said.
"India has got a good potential for cultivation of soybean. We need more genetic sequencing research to get maximum yield," said Prof Babu Valliyodan from University of Missouri, who is exploring collaborations with different institutes in India, a release said here today.
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