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Pamela Ronald is Professor of Plant Pathology at the University of
California, Davis, where she studies the role that genes play in a
plant's response to its environment. Her laboratory has genetically
engineered rice for resistance to diseases and flooding,
both of which are serious problems of rice crops in Asia and Africa. Ronald is co-author with her husband, an organic farmer, of "Tomorrow's Table: Organic Farming, Genetic and the Future of Food".
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"[Tomorrow's Table" is a fantastic piece of work.
I totally recommend it whether you are pro GMO or anti-GMO." "This is an important book... I agree with the authors that we will need the best ideas from "organic" thinkers and from scientists – including genetic engineers – to feed the world and help the poorest...I certainly recommend this book"--
Bill Gates
"Here's a persuasive case that, far from contradictory, the merging of genetic engineering and organic farming offers our best shot at truly sustainable agriculture"--
Stewart Brand, creator of the Whole Earth Catalog
We found the book insightful and well-documented." --
Organic Gardening Magazine
"Whether you ultimately agree with it or not, Tomorrow's Table bring a fresh approach to the debate over transgenic crops."--
Michael Pollan, author of
In Defense of Food and
The Omnivore's Dilemma
"The noteworthy aspect of the book is the way they then marry their separate fields to argue logically for the use of GM technologies to improve organic agriculture." --
Science magazine
"Brilliant... the best book I have ever read about the ways in which genetically engineered and organic food relate to each other and society." --
Michael Specter, Staff writer for
The New Yorker
"A unique, personal perspective ... Highly recommended." -- Peter H. Raven, President,
Missouri Botanical Garden
"A tale of the passions of an organic farmer and a plant genetic scientis...a source of inspiration." -- Sir Gordon Conway KCMG FRS, Professor of International Development,
Centre for Environmental Policy, Imperial College, London, and past President of the
Rockefeller Foundation
"Simply one of the best scientific presentations of organic agriculture I have read in that it is soundly grounded in the literature and does not over-reach, while remaining staunchly and reasonably pro-organic." -- Phil Stewart
"This wildly eccentric book juxtaposes deep scientific analysis of genetically engineered agriculture with recipes for such homey kitchen staples as cornbread and chocolate chip cookies." -- Booklist
Tomorrow's Table in the classroom at Oregon State University:
"I really enjoyed the book. It did a great job of keeping everything in perspective. Use again!"
"Use again! A great resource and easy to understand"
"The textbook was great. It had a story line to it. It was easy to remember."
"Tomorrow´s Table, una búsqueda de la verdad sobre la agricultura orgánica y la modificación genética" --
Antama Fundacion
Article, The New Organic in The Boston Globe
Article, Making Rice Disease-Resistant in Scientific American
Ronald speaking schedule
Ronald publications
Read Reviews of Tomorrow's Table
Interviews, lectures and profiles
Read about submergence tolerant rice
Learn about pattern recogniton receptors and disease resistant rice
Learn about the Genetic Resources Recognition Fund
Learn about Biofuels
January 31, 2012
Category: biofortified • innate immunity • the scentific life
Applause for Plant Physiologist Helen Stafford who left the Reed College Biology Department $1M. As a woman scientist in the 1950s, Stafford was ineligible for many jobs. Reed College, not deterred by her sex, offered her a position. She went on to establish a successful career and inspired many young scientists. Here is a short story of how she influenced my career.
The windowless room, dank an dark, was not an obvious place for inspiration. I took notes, wondering if I would be able to glean anything meaningful from Professor Helen Stafford's (1922-2011) meandering lecture. I was skeptical. After all, this was the same teacher who, annoyed with our choice of vegetarianism, had told us that "plants have feelings, too".
But what I learned that day, 33 years ago, would trigger a grand curiosity about the natural world and draw me into the greatest scientific puzzle of my career.
Helen informed us that human language is not the only way that species communicate. Plants form intimate associations with fungi and bacteria, which allow them to thrive in stressful environments. Establishment and maintenance of the relationship depends on the passing and receiving of coded information between partners. She also told us that plants can only defend themselves against microbes that they can sense.
This interspecies communication is not restricted to plants and microbes. The human intestine is home to diverse bacteria, allowing us to harvest nutrients that would otherwise be inaccessible. The human immunodeficiency virus chooses for its target only those of us that carry a specific receptor, decorated in a particular way.
All these interactions dramatically affect human health and farm productivity.
I was hooked.
Read on »
Posted by Pamela Ronald at 4:06 PM • 0 Comments • 0 TrackBacks
January 27, 2012
Category: biofortified • innate immunity
"Nothing more fun than making discoveries in nature and then seeing them used for the public good "
Listen to the NPR interview with enthusiastic Professor Emeritus Murray Gardener.
He describes recent UCDavis symposium with 2011 Nobel Laureates Bruce Beutler and Jules Hoffman
Posted by Pamela Ronald at 1:09 PM • 0 Comments • 0 TrackBacks
January 22, 2012
Category: biofortified • innate immunity • the scentific life
The University of California, Davis, will host two Nobel laureates for a symposium this month about the shared characteristics of plants, flies and people in terms of how they fight infections.
"Evolution of Common Molecular Pathways Underlying Innate Immunity" will feature the 2011 Nobel Laureates in Physiology or Medicine, Jules Hoffmann of the University of Strasbourg, France, and Bruce Beutler of the University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center, Dallas. Luke O'Neill, professor of biochemistry and immunology at Trinity College, Dublin and I will also give lectures.
The symposium is scheduled from 1 to 5 p.m. Wednesday, Jan. 25, in the UC Davis Conference Center. Admission is free, with preregistration required online.
It will be the first symposium at UC Davis to highlight the remarkable similarities between the plant and animal immune systems. The discovery of a role for fly Toll and mouse TLR4 in immunity provided a structural link between receptors utilized by animals and those used by plants (eg. Rice XA21, flax L6 and tobacco N) to detect infection.
[Bruce and I share more than an interest in science; my father (Robert Rosenthal) and Bruce's father (Ernst Beutler) were young cousins in Berlin in the 1920 and early 1930s. Their families fled the Nazi's and reunited in the US after the war. Listen to Bruce discuss XA21/Ax21 and our shared family history during his Nobel lecture last month (starts at 40:45)]
More on the Nobel discoveries, the history of plant and animal immunity and the XA21 cypher-breaking detection system can be found on my recent blog posts here and here.
Posted by Pamela Ronald at 12:22 PM • 0 Comments • 0 TrackBacks
January 16, 2012
Category: agricultual policy • biofortified
Another vigilante for truth. Lithodid man exposes Jeffrey Smith #antiGMO fraud in this entertaining video. Well done Lithodid.
Posted by Pamela Ronald at 12:58 PM • 1 Comments • 0 TrackBacks
January 9, 2012
Category: Ronald research • biofortified • scientific scrutiny • the scentific life • women in science
Jonathan Eisen, scientist and blogger extraordinaire has established a science writing series called "Story behind the paper". The idea is for authors who have recently published Open Access papers to tell the story behind the paper: what sorts of experiences and experiments led up to the new discovery and how we navigated through the publication process. Several years ago Jonathan patiently explained to me what a blog was and got me started with science blogging. He recently kindly extended an invitation to write story about our discovery of a new communication code in disease causing bacteria.
Here it is. Happy reading.
Posted by Pamela Ronald at 12:35 PM • 2 Comments • 0 TrackBacks
January 6, 2012
Category:
UC Davis unified in condemning use of pepper spray on students. Support for Chancellor Katehi grows.
Posted by Pamela Ronald at 1:37 PM • 5 Comments • 0 TrackBacks
January 3, 2012
Category: biofortified • genetics and society
This excellent New York Times article describes Eric Lander's journey in science to his position today as not only one of the great genome researchers but a terrific teacher and human being.
Posted by Pamela Ronald at 9:19 PM • 3 Comments • 0 TrackBacks
December 31, 2011
Category: biofortified • health • poetry • prediction • writing
In Memoriam,
by Alfred, Lord Tennyson
Ring out, wild bells, to the wild sky,
The flying cloud, the frosty light:
The year is dying in the night;
Ring out, wild bells, and let him die.
Ring out the old, ring in the new,
Ring, happy bells, across the snow:
The year is going, let him go;
Ring out the false, ring in the true.
Ring out the grief that saps the mind
For those that here we see no more;
Ring out the feud of rich and poor,
Ring in redress to all mankind.
Ring out a slowly dying cause,
And ancient forms of party strife;
Ring in the nobler modes of life,
With sweeter manners, purer laws.
Ring out the want, the care, the sin,
The faithless coldness of the times;
Ring out, ring out my mournful rhymes
But ring the fuller minstrel in.
Ring out false pride in place and blood,
The civic slander and the spite;
Ring in the love of truth and right,
Ring in the common love of good.
Ring out old shapes of foul disease;
Ring out the narrowing lust of gold;
Ring out the thousand wars of old,
Ring in the thousand years of peace.
Ring in the valiant man and free,
The larger heart, the kindlier hand;
Ring out the darkness of the land,
Ring in the love that is to be.
Posted by Pamela Ronald at 11:59 PM • 5 Comments • 0 TrackBacks
December 12, 2011
Category: Ronald research • biofortified • evolution • innate immunity
It was Sept 4, 1939, the day after the UK declared war on Germany, when mathematician Alan Turing reported to work at the Government Code and Cypher School at Bletchley Park. Within weeks of his arrival, Turing and his colleagues were able to intercept high-level encrypted enemy communication signals and decode a vast number of these messages. The intelligence gleaned from this effort was passed on to field commanders, a process that was decisive to Allied victory.
Like the German military strategists, single-celled bacteria communicate with each other using coded messages to coordinate attacks on their targets. For bacteria these targets are plants and animals that provide the nutrients needed for growth. Until now, the diversity of codes employed by invading bacteria was thought to be extremely limited. However, our new research shows that bacteria communicate with a previously unknown signal. The research is described in two articles published today in the Public Library of Science and Discovery Medicine.
In a feat worthy of the Turing cryptographers, some plants have evolved a cypher-breaking detection system, called the XA21 receptor, that intercept the bacterial code and use this information to trigger a robust immune response, preventing disease.
Read on »
Posted by Pamela Ronald at 5:00 PM • 12 Comments • 0 TrackBacks
