New thinking
THE NZ FARMERS WEEKLY – farmersweekly.co.nz – February 19, 2018
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Pressurecooker science rewarded The dark, dire days of early Psa infection in kiwifruit orchards prompted a shift in how scientists approach disease incursions, demanding a rapid response across many disciplines that brought with it many risks of failure. Those risks have paid off doubly for the research team at Plant and Food Research. Last week the team was recognised as the recipient of the country’s most esteemed science award, the Prime Ministers Science Prize. Richard Rennie spoke to team leader Dr Bruce Campbell on what the $500,000 award means for future research into the disease and how scientists will work on such outbreaks in future.
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RUCE Campbell can claim to be one of the scientists at ground zero on November 5, 2010, when Psa was confirmed in a Bay of Plenty kiwifruit orchard. He recalls the sense of dread on confirming the disease’s presence, not dissimilar to the feeling his bovine research colleagues would experience if they had confirmed the presence of foot and mouth disease. That sense was reinforced by knowledge that until then Psa had been given a relatively low priority in research here, simply because it was not present in New Zealand. But that changed overnight. “November 5 really was a watershed moment for us. “When it became evident very early on containment was not an option, mobilising our need to understand how we were going to live with it became an absolute priority. “It put scientists under pressure in unprecedented ways to respond to that.” Getting to know the enemy became the number one priority for the more than 100 scientists involved in the project. But to do so demanded a better genomic understanding of the Psa variant, one of hundreds of Pseudomonas variants that existed in the environment, populating almost every variety of plant. “Diagnostic tests were identifying Psa everywhere and we were required to identify the strain, develop a test that could be easily carried out and could be commercialised.” Within a matter of months scientists had done just that, presenting a world-first molecular test that meant researchers also had a tool to determine the tolerance of new kiwifruit cultivars to
the insidious disease. Another team of scientists was trialling crop treatments to help vines resist the disease. While the G3 SunGold cultivar had been in the sights of plant breeders to ultimately replace the Hort16a variety hit so hard by Psa, G3 had not been extensively tested for its tolerance, with parameters of drymatter and taste playing a bigger part. “We had not had the disease pressure of Psa here to really know how it would respond. “We had to view how the G3 cultivars responded in Italy to Psa exposure and almost crash test the plants against the disease.”
It was almost a crash test dummy approach to trying to determine how tolerant the new cultivar was to Psa. Dr Bruce Campbell Plant and Food Research Given the usual careful, systematic and measured way plant research scientists are used to working, Campbell admits he and his colleagues were pushed well beyond their comfort zone to try to accelerate their progress in understanding and dealing with the disease. “It was almost a crash test dummy approach to trying to determine how tolerant the new cultivar was to Psa. “We were testing cultivars right to the end when we had to make a decision on which was the best and G3 happened to be very good.”
BEST BOFFINS: Plant and Food Research chief operating officer Bruce Campbell, left, and plant pathologist Mike Manning are on the team recognised with New Zealand’s top science award.
The decision resulted in the single largest varietal shift of any crop in NZ history, with the entire Hort16a Gold fruit being dropped and G3 being grafted or planted in its place in only 18 months. Since then the industry has rebounded on the unprecedented success of a crop not only capturing consumer palates but also continuing to show tolerance to Psa and to generate almost $700 million in export earnings last year. Looking into the future with $500,000 in the research coffers, Campbell says that amount will prove highly useful for exploring disease control options and not only for Psa. “The Psa incursion has bought a learning not to be complacent, there is an ongoing battle between plants and disease and there could be another any time so we need to build a pipeline of new options.” Researchers face the tension of these diseases having to be dealt with and consumer resistance to the use of chemicals to do it. The award funds could help in non-chemical research of such controls as naturally occurring endophytes. Another area is elicitors, molecules whose presence in a plant reduces the damage it might suffer from environmental, pest or disease challenges. With this research comes the need for new faces and talent to drive it. Campbell says with greater cross-field co-operation between areas of human, plant and genomic study in a very digital environment there is a need for researchers capable of interpreting vast amounts of data and seeing patterns in it across such areas. “Because of this success there is a lot of interest for young scientists in this. “For our science team this award will be the career highlight for many. “It is not often the role of science is so well recognised.”
Other winners THE Prime Minister’s 2017 MacDiarmid Emerging Scientist Prize went to Dr Carla Meledandri from the University of Otago who is at the forefront of developing applications for nanotechnology. Her work includes incorporating silver nanoparticles into a range of breakthrough products designed to treat and prevent dental disease through a start-up company, Silventum, that she has co-founded and a technology licensing deal with a multinational dental company. The products offer a new solution for tooth decay, one of the most prevalent chronic diseases in the world, and have potential to make dental care more affordable. Meledandri is also developing nanomaterials for use in industrial applications such as gas capture and storage, which can potentially help mitigate global warming. The Prime Minister’s 2017 Science Teacher Prize was won by Nelson science teacher Sarah Johns who is in charge of junior science at Nelson College for Girls. Johns says she empowers her students by encouraging them to share her own philosophy of life — to be curious, open to possibilities and willing to take a risk. She receives the prize for what the judges describe as 100% commitment to her students and an uncompromising approach to bringing out the best in them. Johns devotes a huge amount of time to getting to know her students as individuals and negotiating the learning experiences that are relevant to them. She says passion and joy are high priorities in her classroom and she believes that comes from students having a say in how the class moves through a piece of work. The Prime Minister’s 2017 Science Communication Prize went to Damian Christie, a lawyerturned-journalist, who will use the prize money to establish New Zealand’s first science video news agency.
The Aotearoa Science Agency will showcase some of the extraordinary achievements and discoveries from NZ’s science sector and promote the successes to new audiences here and overseas. The prize recognises the success of Christie’s creation and production of Jamie’s World on Ice, which featured globally successful YouTuber Jamie Curry exploring Antarctica and relaying her findings to an international following on social media. The video series got more than 2.5 million views on social media, featured on television, radio, in several media publications and played on Air NZ international flights. He also won the 2017 Science Communicators Association of NZ Excellence in Science Communication Award for the same project. The Prime Minister’s 2017 Future Scientist Prize was won by former Auckland Grammar School student Jonathan Chan for development of a sophisticated, 3D-printed mesh, emulating a spider web, as a novel approach to atmospheric water collection. With support from his teachers and staff at the University of Auckland, Chan researched a low-cost, environmentally friendly system of fog collection to provide good quality drinking water where it might otherwise be unavailable in less economically developed countries. His challenge was to create a more efficient mesh that mimicked the wetted spider silk or cactus spine by controlling the size and structure of the mesh and using a chemical coating. Chan’s research also involved analysis of droplet formation as fog came in contact with the mesh. He is enrolled at the University of Auckland to begin biochemistry studies with the goal of eventually being involved in designing new drug therapies.