Chinese scientists have successfully identified the nitrogen-efficient gene in rice

BEIJING, Jan. 7 (Reporter Sun Selffa) reporter 7 from China
Institute of Genetics and Developmental Biology (
Genetic Development Institute) was informed that the institute's research team through the past 100 years collected in 52 countries and regions in different geographical regions of the world 110 early rice farmers in different nitrogen fertilizer conditions to carry out a comprehensive agrochemical identification, found that the rice branch (branch) nitrogen response capacity and nitrogen fertilizer efficiency variation is highly correlated.
team used genome-wide association analysis combined with multi-recombination techniques to identify a rice nitrogen-efficient gene OsTCP19, which is used as a key regulatory factor to regulate rice branching. Further research shows that the absence of a small segment of nucleic acid fragment (29-bp) in the upstream control area of OsTCP19 is the main reason for the difference in nitrogen response between different rice varieties.
the newly identified nitrogen-efficient gene, OsTCP19-H, is concentrated in varieties originating in poor soil, and most of the modern cultivation species are lost. The frequency of nitrogen-efficient type OsTCP19-H in rice varieties was significantly negatively related to the nitrogen content of rice field soil, and more than 90% of wild rice was nitrogen-efficient genotype, suggesting that it contributed to the geographical adaptability of rice to low soil fertility areas and was retained in low-fat areas during rice domestication. The team imported OsTCP19-H into modern rice varieties, which can improve the efficiency of nitrogen fertilizer utilization by 20-30% at nitrogen reduction levels, indicating that the gene has important application potential in the field of green agricultural development.
In the early hours of the 7th Beijing time, the internationally renowned academic journal Nature published this major breakthrough in rice green development research by Chinese scientists online in the form of a long article, which was also highly evaluated by many international peer experts.
S. Sanders, director of the John Innes Institute in the UNITED Kingdom, said, "This is a truly ground-breaking work that is important not only for understanding the nitrogen regulatory mechanisms of plants (rice) but also for reducing fertilizer use."
Professor Fernie of the Map Molecular Plant Physiology Institute in Germany believes that "the authors have demonstrated that OsTCP19 allied genetic diversity is associated with the geographical distribution of rice, and this excellent study tells us that by retracing our breeding history and understanding the adaptive improvements of modern intensive agriculture, we can find a solution that reduces fertilizer inputs without sacrificing food production".
Professor von Wiren, a nutritionist at the German Institute of Plant Genetics and Crop Breeding, said the findings, which found that nitrogen-efficient allegant genes were associated with low nitrogen levels in soil, made the results important in many ways and showed great potential for improving the quality of species by digging deep into superior genetic variations.of genetic development, global food production has been increasing since the early 1960s, and according to the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations, the main driving force for increasing food production is the large use of fertilizer, the vast majority of which is nitrogen fertilizer. In 2018, the world's fertilizer use reached 200 million tons, while China's annual fertilizer consumption exceeds 33% of the world's total fertilizer consumption, nitrogen fertilizer utilization efficiency is only about 30%, less than half that of western developed countries. The excessive application of fertilizer not only pollutes air, soil and water, but also brings great environmental pressure to the sustainable development of agriculture. In addition, long-term breeding under high fertilizer leads to the loss of some important genetic resources, so that the main rice varieties fertilizer utilization efficiency is generally low.
team's identification of OsTCP19, a key nitrogen-efficient gene, relies on a diverse family of farmers to grow rice population resources. These farm species are before the spread of modern high-yielding rice varieties, that is, before the large-scale application of nitrogen fertilizer, farmers around the world planted local varieties, the world's climate and soil differences have also created a wealth of genetic diversity of farm varieties. By genetically analyzing these "early" rice varieties in the rice seed bank, the researchers eventually located this key mutation in the genome. Through the analysis of soil nitrogen content data in rice growing areas of the world, the research team found that the more barren the soil, the more common the high-efficiency variation of OsTCP19 nitrogen, and with the increase of soil nitrogen content, nitrogen-efficient varieties gradually decreased, and almost all of this nitrogen-efficient variation in modern rice varieties in China was lost.
" to reintroduze this nitrogen-efficient variation into modern rice varieties, under the condition of nitrogen reduction, rice nitrogen fertilizer utilization efficiency can be increased by 20-30%, that is, in rice production, the use of less fertilizer, can achieve the same yield. "China's proposal to achieve carbon-to-carbon-to-carbon parity by 2060, and energy conservation and emission reduction in agriculture, especially reducing the use of fertilizers, are crucial, and the research team's latest research results provide a new way of thinking to achieve carbon-to-carbon-to-carbon goals, " he said.