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FUTUREROOTS: Redesigning root architecture for improved crop performance

Final Report Summary - FUTUREROOTS (FUTUREROOTS: Redesigning root architecture for improved crop performance)

Global population growth means that crop production must double by 2050. This target is even more challenging given the impact of climate change on water availability and the drive to reduce fertilizer inputs to make agriculture more sustainable. Developing crops with improved water and nutrient uptake efficiency could provide the solution. Root architecture critically influences nutrient and water uptake efficiency in crops. However, a major bottleneck to genetic improvement of crop root architecture has been the inability to image roots non-invasively in soil.

The ERC FUTUREROOTS project successfully solved the challenge of imaging crop root architecture directly in soil by creating a state of the art X-ray microCT (µCT) root imaging facility. Fittingly, our facility is named after the Nottinghamshire-born Nobel Prize winning inventor of µCT, Sir Godfrey Hounsfield. µCT imaging takes place in a specially designed research building with an adjoining greenhouse. Uniquely, the greenhouse is fully automated, employing robotic systems to pack, deliver and return large soil columns containing wheat plants to and from the room sized µCT scanner and greenhouse.

A room-sized µCT scanner was required to provide a powerful enough X-ray source to image large soil filled columns able to grow a wheat plant throughout its entire life cycle. The large µCT scanner takes approximately 8000 image slices through each 1m soil column. To segment roots from the surrounding soil and generate 3D images of wheat root systems required we develop advanced image analysis software. We have exploited our µCT root imaging capability to characterise variation in wheat root systems. For example, imaging root systems of ancestors of modern bread wheat has revealed striking differences in the number and distribution of seminal and tiller (i.e. grain bearing stem) root systems compared to modern bread wheat. The root architectural differences we observed may reflect the impact of chemical fertiliser application over the last 50 years, which has led to the selection of modern wheat varieties that forage via tiller roots in upper soil profiles to aid grain filling.

One of the major benefits of µCT is that it is non-invasive, so we can re-scan the same sample to generate 4D information about how wheat root systems grow and develop in soil over time. For example, 4D µCT imaging has revealed the importance of embryo-derived seminal roots for deeper soil exploration, whereas tiller roots forage in the top soil at later stages of the wheat life cycle. To pinpoint the key root features required to improve nitrate and water uptake efficiencies in wheat, we have employed advanced mathematical models. For example, simulations of water uptake in wheat roots have revealed the importance of deeper seminal (rather than tiller) roots when plants are exposed to a drought stress. µCT imaging has also helped us discover several new root adaptive responses to water and nutrient stress. For example, we have observed that roots only branch when in direct contact with water using a developmental response called hydropatterning.

The ERC FUTUREROOTS project and the Hounsfield Facility has also delivered wider societal impact. For example, we have hosted over 300 visits from local community organisations and Schools; national, European and international Universities, Companies, Senior Governmental officials and NGO’s; and received wide media interest from TV (e.g. BBC1, EuroNews), new media (e.g. one Hounsfield Facility article attracted 550K hits on the BBC1 website) and Newspapers (e.g. ranked in Daily Telegraph’s top 10 most innovative UK University projects). ERC staff and our research has won 20 awards including a Gold Medal at the Chelsea Flower Show. The Hounsfield Facility has also attracted considerable commercial interest, performing services for over 50 major companies and SMEs since 2012; and winning over 20 industry co-sponsored research grants and PhD awards.

In summary, the ERC FUTUREROOTS project and its Hounsfield Facility have made numerous technological achievements and research discoveries, whilst also delivering wider societal impact.