Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries

The Mediterranean has been described as ‘under siege’ because of the intense pressure it is under from a variety of human activities. But more information is needed to see what impact the activities are having on the ecosystem and its resources. An EU-funded project has published a report to help plug the information gap.

The EU-funded MYCOKEY project reports early success in the hunt for a faster, reliable and more environmentally friendly way to detect food contamination.

New research part-supported by the EU-funded FLIACT project has shown that gut bacteria ‘speak’ to the brain to control food choices, identifying two specific species of bacteria that have an impact on animal dietary decisions.

Identifying the environmental factors driving larval settlement is crucial to understanding the population dynamics of marine invertebrates. EU-funded research feeds into a new study that takes three environmental factors into consideration in an attempt to predict larval presence and intensity.

By providing a better understanding of the Arctic’s biogeochemical cycles of trace elements, the EU-funded ARCTIC GEOTRACES project is shedding more light on the Arctic Ocean’s resilience to global changes and so also pointing to its likely future.

Will we have enough fertile land to grow the food our increasing population needs? Is it possible to adapt food production to climate change? How do we define responsible research and innovation in relation to food security? An EU-funded project, which aims to encourage people to debate the issues and articulate their views, has just published a toolkit settig out the steps to maximise grass-roots engagement.

Two successive years of mass coral bleaching have left 1 500 km of Australia’s Great Barrier Reef badly weakened. Scientists now fear the damage is irreparable.

With competition for the use of forest resources ever increasing, the EU-funded project DIABOLO sets out to track disturbances and degradation more effectively.

War is not just a human activity. Costly group fights also break out between mongooses researchers have just found, with up to 30 animals on each side ‘arranged in battle lines’.

A European project is coming close to the validation of a prototype of ‘Passive bistatic radar’ (PBR) technology based on Galileo transmissions. Once finalised, the new system could help relevant authorities to assure better maritime surveillance, detecting and localising, even of non-indexed ships.

The EU-funded XF-ACTORS project recently reported on its disease modelling work, key to its integrated management strategy to control the spread of the Xylella fastidi-osa (XF) pathogen, which is putting olive groves at serious risk in Southern Italy.

With low-oxygen seafloor areas around the world on the rise, the EU-funded HYPOX project points to warning signs for marine ecosystems.

Commission Regulation (EU) 432/2012 lists a series of requirements for producers to legally advertise the health benefits of polyphenols in their olive oil. Thanks to the OLEUM project, an easy method can now be applied to certify compliance with this regulation.

Supported through the EU-funded PALEOPLANT project, a series of genetic analyses of prehistoric seeds have unearthed millennium-old barley on the Canary Islands, shedding light into native Canarian origins.

In the last Trending Science of 2016 (your writer will be ho ho home for the holidays by the time you read this), we’re reporting on three science-related Christmas stories that have hit the headlines this festive season.

An EU-funded Scottish-led team is using virtual coral larvae to test how well marine reserves can withstand climate change.

A new study supported by the EU-funded TRIFORC project has shown that by changing the genetic code for one amino acid in a plant begins a process that produces a new natural product that could be used in a variety of ways, including disease resistance.

A recently published study part supported by the EU-funded NEOMILK project has outlined widespread evidence of prehistoric milk production in southern Europe.

New research supported by the EU-funded STILTS and NEUROFAST projects has discovered that individuals who carry variants in a particular gene have an increased preference for high fat food, but a decreased preference for sugary foods.

EU researchers have developed a new system to monitor industrial food processing in real time, an innovation that could have real commercial potential.

Collaborative research funded by the ERC’s CACH project has announced the first real evidence that deep-sea animals are ingesting microplastics that are finding their way into the world’s oceans. This comes at a poignant moment as several governments are considering a ban on plastic microbeads, most often found in toiletries and cleaning products.

A new study has shown that individual mole rats perform different roles at different ages, and that age rather than caste behaviour accounts for the changes in their behaviour.

The sustainable production of pathogen-free crops is one of mankind’s most pressing concerns, given projected population growth and the threat posed by climate change to arable land. Incredibly, the study of a species of unassuming tree-dwelling beetles could hold some answers.

EU-funded researchers have examined new ways of rapidly detecting infectious pathogens - such as rabies and influenza - in order to prevent pandemics.

EU researchers have developed tools and guidelines to help protect Europe’s spice and herb commodity chains from deliberate, accidental and natural biological and chemical contamination.