The Portuguese are making ‘super pines’ more drought-resistant | the trees
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The BLC3 Campus of Technology and Innovation, in the municipality of Oliveira do Hospital, has developed the most drought-resistant pine trees, which need less than half the usual water to achieve the same productivity and performance.
“We have been able to create more resilient pine trees with better genetic quality, through an approach at the level of genetic and molecular biology, while creating induced and controlled stress situations. The combination of these two dimensions makes it possible to have plants that are more resilient and resilient to climate change and phytosanitary risks, Without losing sight of the appreciation of biodiversity and genetics,” said BLC3 President.
Speaking to Lusa, João Nunes explained that this genetic optimization of plants, to be then transplanted into agricultural or forest ecosystems, was developed over a two-year period by three scientists from BLC3.
“We have plants in which we can save 50-60% more water compared to the normal rate, which is very good, taking into account achieving the same productivity and performance. He pointed out that we have samples from which we were able to get very important and new results, as It exploded after drying and in extreme situations of water stress.”
These “super pines” were planted 15 days ago at the Oliveira do Hospital, respectively with proper spacing between them.
In the field, a total of 162 specimens can be counted that survived the stress conditions imposed on them, and are now left alone after irrigation to compact the ground.
These will be the mother plants, to generate other plants with the same characteristics. Our role is mainly to help create the genetic conditions, so that we can then create nurseries that can provide these plants,” he explained.
For the head of BLC3, PhD in biological sciences, work to combat climate change and its impact on plants “must start as soon as they are young.”
“If the approach and intervention were only after planting and laying the land, we would not be prepared to face climate change, which could lead to a significant loss of plants and is fundamental to the balance of the planet,” he added.
Still in this range of stone pine and marine pine, BLC3 has achieved “important results in the valorization of natural resins, of great importance to the national economy”.
“We should have the only marine pine specimens with more years of resilience to pine nematodes, which arose from the work of more than 20 years of molecular intervention, application of Darwin’s law and introduction of genetic optimization algorithms principles in improving plant quality and resilience.”
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