UNews - Dmytro Yevtushenko

Sustainable potato production the focus of new funding for ��Ѹ��Դ��߿�Ƭ of Lethbridge researchers

caroline.zentner — Thu, 13 Apr 2023 17:17:51 +0000

Potatoes are an important economic crop in southern Alberta and, around the world, the humble potato is a key component of global food security.

Researchers from the ��Ѹ��Դ��߿�Ƭ of Lethbridge have been awarded nearly $250,000 through the Agriculture Funding Consortium to improve sustainable potato production by looking at ways to reduce disease in the field and in storage and to increase production while minimizing the use of resources.

Dr. Larry Flanagan, a biology professor, has received nearly $50,000 to test six types of potatoes used in fry and chip processing for their water-use efficiency under typical growth and irrigation practices in southern Alberta.

“Our research will benefit the potato industry in southern Alberta by providing new information to producers,” says Flanagan. “The efficient use of water in crop production in an arid region like ours is an important goal for increasing sustainable potato production.”

Flanagan and partners, Drs. Michele Konschuh and Dmytro Yevtushenko from ULethbridge and Dr. Jonathan Neilson from Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada, will apply stable isotope techniques to identify water-efficient potato varieties for use in crop production under expected future warmer and dryer conditions that will stress our available water resources.

In a separate project, Yevtushenko, a biology professor, was awarded $200,000 to develop and validate protocols to detect potato pests and pathogens.

“Disease incidence in both the field and in storage remains a major limiting factor in sustainable potato production,” says Yevtushenko. “The aim of this study is to develop diagnostic molecular protocols for fast and reliable identification of the major existing and emerging potato pests and pathogens in Alberta.”

Yevtushenko and partners, Drs. Michele Konschuh and Jie Feng, a research scientist with Alberta Agriculture and Irrigation, will focus on identifying nematodes, which are parasites, and fungal diseases like pink rot, potato stem canker and black scurf, that are known to cause substantial potato losses in Alberta.

The researchers expect the study will generate data and lead to the implementation of new technologies that will maintain Alberta’s reputation as a leading Canadian producer of top-quality potatoes and enhance the profitability and sustainability of the potato industry.

Virtual iGEM Giant Jamboree sees ��Ѹ��Դ��߿�Ƭ of Lethbridge-supported teams garner silver and bronze

trevor.kenney — Tue, 08 Dec 2020 17:29:10 +0000

��Ѹ��Դ��߿�Ƭ of Lethbridge-supported teams earned silver and bronze medals as the International Genetically Engineered Machines (iGEM) Giant Jamboree took place in the virtual space recently.

The annual celebration of synthetic biology and genetic engineering is usually hosted by the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) in Boston, MA and was moved online as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic. Still, 4,000 participants attended, with the U of L represented by its collegiate entry and the Lethbridge high school team.

High School iGEM team members present during their virtual appearance at the Giant Jamboree.

Both groups chose to tackle problems related to agriculture, with the collegiate team presenting FriGEM, a project aimed to fight post-harvest potato diseases, and the high school entry’s tPectin-ACE project, which focused on creating a biological catalyst to accelerate compost degradation.

Collegiate (bronze medal)

The university team worked extensively with Dr. Dmytro Yevtushenko, the U of L’s Research Chair in Potato Science, and research associate Dr. Mariana Vetrici. Their project aims to fight post-harvest potato diseases caused by Fusarium and other plant pathogens by using targeted expression of antimicrobial peptides (AMPs) in tubers. They were awarded a bronze medal standing for their work.

The team has become fascinated with this diverse group of small, naturally occurring peptides (also called host defense peptides) that are part of the host innate defense system against pathogen invasion. By engineering the AMP-expressing potato plants, less pesticides would be required to combat plant diseases.

“The COVID-19 restrictions made it especially difficult to complete experimental laboratory work this year,” says second-year chemistry student Mark Lea. “Ebven though we only had a short time to experiment on the potato plants and obtain preliminary results, that work will be very helpful in the continuation of our project.”

The team is also exploring the suitability of potato tubers as a low cost, safe and efficacious platform to produce therapeutic AMPs. In particular, they test the hypothesis that a targeted, high-level accumulation of therapeutic BMAP-18 peptide in potato tubers retains its direct toxicities to trypanosomes, the causative agents of sleeping sickness, which may lead to the development of edible therapeutics.

“It’s amazing how much work the undergraduate students got done on their personal computers before they could get access to campus, work that I could not have achieved by myself in such a short time,” says Dr. Vetrici.

Check out their promo and project videos, wiki and poster for more information.

��Ѹ��Դ��߿�Ƭ of Lethbridge team members included: Deepika Anupindi, Sara Balderas, Abel Belay, Trinity Deak, Rowan Fehr, Seanna Goeseels, London Gokarn, Rebecca Ha, Emily Hagens, Ilyanna Janvier, Dia Koupantsis (student leader), Mark Lea, Reece Martin, Mehreen Kabir, Joshua Omotosho. Supervisors/advisors were Justin Vigar, Fabian Rohden and Dr. Angeliki Pantazi.

High School (silver medal)

The high school team focused its project on creating a biological catalyst to accelerate compost degradation via enhanced pectin digestion. The group collaborated with City of Lethbridge Waste and Recycling officials, local restaurants and researchers at the Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada Research Centre.

Using unique pectin degradation enzymes from the organism P. amylolyticus, the team engineered a system that would accelerate the breakdown of homogalacturonan, a major component of pectin. The engineered enzymes would also be heat stable, ensuring they survive the high temperatures required for efficient composting. While initially designed for use in at-home composters, discussions with Lethbridge Waste and Recycling engineer Bill MacMillan led the team to pivot their project to target industrial compost facilities instead. The team intends to continue work on the project in 2021.

Their project was awarded a silver medal and was nominated for Best Integrated Human Practices.

“We’re super proud of what we could accomplish this year and really happy the judges liked our work,” says team member and project presenter Thomas Byrne, a grade-12 student at Winston Churchill High School.

You can watch their promo or project videos, read their wiki and check out their poster.

Lethbridge high school team members included: Shada Aborawi, Rebecca Avileli, Jasmine Belisle, Thomas Byrne, Wenyu Chen, Kimoya Edwards, Olive Graham, Linda He, Livia Kadezabek, Xinhong Li, Dominic Piper, Declan Sander, Lana VanGenderen, Elisha Wong, Marissa Wong, Michelle Wu, Damian La Rosa Montes (Grad Student Advisor), Kristi Turton (Grad Student Advisor), Luke Saville (Mindfuel Advisor), Jalyce Heller (Primary Investigator), Dr. Laura Keffer-Wilkes (Primary Investigator).

Both teams were supported by the U of L Department of Chemistry & Biochemistry, Alberta RNA Research and Training Institute (ARRTI), SynBridge, the Regional Innovation Network of Southern Alberta (RINSA), Agility, and the ��Ѹ��Դ��߿�Ƭ of Lethbridge Students’ Union (ULSU).

The full iGEM Giant Jamboree experience is also available to view on the iGEM website.

You can also follow iGEM on social media:

Twitter @LethHS_iGEM and @LethbridgeiGEM
Instagram @lethbridgehsiGEM and @uleth.igem
Facebook @lethbridgehsiGEM and @LethbridgeiGEM

U of L researchers awarded more than $1.8 million in NSERC funding

caroline.zentner — Mon, 22 Jul 2019 16:47:48 +0000

Eleven ��Ѹ��Դ��߿�Ƭ of Lethbridge researchers have been awarded Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council (NSERC) Discovery Grants worth approximately $1.8 million, payable in instalments of anywhere from one to five years.

“��Ѹ��Դ��߿�Ƭ of Lethbridge researchers were very successful this year, with 11 out of 14 applications being awarded funding,” says Dr. Erasmus Okine, U of L vice-president (Research). “This funding of almost $2 million demonstrates the calibre of research our scientists are engaged in and I congratulate each one of them.”

Dr. Gerlinde Metz, a neuroscience professor, received the U of L’s largest grant worth a total of $510,000. She and her research team will continue exploring early life stress and its effects on brain plasticity. They’ll examine how early life stress alters brain development, connections between neurons, and behaviour. They’ll also look at whether factors such as age and sex determine the response to early life stress and whether early life stress affects subsequent generations.

Dr. Theresa Burg, a biology professor, studies how the evolution of high-latitude species is linked to historical and present-day environmental changes. Examining how landscape features and past climate changes have shaped today’s populations can further the understanding of population dynamics and help predict how these species might respond to future climate change.

Dr. Dmytro Yevtushenko, a professor in the Department of Biology and Research Chair in Potato Science, was awarded an early career researcher supplement in addition to a Discovery Grant. Yevtushenko will conduct research into the natural defense mechanisms of potato plants. His work could lead to higher crop yields, less crop loss, increased food safety and could help point the way to improving disease resistance in other crops.

Dr. Borries Demeler, Canada 150 Research Chair and a professor in the Department of Chemistry & Biochemistry, is a leading biophysics scientist with expertise in analytical ultracentrifugation (AUC). AUC is used to analyze molecules in solution. He has established the Canadian Center for Hydrodynamics, which is equipped with three unique AUC instruments to accelerate biophysical research in Canada. He hopes to develop new analysis protocols and software tools that will benefit basic research in biochemistry, physics and material science.

Other U of L researchers who received grants include Dr. Jon Doan (kinesiology and physical education), Dr. Stewart Rood (biology), Dr. Lawrence Flanagan (biology), Dr. Anthony Russell (biology), Dr. Hadi Kharaghani (mathematics and computer science), Dr. Matthew Tata (neuroscience) and Dr. Saurya Das (physics and astronomy).

UNews - Dmytro Yevtushenko

Sustainable potato production the focus of new funding for ��Ѹ�����Դ���߿�Ƭ of Lethbridge researchers

Related Topics

Virtual iGEM Giant Jamboree sees ��Ѹ�����Դ���߿�Ƭ of Lethbridge-supported teams garner silver and bronze

Related Topics

U of L researchers awarded more than $1.8 million in NSERC funding

Related Topics

Sustainable potato production the focus of new funding for ��Ѹ��Դ��߿�Ƭ of Lethbridge researchers

Virtual iGEM Giant Jamboree sees ��Ѹ��Դ��߿�Ƭ of Lethbridge-supported teams garner silver and bronze