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Genetic engineering creates rice strain that makes less methane

A modified rice that borrows a gene from barley reduces its production emissions by starving paddy field microbes of the sugar they use to produce methane
Rice's gas problem gets muted

Head down in embarrassment (Image: Pascal Deloche/Godong / Panos)

IT鈥橲 food for climate conscious consumers. A strain of rice has been genetically engineered to produce less methane.

Rice agriculture is responsible for between 7 and 17 per cent of human-induced methane emissions. Sugars produced during photosynthesis leak into the soil via the roots, where they are used up by methane-producing soil microorganisms.

from the Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences in Uppsala and his colleagues have now engineered rice that stores more sugar in its grains and stems. In a three-year-long trial, the rice grew well and led to drops in paddy field methane emissions (Nature, ).

of Kansas State University in Manhattan.

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