Staff

2024-2025 ‘Empowering farmers: a participatory approach to soil organic carbon assessment’

Funded by the AFN+ network (UKRI)

Website: https://www.agrifood4netzero.net/funding/funded-projects/funded-scoping-study-projects/empowering-farmers-a-participatory-approach-to-soil-organic-carbon-assessment/

Soils are key to sustain food production. An important component of soils is organic matter, which contributes to soil fertility and crop growth, and consists of about 58% carbon. This soil organic carbon also helps to fight climate change, as the more carbon is in the soil, the less in the atmosphere contributing to greenhouse effect and global warming. The primary objective of this project is to empower farmers to estimate the level of soil organic carbon content in their fields, through the assessment of soil colour. This easy and accessible method will be validated against laboratory assessment, which is usually more costly and time consuming. The project aims to develop a new, accessible method and will contribute to raising awareness on soil health and carbon sequestration that can be used to adapt farm management practices towards net zero targets.

2023-2024 ‘Discovering the traits underlying emergence of weed populations in the annual grass Vulpia myuros’

Funded by the Royal Society

Weeds represent a major pressure on food production worldwide, by decreasing yields and contaminating harvests. It is thus crucial to study weed ecology to better understand how to control them now and in the future. In particular, the question of which traits (i.e. characteristics) favour the invasion and growth of new weeds into arable fields is key to understand how weediness emerges. In this project, we addressed the question of the traits underlying weed emergence in the grass species Vulpia myuros, also called rattail fescue. This species originates from the Mediterranean region and has been naturally present in Europe for centuries. However, V. myuros has emerged as a weed in recent years, benefiting from changes in cropping practices, in particular the reduction of tillage intensity. This species thus offers a unique opportunity to study the early stage of its invasion of arable fields. The traits characterising weediness in V. myuros will be studied by phenotyping wild and weed populations, i.e. we will measure important traits along the life cycle of the plant, from germination to flowering and seed production. The phenotyping of these populations in a growth chamber and greenhouse set up will reveal the similarities and differences in important traits among wild and weed populations and identify traits that are important to explain weediness. This project will shed new light on the traits underlying weed emergence in a species that may pose problems for food production in the future, and provide insights for improved control methods.

2022-2024 ‘Increasing productivity and sustainability in UK viticulture’

Funded by Innovate-UK’s Farming Innovation Programme, led by NIAB-EMR and Gusbourne vineyard, in collaboration with Chapel Down vineyard, Vinescapes and T Denne & Sons

Website: https://www.vinescapes.com/i-uk-cover-crop-research-project/

The proposed project will bring innovation by quantifying, for the first time, the impact of cover crops and non-chemical weeding strategies on soil health, production efficiency, and juice quality in UK vineyards. Project outputs will include evidence-based recommendations for growers on the best ground management approaches to suit UK vineyards. Industry-wide uptake of these practices would demonstrate to the public, the horticultural sector and retailers that the viti industry is committed to achieving environmental and net-zero goals. We propose to carry out the first full-scale experiments and commercial trials of cover cropping and mechanical weeding strategies in UK vineyards to identify and tailor optimal soil management approaches for the UK industry. The trial sites will serve as long-term research facilities on commercial holdings in Kent, and our intention is that they host separate but allied future research on beneficial insects and soil pathogens. We intend to commercialise project outputs through an existing route.

2019-2021 ‘Landscape scale genomic-environment diversity data to model existing and novel agri-systems under climate change to enhance food security in Ethiopia’

Funded by BBSRC GCRF, in collaboration with the Royal Botanic Gardens Kew, Queen Mary University London and Addis Abeba University

Goal: We propose to perform a high-resolution multi-functional genomic and environmental characterization of Ethiopian highland agri-systems, focusing on Enset and ten regionally and globally important crops that together comprise a range of complementary cropping agri-systems in the Southern Ethiopian highlands, seeking to enhance their role in future resource provision, and generating clear economic and social impact on the livelihoods they support.

2019-2021 ‘Socioeconomic and environmental sustainability of coffee agroforestry’ (SEACAF)

Funded by BBSRC GCRF, in collaboration with CATIE (Costa Rica) and Universidad del Valle (Guatemala)

Goals: 1. Identify and assess trade-offs between intensification (maximising productivity and profits) and sustainability (provision of ecosystem services, climate and market resilience) in coffee monocultures and agroforestry systems

2. How to meet growing demand for agricultural products and sustain livelihoods of farmers, in a context of climate change and market variation, while maintaining ecosystem services that are required for production and society as a whole

Biophysical drivers of soil resilience in a changing climate (2019-2022)

Funded by the Independent Research Fund Denmark, in collaboration with Aarhus University and Rothamsted Research.

Soil resilience to accelerated climate change largely depends on soil organic carbon (SOC) and its impact on food and fibre production and other ecosystem services. The roles of soil microbial communities and soil physicochemical properties on SOC dynamics are often examined separately, leading to incomplete understanding of soil-microbe interactions. The BROSE project aims to integrate the soil microbiome and physicochemical properties to identify critical drivers of soil resilience and propose a methodology for restoring SOC-depleted soils. The project will utilize experimental sites from three geographical regions with gradients in climate, SOC, physicochemical properties, and differences in soil management. The sites will provide the necessary platform to develop experimental setups to identify i) soil habitats that drive soil resilience, ii) biophysical dynamics and SOC sequestration capacity, and iii) propose microbial inoculants that recover soil function in SOC-depleted soils.

Soil to Nutrition (2017-2022)

Funded by BBRSC, Rothamsted Research strategic programme

Soil to Nutrition is predicated on the premise that identification of the key processes determining nutrient use efficiency, productivity and resilience across food production systems, from soil to landscape, will provide the key mechanistic indicators necessary to direct interventions for sustainable intensification of future farming systems at the field, farm and landscape scales.

Improving Integrated Pest Management in Soft Fruit Crops (2019-2022)

Funding: AHDB SF174
Partners: NIAB EMR, RSK ADAS, Harper Adams University, James Hutton Institute, Russell IPM, BioBest

This project is the latest phase in a rolling programme of research on improving IPM in soft fruit crops funded by the AHDB.  This phase has a number of objectives and those involving NRI include the following.

• In previous phases, NRI and NIAB EMR have developed an approach to control of capsid bugs on strawberry using a repellent in the crop and an attractant outside (Fountain et al. 2021). In this phase, the approach will be adapted for use on raspberry.
• NRI will also be involved in work with ADAS, NIAB EMR and Russell IPM to develop a similar “push-pull” approach to control of western flower thrips, raspberry cane midge and blackberry leaf midge on soft fruit crops using attractants and repellents developed in previous projects.
• NRI and NIAB-EMR have previously developed attractants for hoverflies and in this project these will be tested to help maintain populations of hoverflies in the crop after they have been released for control of early-season aphids on strawberry.

Development and Implementation of Season-Long Control Strategies for Drosophila suzukii in Soft and Tree Fruit (2019-2022)

Funding: AHDB SF145
Partners: NIAB EMR, James Hutton Institute, MicroBiotech

Spotted wing Drosophila, Drosophila, suzukii (SWD), is an invasive pest that has been the most damaging pest on soft fruit, top fruit and grapes since its arrival in the UK in 2013. This project is the latest phase in a rolling programme of research on control of SWD funded by the AHDB.  In this phase, NRI will be particularly involved in exploitation of a powerful repellent for SWD discovered by PhD student, Christina Conroy.  This will be tested in large-scale trials on cherry and raspberry. NRI also provides lures for traps used in season-long monitoring of SWD populations in England and Scotland.

Auto-Dissemination of Entomopathogenic Fungi for Sustainable Control of Spotted Wing Drosophila, An Invasive Pest Threatening the Prosperity of the UK Horticulture Industry (2018-2022)

Funding: Innovate UK 104607
Partners: NIAB EMR, Russell IPM, Berry Gardens Ltd

Spotted wing drosophila, Drosophila suzukii (SWD) is an invasive pest in the UK, and is currently the most important and damaging insect pest in horticultural crops. This project aims to develop a novel device to attract the flies and then infect them with an entomopathogenic fungus which is highly specific against SWD.  The flies can pass the fungus to other flies before dying, greatly enhancing the efficiency of the device. NRI will be particularly involved in developing the attractant to be used in the device.  A lure based on fermentation volatiles has been developed which is now marketed by Russell IPM under the name “SWD DryLure”.

Exploitation of Interspecific Signals to Deter Oviposition by Spotted Wing Drosophila (2019-2022)

Funding: BBSCR IPA (BB/S005994/1)
Partners: NIAB EMR, Berry Gardens, University of Southampton

Spotted wing drosophila, Drosophila suzukii (SWD) is an invasive pest in the UK, and is currently the most important and damaging insect pest in horticultural crops. In previous work, scientists from NIAB EMR working at the University of Southampton showed that SWD was deterred from laying eggs on plates that had previously had D. melanogaster adults mating and laying eggs on them. This project aims to determine the cause of this deterrence which might be developed to deter egg laying by SWD on crops.
It is considered likely that the origin of this deterrence is chemical. NRI is responsible for isolating and identifying candidate chemicals for laboratory and field bioassays at NIAB EMR.

Finding a Solution to Hylobius abietis in Forest Establishment (2020-2022)

Funding: Forest Research; Forests and Lands Scotland
Partners: Forest Research, Sentomol

The pine weevil, Hylobius abietis, is a serious pest of young pine seedlings that is a major constraint in establishing new pine plantations in Scotland and throughout Europe. The aim of the project is to develop a trap that can be used both for monitoring Hylobius and as a device for selective transfer of biocontrol agents to the beetles in a “lure-and-infect” approach. NRI is developing attractants for Hylobius based on components of the volatiles released by host plants and also potential aggregation pheromones produced by the beetles themselves.

Developing Prototype VOC Sensor-Based Products for Determining Soil Health On-Farm (2019-2022)

Funding: Innovate UK 105534
Project Partners: PES Technologies, Small Robot Company Ltd, HL Hutchinson Ltd, NIAB EMR, University of Essex

Healthy soils are vital for food production.  They also provide the largest store of terrestrial carbon, helping to mitigate climate change. Healthy soils are less prone to erosion which exacerbates the damage caused by flooding and the associated economic and human costs.  This project aims to tap into the wealth of information contained in the volatile organic compounds (VOCs) released by soil biota. These have been demonstrated to be excellent indicators of soil biota activity, but their detection and measurement currently requires laboratory-based instrumentation and skilled personnel. In previous work, PES Technologies have developed cheap electronic sensors capable of detecting these VOC’s with the potential to provide virtually real-time, in situ measurements of soil biota activity. In this project data from the sensors will be correlated with a wide range of measurements of soil health. Machine learning will be used to process the data obtained to provide a cloud-based database that can be accessed directly by sensors in the field. NRI scientists are responsible for collecting, analysing and identifying volatiles from a wide range of soil types to provide the data for validating the sensor outputs.

Identification of the Sex Pheromone of Nesidiocoris tenuis, a Damaging Pest of Commercial Tomato (2020-2021)

Funding: AHDB; BBSRC; UoG HEIF
Partners: NIAB-EMR; Thanet Earth; van Iperen BV

Nesidiocoris tenuis (Reuter) (Heteroptera: Miridae) is a tropical mirid bug which is used as a biocontrol agent in protected crops, including tomatoes. Although N. tenuis predates important insect pests, especially whitefly, it also causes damage by feeding on tomato plants, particularly when prey populations decline. In this project the female-produced sex pheromone of N. tenuis was identified and synthesised and shown to attract male bugs. Large-scale trials of mating disruption are in progress in glasshouses in the UK and The Netherlands

Chemical Ecology of Heather Beetle (2020-2021)

Funding: UoG Seedling Fund and UK Heather Trust
Partners: UK Heather Trust; various moorland farmers

Heather Beetle, Lochmaea suturalis, is a widespread and common insect species found across Britain. The larvae and to a lesser extent the adult beetles feed on the leaves of heather plants, stripping them bare and damaging the health of the heather. Periodically, heather beetle populations expand into huge outbreaks, in which millions of beetle grubs can decimate hundreds of hectares of carefully managed heather. This project aims to demonstrate the existence of a pheromone in this species, to identify and synthesise it and to evaluate its potential for monitoring and control of the pest in laboratory and field studes.  To date production of a pheromone by male beetles has been demonstrated and a candidate chemical structure proposed.  Synthesis of this is underway to make material available for laboratory bioassays and field trapping trials.

Pheromones for Row Crop Application (PHERA) (2020-2023)

Funding: Russell IPM/EU Horizon 2020
Partners: Russell IPM (UK), BioPhero (Denmark),. BPF (Netherlands), Fraunhofer (Germany), SEDQ Healthy Crops (Spain), ISCA Europe (France), and Novagrica (Greece)

This EU H2020 project aims to exploit technologies for bio-based production of insect pheromones developed by BioPhero (Denmark) that promise to reduce the cost of these compounds and make widespread use in mating disruption economically feasible.
NRI is contracted by Russell IPM to assay pheromones produced by this technology and to determine release rates of new formulations developed for mating disruption.

Chemical Ecology of Leptoglossus occidentalis (2015-present)

Funding: University of Valladolid, Spain
Partners: University of Valladolid, Spain; University of California Riverside, USA

The Western conifer seed bug, Leptoglossus occidentalis, is an invasive pest from the US in Europe and has become a major problem in cultivation of pine nuts in Spain and Italy. In work on the chemical ecology of this pest by NRI and the University of Valladolid, Spain, male bugs were shown to produce a novel sesquiterpene that caused a strong electrophysiological response in both male and female bugs. The same compound was also shown to be produced by the related L. zonatus, a pest of various fruits and nuts in the southern US.  In collaborative work with Prof Jocelyn Millar, the structure of the sesquiterpene was identified and the synthetic compound is currently being investigated as an attractant in field trapping experiment in Spain and California.

Human Decoy Trap; operational and social acceptability of a novel tool to improve surveillance and control of mosquitoes and other disease
MRC £580k, 2 yrs 2017-19, Role:PI, Collaborators IRSS Burkina Faso and IITA Benin.

Malaria infects over 200 million people every, mostly in sub-Saharan Africa. The malaria parasite is spread by infected mosquitoes and the most effective way to monitor the disease is to monitor populations of these mosquitoes. However, current tools for sampling malarial mosquitoes are time-consuming and labour intensive, making them expensive and difficult to standardize.

We have developed a mosquito trap that exploits the blood-seeking behaviour of mosquitoes by mimicking the sensory stimuli that a mosquito follows when searching for a person to bite. These include the look, smell and temperature of warm-blooded hosts. We have incorporated these stimuli into a trap that lures mosquitoes towards it and then captures them when they land.

We will test this "Human Decoy" Trap against current methods used in mosquito monitoring to determine whether it can overcome the limitations of existing tools. Fieldwork will be conducted in Burkina Faso, Benin and Cameroon, three West African countries where malaria causes thousands of deaths every year, but differing in intensity and seasonality of transmission and with different mosquito species involved to assess potential differences in trap performance in a wide range of malaria settings. We will also work with end-users of the trap (local communities, public health operatives and field technicians) to determine their perspectives and needs regarding mosquito sampling and control. The long-term aim is to develop a commercial prototype that is effective and acceptable to end-users, maximising the likelihood the trap will be adopted into the communities and sectors that need it the most.

The Human Decoy Trap may be deployed as a mosquito control tool by reducing the number of infective mosquito bites a person receives. This is currently achieved by providing people with insecticide-treated bed nets to protect them from bites whilst they sleep and spraying the walls inside houses thus killing mosquitoes that rest there. However, neither of these options protects people from mosquitoes that may bite them outdoors during the day or just before they go to bed at night. The trap may also be effective against other vector species that transmit infectious diseases, such as dengue fever, chikungunya and Zika viruses.

Taking The Bite Out Of Wetlands: Managing Mosquitoes and The Socio-Ecological Value of Wetlands For Wellbeing
NERC £3 m, 3 yrs, 2016-2019, Role Co-I, 4 collaborating Universities.

Interest in the health and wellbeing impacts of wetlands has increased in the UK, in the context of both short and long term responses to extreme weather events and climate change. This is reflected in the UK Wetland Vision (Hume, 2008) that identifies a need to 'make wetlands more relevant to people's lives by better understanding and harnessing the benefits provided by naturally-functioning rivers and wetlands'. Expansion of wetlands can bring many benefits but it can also increase potential for mosquito-borne disease. There is a lack of knowledge about the consequences of wetland expansion for disease risk. This knowledge gap opens up space for speculation in the press and media about the perceived problems of 'killer' mosquitoes spreading across England, which can in turn fuel community unease and opposition to wetland creation and expansion. A key concern of the project is, therefore, to develop ecological interventions and guidance for diverse end-users to minimise mosquito-related problems, framed within and facilitated by a broader understanding of wetland value as impacted by mosquitoes. The potential contribution of wetland development to social and economic wellbeing envisaged in the UK Wetland Vision could be severely constrained by a failure to adequately address the risks imposed by mosquitoes and biting insects.

The overall aim of this project will be to show how positive socio-cultural and ecological values of wetlands can be maximised for wellbeing and negative attitudes reduced. Management interventions for use by Public Health England and general guidelines will be developed to limit the damaging effects of mosquito populations and enhance appreciation of the ecological value of mosquitoes in wetland ecosystems. The project will result in an increase in our understanding of wetland environments and demonstrate how ecological interventions embedded in a broader understanding of wetland valuation can deliver wellbeing benefits to a broad range of stakeholders.

There are four main objectives:

1. Development of a new conceptual place-based ecosystem services and wellbeing framework for understanding the impact of interventions and wetland values.
2. Exploration of the value of wetlands and mosquitoes in twelve case study locations.
3. Production of guidelines for valuing wetlands and managing mosquito populations to enhance the value of British wetlands for wellbeing.
4. Production of a place-based narrative on the socio-cultural, economic and ecological value of wetlands in British Society in the early years of the 21st Century.

Exploiting acoustic distortion by mosquitoes to listen on the wing. The Leverhulme Trust: £194,000. 2012–14. Role: Co-PI. Collaboration with Prof. I.J. Russell, University of Brighton.

The underlying mechanism of flight tone convergence (see The Wellcome Trust funded project, above) is not well understood. We know that it occurs, remarkably, at frequencies too high for males or females of a given species to hear. The physiological mechanism by which mosquitoes detect and respond differentially to the flight tones of closely related taxa is the subject of this project. It has been shown that mosquito hearing is the most sensitive of all arthropods. Moreover, they can detect and process the sound of another mosquito that is only a few centimetres away, against the background sound of their own flight tones, with both sources of sound simultaneously impinging on the flagella of their antennae. In itself, this acoustic capability is extraordinary and presents valuable insights into the wide variety of hearing mechanisms that have evolved to enhance the sensitivity and specificity of sound detection in insects.

Areas for future research: The ultimate objective is to elucidate the mechanisms by which ecological speciation occurs in the malarial mosquito species complex Anopheles gambiae s.l. at the physiological level. Clearly, when two entities no longer recognise each other as conspecifics, the speciation process is more-or-less complete. The immediate aim of this phase of the project will be to determine the acoustic cues used by An. gambiae M and S forms to distinguish themselves from each other.

The effect of radiation on the mating songs and courtship behaviour of the IAEA colony mosquitoes. Funded by the International Atomic Energy Agency's (IAEA) project on the biology of male mosquitoes in relation to genetic control programmes: £10,000. 2012–13. Role: Chief Scientific Investigator.

The efficacy of the sterile insect technique to control mosquitoes depends to a large extent on the mating competitiveness of released males compared to wild males of the target species. This project successfully demonstrated that male courtship behaviour, especially mate recognition through flight tone harmonisation, is not affected by the colonisation or irradiation of the IAEA colony males.

Areas for future research: This research project established a 'proof of concept' that 'pure' research on mosquito communication has an immediate practical application to the development of novel tools for controlling mosquitoes of public health importance. The current rise in interest in genetically modified or manipulated mosquitoes to control wild mosquito populations provides a welcome opportunity for collaboration. NRI could become a centre of expertise for testing the mating compatibility of engineered and wild strains of target mosquito populations.

A novel acoustic signalling system discovered in mosquitoes: exploring the biophysical and neurophysiological basis for interactive behaviour in an insect. BBSRC: £587,000. 2008–11. Role: Co-PI. Collaborator Prof. I.J. Russell, FRS, University of Sussex and Dr R. Dabiré, IRSS, Burkina Faso.

It has been known for more than 150 years that males use their highly sensitive hearing organ (antennae and Johnston's organ) to locate potential mates by detecting the sound of a con-specific female's wing-beats. In 2006, Professor Gibson and Professor Russell (University of Brighton) discovered that females also detect males, but respond by 'singing a duet' with the male, each one subtly altering the frequency of their wing-beats to converge on a shared harmonic if they are a 'good match'. All-the-while, the male closes in on the female in a high-speed chase.

Remarkably and perhaps uniquely in the insect kingdom, this system of sexual recognition between mosquitoes is based on interactive auditory exchanges between mosquitoes, consisting of continuous changes in wing-beat frequency in response to the detection of simultaneous changes in the wing-beat frequency of the other, unlike the highly stereotypical 'call-response' song patterns of communication described for other insects. This project characterised the behavioural, neurophysiological and biophysical mechanisms of auditory sexual recognition in mosquitoes, which led to our next novel discovery, that the Johnston's organ of mosquitoes is tuned not to the actual wing-beat frequency of the opposite sex, but to different tones in the harmonics of antennal vibrations which are generated by the combined input of flight tones from both mosquitoes. This acoustic distortion has been known to exist in the hearing organs of a range of organisms, but previously described as an interesting epiphenomenon, with no obvious purpose. Mosquitoes, however, appear to use distortion products as sensory cues that enable male–female pairs to communicate through auditory interactions between them. (See: Gibson & Russell, 2006; Warren et al., 2009).

Areas for future research: These results led the researchers to a second phase of research investigating the potential for frequency matching to be used as a mechanism for species recognition, and found that the incipient species Anopheles gambiae s.s. and An. coluzzii from Burkina Faso, where they are sympatric, do not frequency match unless they are paired with their own species (Pennetier et al., 2010; Gibson et al., 2010), and this is the subject of a new project (see The Leverhulme Trust funded project, below).

Nature based solutions for climate resilience of local and indigenous communities in Guatemala, DEFRA/GCBC 2024-2027

Scientific and traditional local and Indigenous knowledge systems will be integrated in the design and assessment of nature-based solutions (NbS) to enhance their impact on the climate resilience and just wellbeing of rural communities in two regions of Guatemala. Local and national decision-makers will use guidelines and tools that integrate local and Indigenous Peoples’ values, knowledge and culture in the co-design of NbS for landscape climate resilience. Individual people, households and communities will be empowered to be at the centre of NbS planning and implementation through an enhanced awareness of the current and potential role of ecosystems in their lives and of the factors required for NbS to result in just and successful outcomes. The tools and evidence from application of this approach will be made available to inform landscape resilience planning across Central America.

Biocultural landscapes for livelihoods and biodiversity in Las Verapaces, Guatemala: Darwin Initiative (2022-2025)

The cultural and biological megadiversity of Guatemala is vulnerable to forest fragmentation and climate extremes, isolating highland endemic species and increasing poverty though landslides cutting off communities from markets and taking lives. In the Sierra Yalijux an Indigenous cooperative federation will integrate traditional knowledge and support communities including women and youth in agroforestry production and to become carbon neutral for the coffee and cardamon exports. Reforestation and forest conservation coordinated with adjacent private nature reserves will improve landscape connectivity for biodiversity, while building capacity and income from eco-tourism and provide a basis for receiving forest incentives by Indigenous families. A biological corridor is proposed as a potential co-management area between cooperatives and private nature reserves.

Conservation and use of native coffee species in Sierra Leone: Sucafina S.A. 2022-2027

Since our rediscovery of Coffea stenophylla with Royal Botanical Gardens, Kew in 2018 we have started the process to bring this coffee back into production with support from Swiss coffee trader Sucafina S.A. With our partners in Sierra Leone we have collected seed from the wild and established nurseries to initiate the production of this coffee. With Welthungerhilfe a network of plots has been established to test the adaptability of stenophylla coffee to different growing conditions. Our partner Coffee Culture: Sierra Leone is working with forest edge communities to conserve the wild coffee, but also establish nurseries and plantations to bring this coffee into cultivation. We hope the first plantations will have started production and small quantities of this coffee can be offered to market by the end of the project.

Sustainability-Intensification Trade-Offs in Coffee Agroforestry in Central America, BBSRC/GCRF - 2019-2021, Sierra Leone. 2013–15. Value: EUR1.4m. European Commission/Govt of Sierra Leone.

The research builds on a unique 20-year old coffee experiment contrasting monoculture and agroforestry under different inputs levels to evaluate a similar range of systems across 180 coffee farms in Costa Rica and Guatemala for their environmental and economic performance. The research brings together field measurements of productivity, use of light, water and nutrients with a coffee agroforestry model to assess carbon, nitrogen and water balance as well as productivity under different input and climate scenarios. The modelled outcomes will be used to conduct economic sensitivity analysis against climate and market variations. A trade-off model will be applied that integrates productive, economic, environmental and social parameters, and works with the variability in a population of farmers to assess the proportion of the population that will adopt sustainable or intensive practices, and the economic and environmental outcomes. Uniquely, we will apply this model across different market and climatic conditions to assess where sustainable or intensive production options provide greater resilience to these challenges. Assessments of ecosystem services (biodiversity, carbon storage, soil and nutrient retention, pest and diseases control) under different management scenarios will be used to identify how different management systems affect the environment and the coffee productivity. Furthermore, the ecosystem services assessment could help identify possible trade-offs between sustainability and productivity of the different management strategies identified in the two countries.

VIRTIGATION: Emerging viral diseases in tomatoes and cucurbits: implementation of mitigation strategies for durable disease management, 2021-2025.

Tomato and cucurbits are affected by emerging viruses, such as begomoviruses and tobamoviruses, which reduce crop value both quantitatively and qualitatively while increase production costs due to the use of pesticides to control them. Virtigation will enable a deeper understanding of the effect of climate change on plant-virus-vector interactions, develop reliable diagnostic, and control methods including vaccines for plants and biopesticides against virus vectors, as well as integrated pest management strategies. The project will establish a pipeline for rapid mitigation of emerging crop diseases by developing advanced diagnostic tools enabling early detection of virus variants associated with hyper-virulence and/or expansion to new host species. New diagnostics methods combined with web-based meta-analysis will help prevent the entry and spread of begomovirus and tobamovirus-associated diseases in Europe and in other regions through introduction of improved quarantine measures. Natural resistances against viruses and vectors will be investigated and introgressed into preferred varieties to provide a durable mitigation strategy. We will embed research and implementation activities in a multi-actor co-creation and co-design approach with stakeholders for ensuring research activities and products meet the core needs and expectations of the value chain. This project is funded by the European Commission, led by the KU Leuven University in which Professor Gowda is leading the work package 4.

DualCassava: Dual-resistant cassava for climate resilience, economic development and increased food security of smallholders in eastern and southern Africa (DualCassava), 2018-2021.

Prof. Gowda led this African Union-funded multi-partner project, which was focused on mitigating the impact of the two viral diseases; cassava mosaic disease (CMD), cassava brown streak disease (CBSD) and drought on subsistence farmers in Tanzania and Malawi. We carried out socio-economic research, first, to understand the impact of the two diseases and drought on the poor. We then distributed drought-resistant virus-clean cassava varieties to farmers in drought-prone areas as a way of crop diversification to mitigate the impact of drought. We have identified dual-resistant cassava varieties and used state-of-the-art next generation sequencing for identifying genes that are contributing to resistance. The project was implemented successfully for controlling both CMD and CBSD and minimize the impact of drought on farmers in drought-prone areas. The project was ranked first for its impact and future potential among the 30+ projects funded by the African Union.

African cassava whitefly project phase I and II: outbreak causes and sustainable solutions project, 2014-2024

Professor Gowda was part of this mega project (two phases) lead by Prof John Colvin and Mark Parnell from NRI. Gowda contributed to three key areas of research and development; to identify natural sources of resistance to African cassava whitefly species in local and exotic cassava lines, and to investigate the role of endosymbionts on whitefly biology, virus transmission and population ecology to understand the phenomenon of whitefly super abundance in African countries. In phase II, Gowda lead research on cassava pre-breeding for the integration of whitefly resistance from South American cassava germplasm into farmer-preferred African cassava varieties.

Building Local Capacity for Surveillance Diagnosis, Characterisation and Control of Cassava Viruses in Northern Nigeria, 2014-2017

Professor Gowda was a Co-PI in this PEARL project lead by the Kebbi State University of Science and Technology in Nigeria, funded by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. Main aim of the project was to build human and physical capacity through training and setting up a virus diagnostic laboratory that can now carry out surveillance, diagnosis and characterization of viruses affecting cassava in northern Nigeria. University researchers, postgraduate students, extension workers and quarantine officers were trained to identify cassava diseases in the field and also using diagnostic molecular techniques in the lab. Field surveys were conducted in the nine states of the northern Nigeria to determine the prevalence of CMD including the recently introduced severe strain East African cassava mosaic virus-Uganda (EACMV-Ug) in the region. The Nigerian cassava were resistant to CMD but highly susceptible to CBSD, which poses a serious threat to cassava production in the country. The long-term benefit of this project is to use the laboratory set up as a strategic point for disease surveillance in West Africa for cassava as well as other important food crops such as yams and legumes.

New cassava varieties and clean seed to combat CMD and CBSD project (5CP), 2012–2016.

Professor Gowda was a partner in this multi-partner project lead by the IITA and funded by the Gates Foundation. The project, implemented in five eastern African countries, identified CBSD resistance in 25 elite cassava lines in five target countries and developed a commercial seed system for cassava. Professor Gowda's developed a virus indexing programme for cleaning over 35 lines from virus infection using a combination of tissue culture, thermotherapy and chemotherapy, and virus diagnosis. Methodologies developed at NRI have wider applications beyond the scope of 5CP as they will contribute to prevent virus-susceptible cassava varieties from going extinct and the spread of virus-infected plants to new regions. The project was part of submission that was awarded the Queen’s Anniversary Prize-2016 for the University of Greenwich

LimitCBSD: Limiting the impact of cassava brown streak disease on smallholders, women and the cassava value chain. 2012–2015.

Professor Gowda lead this African Union-funded multi-partner project to mitigate the impact of CBSD in Kenya, Tanzania and Malawi. The main aim of the project was to better understand the recent disease outbreaks in east Africa and devise effective control strategies. We first carried out socio-economic research to understand the impact of the disease on farmers, on woman who are the main workforce for cassava cultivation. We then screened new cassava lines for viruses to identify resistant varieties and used next generation sequencing for identifying candidate genes.

Whitefly control using Wolbachia, 2012–2013.

This highly innovative Gates Foundation-funded project to control the agricultural pest whiteflies using endosymbiotic bacteria, Wolbachia was lead by Professor Gowda. Wolbachia infects over 75% of the earth's insect population and are shown to negatively affect the lifecycles of certain insect species and can also reduce pathogen transmission by them. Certain strains of Wolbachia are therefore used as potential bio-control agents for controlling diseases of medical importance (eg. dengue viruses) transmitted by mosquitoes. Since whiteflies are naturally infected with Wolbachia, we investigated whether a similar strategy can be employed to reduce the high whitefly populations on cassava in Africa and found that some endosymbiotic bacteria have similar effect to Wolbachia infections. This strategy has huge potential for controlling whiteflies and the viruses they transmit since it comes at no-cost to the farmers, is self-perpetuating and can be implemented together with existing control strategies. 

Pyrethrum in Bloom: Bringing Back the Power of Pyrethrum to Enhance Livelihoods of Smallholders in Kenya

Donor: Innovate UK (Agritech Catalyst)
Value: Approx. £800K (90K retained)
Partners: Egerton University, Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew, BioExtractions (Wales), JatFLora (Kenya), Growtech Nurseries (Kenya)
Dates: 2020-2023

Pyrethrum, (Tanacetum cinerariifolium), is a plant-based pesticide. For almost 60 years, Kenya was the largest source of pyrethrum traded in the world but no falls way behind other global producers.  The return of Kenya into the mainstream global pyrethrum trade will increase supply and return the world on an organic pesticide path. Previously the sector provided valuable economic and social benefits to approximately 2 - 3 million people with direct or indirect link, including over 300,000 subsistence and low-income farmers in Kenya. This project aims to support the revival of the pyrethrum subsector in Kenya and address rural poverty and transform rural economies by providing consistent incomes in the target regions as envisaged by this call. Specifically, we will develop pyrethrum seedlings via plant multiplication using tissue culture techniques that guarantee axillary shoot multiplication and rooting that optimise pyrethrins content (the active ingredients). The project will develop more efficient extraction technologies that avoid toxic materials based on ethanol and ultrasound assisted extraction technology and reduce the use of unsafe and unsustainable additives in the formulation of by developing entirely plant based stabilizers, synergists and an excipients

Croton Seed Oil Knowledge Transfer Partnership University of Greenwich, Egerton University and Eco Fuels (EcoFix) Kenya Limited

Donor: Innovate UK (African Agriculture Knowledge Transfer Partnership)
Value: Approx. £200K
Partners: Egerton University, EcoFix Kenya, Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew.
Dates: 2021-2023

To design and develop plant-based natural product innovations using Croton seed oil and the by-products from its extraction for sustainable, organic agriculture in Kenya that reduces farmer reliance on synthetic chemical pesticides and increases revenue for the farmers and the KTP business partner. Croton oil is extracted as a biofuel from Croton seeds and remains EFK’s primary source of revenue. However, it is our strategic aim to commercialise Croton seed oil and by-products of its extraction into a wider product range, especially sustainable pest control. This KTP will increase opportunities to market by-products (organic pest control and growth boosters) and develop new technologies (use of oil as an excipient for botanicals). The KTP delivers the first through chemical and biological validation of extracts from husks, a by-product from Croton oil extraction, for pest control. The second is achieved by using the main Croton product, the oil, as an excipient for pyrethrum. Pyrethrum is the world’s most traded botanical insecticide and is non-persistent in the environment and has low mammalian toxicity. However, it is presently formulated with petroleum industry products so non-organic.

The influence of diet on the honeybee lipidome

Donor: BBSRC
Value: Approx. £450K (to PS at Kew)
Partners: Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew & Oxford University.

Dates: 2020-2023

The research undertaken will make important discoveries regarding the role of lipids in a honeybee colony. We will investigate how natural lipids in the pollen and bee bread consumed by nursing-age worker honeybees are taken up and converted into glandular secretions (e.g. royal jelly) fed to larvae. We will quantify how these lipids are distributed within the tissues of adult and larval bees. We will map the transformation of dietary fatty acids and sterols into fat compounds found in bee guts, brains, reproductive organs, fat bodies, and brood food glands. Our research will also identify how fats in diet influence the quality of food given to larvae, and whether diet-induced alterations to fat in larval food affect development. Our ultimate goal will be to test how dietary fats influence the longevity of foragers and whole colony performance in a field setting. With these data, we will advise the beekeeping industry of best practice for the use of fats in substitutes for pollen. Using these data, land managers can also choose plants that provide the correct fatty acid and sterols in pollen for flower strip planting in agroecosystems. For these reasons, our research will lead to the improvement of welfare of domesticated bees. It has the potential to make a significant contribution to the enhancement of global food security through its impact on pollination services.

Combination Biopesticides - Transforming Pest Control in Chinese and UK Agriculture

Donor: BBSRC-Innovate UK (Newton UK-China)
Value: Approx. £400K
Partners: AgroPty Ltd (UK), Fujian Agricultural and Forestry University, Jiangxi Tian-Ren Ltd.
Dates: 2019-2021

Environmentally benign fungal pathogens and insecticidal plant extracts could offer a sustainable alternative to synthetic chemical pesticides. Fungal control does not have many of the problems associated with conventional control such as pest resistance, toxicity to humans and persistence in the environment. One downside to such a technology is that it can be slow acting to achieve effective control. The aim of this project is to create a formulation combining fungal pathogens with the pesticidal plant extracts to create effective pest control with two non-synthetic control agents. This solution will be applicable in developing countries such as China where the materials can be locally produced. Creating a new product with these technologies may confer additional benefits as the modes of action may work in synergy to achieve greater pest control with less material required. Additional benefits to using these biopesticides would be the stimulation the growth of this market, provision of safer working conditions, creating job opportunities and allowing local growers to receive a greater return for their produce by conforming to EU regulations on pesticide use. We anticipate that this will have considerable benefits for the ecosystems in which they are applied due to reduced impacts on non-target insects such as pollinators.

Innovation for Improved Strawberry Pollination by Commercial Bumblebees Using Caffeine

Donor: BBSRC-IPA
Value: Approx. £280K
Partners: NIAB-EMR, Berry Gardens, Biobest Ltd.
Dates: 2017-2019

Efficient pollination by insects, especially bees, is critical to ensuring food security and yields of many crops. Production of soft fruit such as strawberries in the UK is worth around £360m annually, is growing year on year but depends heavily upon pollination by insects, particularly bees. When pollination is inadequate it frequently results in misshapen fruit. Strawberry growers rely heavily on commercial bumblebees to improve pollination, but this is not always sufficient. This project investigated whether it is possible to prime managed bumblebees on strawberry farms to forage more efficiently on the flowers of the crop, in order to pollinate them more effectively. Since caffeine improves bees' memory for the scents of flowers, the project is testing whether these bees show increased foraging activity and attraction to strawberry flowers when they receive this priming treatment.

NaPROCLA - Natural Pest Regulation in Orphan Crop Legumes in Africa

Donor: BBSRC GCRF
Value: Approx. £1 million
Partners: NRI, NM-AIST, LUANAR, Egerton University, Charles Sturt University advising
Dates: 2018-2021

Pest damage of legumes is one of the major challenges to food and nutritional security in Africa and disproportionately affects poor farmers growing low-input orphan crop grain legumes such as beans, pigeon pea, cowpea and lablab. Pest control is typically dependent on high agrochemical inputs which may have negative impacts on users and consumers and severely impact non-target invertebrates that can otherwise be beneficial to food production through pollination or natural pest regulation. Natural Pest Regulation has been estimated to be worth US$906 billion. Non-crop habitats in field margins provide the environment required to support natural enemies of pests including hoverflies. Management or manipulation of this non-crop habitat can help to support natural pest regulation and can even be augmented and sustained in better managed natural or manipulated agro-ecosystems. The occurrence, density and impacts of most beneficial insects in smallholder ecosystems, however, are poorly understood, particularly in Africa.

Optimising Pesticidal Plants

Donor: ACP S&T (European Commission)
Value: Approx. €1 million
Partners: NRI, Egerton University, Mzuzu University, Zimbabwe University, Sokoine University, Sustainable Global Gardens

Dates: 2014-2018

Optimising Pesticidal Plants Technology Innovation, Outreach and Networks (OPTIONs) project is a project (Value Euros 1,000K) funded by the European Union Africa Caribbean and Pacific Groups of States Science and technology Programme 2014-2018 to research ways to optimise the improved use and uptake of pesticidal plants as pest management alternatives for small holder farmers in sub Saharan Africa. The project will develop strategies to increase accessibility to plant materials through propagation and elite provenance selection based on chemical analysis and biological study to ensure that promotion of the technology is sustainable, reliable and effective

Cocoa Pollination Optimisation for Production – CocoaPOP

Donor: ACP S&T (European Commission)
Value: Approx. €570K
Partners: NRI, University of Trinidad and Tobago, CABI, Cocoa Industry Board (Jamaica)

Dates: 2012-2016

The Cocoa Pollination for Optimised Production project was a research project co-funded by the European Development Fund through the ACP Caribbean & Pacific Research Programme for Sustainable Development, a programme implemented by the ACP Group of States. 

CocoaPOP was a collaboration between institutions in Trinidad & Tobago, Jamaica and the United Kingdom with an objective of supporting research and capacity building on methods that improve yields of cocoa through improving pollination services.  Higher yields will mean more cocoa can be produced from less land, reducing the need to expand plantations, protection biodiversity whilst raising farmer's incomes.

Bee medicine

This project is in collaboration with the University of Massachusetts and Dartmouth College in USA and aims to determine how plant chemical sin the nectar and pollen of agricultural crops influence pollinators ability to cope with diseases including Nosema and Crithidia. This project will work closely alongside a National Science Foundation grant won by Phil at Royal Botanic Gardens Kew with the same partners and together will determine which flowering species impact positively or negatively on bees and potentially alleviate or exacerbate pollinator declines and colony collapses. The overall premise is that plant chemical could provide protection against disease or where toxic could weaken pollinators and make them more susceptible to the effects of disease.

Future areas of research will probably focus more on the pollinators as the potential global impact of this work is huge in terms of enhancing pollinator health and providing important impacts at landscape levels. Stevenson's recent research published in Science and Frontiers in Ecology and the Environment indicate the height of interest in this area of research

Current Projects

Gnatwork

Funded by the UK’s Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council (BBSRC) as part of the BBSRC’s Global Challenges Research Fund (GCRF).

https://www.gnatwork.ac.uk/

Gnatwork (2017-2021) aims to create and maintain a community of researchers based on shared technical difficulties across biting midges, sandflies and blackflies. Through pump-prime funding of small-scale studies and hosting of annual training workshops, Gnatwork aims to create a more resilient research base for these three neglected vector groups. Prof Cheke participated in workshops in Bangladesh during 2018 and in Brazil in 2019.

Modelling multi-scale pest control systems with hormesis and homeostatic transitions.

Funded by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (NNSFC). 2018 – 2022.

With the development of pesticide resistance, a paradoxical phenomenon often occurs whereby the stronger the control measures the more serious are subsequent outbreaks of pest populations. Thus, pest populations may achieve higher steady states than before the control measures, analogous to hormesis outcomes in drug toxicology. Therefore, improper control measures against pests (including both agricultural pests and vectors of diseases such as mosquitoes) may lead to severe outbreaks rather than the desired control. In order to restrain the evolution of pesticide resistance and avoid such paradoxical effects happening, it is necessary to understand the mechanisms and dynamics of pest resistance development and ascertain the threshold conditions for the occurrence of paradoxical results. So, in this project, dynamic equations of the evolution of pest populations inducing resistance and the evolution of genetic resistance are being devised. Mathematical methods will be used to analyse the process of Wolbachia matrilineal inheritance and cellular affinity in mosquitoes, study new methods of modelling pest populations with discrete generations and their control and develop a multi-scale system with equations combining descriptions of pest populations and their genetic evolution. Together with mathematical modelling and analyses of experimental data, statistical and numerical analysis, the dynamic behaviour of the multi-scale system will be studied and the internal relations associated with the development of pest resistance analyzed together with the time, the intensity and effectiveness of implemented pest control strategies in relation to the key factors controlling the above relations. The ultimate aim is to design optimal pest control strategies by determining the parameter space which permits successful control by avoiding paradoxical pest resurgences (Tang et al. 2019).

Recently Completed Project

Taking the bite out of wetlands; managing mosquitoes and the socio-ecological value of wetlands for well-being

Funded by the NERC Valuing Nature Health and Wellbeing programme (2016-2019), in collaboration with Cranfield University, Forest Research, Public Health England, University of Brighton and University of Bristol.

www.wetlandlife.org | @wetlandlife

Interest in the health and well-being impacts of wetlands has increased in the UK, in the context of both short and long term responses to extreme weather events and climate change. This is reflected in the UK Wetland Vision that identifies a need to make wetlands more relevant to people's lives by better understanding and harnessing the benefits provided by naturally functioning rivers and wetlands. Expansion of wetlands can bring many benefits, but it can also increase potential for mosquito-borne disease. There is a lack of knowledge about the consequences of wetland expansion for disease risk. This knowledge gap opens up space for speculation in the press and media about the perceived problems of 'killer' mosquitoes spreading across England, which can in turn fuel community unease and opposition to wetland creation and expansion. A key concern of the project was, therefore, to develop ecological interventions and guidance for diverse end-users to minimise mosquito-related problems, framed within and facilitated by a broader understanding of wetland value as impacted by mosquitoes. The potential contribution of wetland development to social and economic wellbeing envisaged in the UK Wetland Vision could be severely constrained by a failure to adequately address the risks imposed by mosquitoes and biting insects.

The overall aim of this project was to show how positive socio-cultural and ecological values of wetlands can be maximised for well-being and negative attitudes reduced. Management interventions for use by Public Health England and general guidelines were developed to limit the damaging effects of mosquito populations and enhance appreciation of the ecological value of mosquitoes in wetland ecosystems. The project has increased understanding of wetland environments to demonstrate how ecological interventions embedded in a broader understanding of wetland valuation can deliver well-being benefits to a broad range of stakeholders. There were four main objectives: 1) Development of a new conceptual place-based ecosystem services and well-being framework for understanding the impact of interventions and wetland values. 2) Exploration of the value of wetlands and mosquitoes in twelve case study locations. 3) Production of guidelines for valuing wetlands and managing mosquito populations to enhance the value of British wetlands for well-being. 4) Production of a place-based narrative on the socio-cultural, economic and ecological value of wetlands in British Society in the early years of the 21st Century.

Together with Prof G. Gibson and Dr F. Hawkes, Prof Cheke participated in ecological surveys at six of the 12 study sites to determine which mosquito species are breeding in the areas and where and when different species occur as adults. Particular attention has been paid to suspected invasive species which pose potential threats as vectors of emerging diseases such as West Nile virus and a handbook for assessing the suitability of wetlands for mosquitoes has been published (Hawkes et al. 2020). A spin-off from the project was the finding that blackflies, some of medical and veterinary importance, were also being caught in the mosquito traps.