If there was ever a time that made us pay attention to our health, it has been this one of the COVID-19 pandemic. This year has also made that clear that not everything in the world of health is under our control. However, many of us are lucky enough to have a say in one important element and that is what we eat. Healthy diets play an important role in our overall health and immune systems.

ISAAA webinar participants from 16 countries were updated on the developments and discussions pertaining to the Convention on Biological Diversity's (CBD) Conference of Parties (COP) to be held in October 2021. The online workshop was organized to prepare experts, officials and regulators from Asia for the agribiotechnology negotiations in the upcoming Conference of the Parties-Meeting of Parties (COPMOP) of the CBD.

The latest Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) Report, released on August 9, 2021, reveals that many of the changes observed in the climate are unprecedented in thousands, if not hundreds of thousands of years, and some of the changes already set in motion—such as continued sea level rise—are irreversible over hundreds to thousands of years.

If the COVID-19 cases surge continuously in the US during the fall and winter, it is more likely that an even more deadly strain of the virus would evolve and could evade the current vaccines available. This is according to Anthony Fauci, Director of National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID) in the US. The surge of COVID-19 cases in the US is caused by the Delta variant, which is known to be more contagious than the original strains of the virus.

Researchers at Kobe University, Japan, and Agrobioinstitute, Bulgaria, have developed a simple way to monitor endocrine disrupting chemicals (EDCs) in river water using genetically modified plants with genes from medaka fish. The results are published in Chemosphere. GM Arabidopsis exposed to as little as 5 ng/mL of 4-t-octylphenol (OP), an example of an EDC, produced detectable levels of green fluorescent protein (GFP) in response to expression of medaka estrogen receptor genes.

Plant Biotechnology needs better politics to counter well-organized campaigns by environmental groups, encourage innovation, and build public trust in the policies. This is according to Alan Raybould, a genetics expert from The University of Ediburgh. He mentioned this in his commentary published in Transgenic Research. 

The FAO Food Price Index averaged 123.0 points in July 2021, 1.2 percent lower than the previous month although still 31.0 percent higher than its level in the same period of 2020. The index tracks changes in the international prices of the most globally traded food commodities. The July drop reflected declines in the quotations for most cereals and vegetable oils as well as dairy products.

The use of heterosis in rice production has significantly improved yield. However, hybrid vigor cannot be preserved in the offspring because of genetic segregation. Simultaneous editing of REC8, PAIR1, and OSD1 genes turns meiosis into mitosis and eventually produces clonal gametes, while knockout of the MTL gene leads to maternal haploid seeds development.

Researchers from the Chinese Academy of Sciences and partners cracked the genetic secrets of Welwitschia, a two-leafed plant that thrives in the desert for over 1,000 years. The results of their findings are reported in Nature Communications."Most plants develop a leaf, and that's it," said Andrew Leitch, a plant geneticist at the Queen Mary University of London. "This plant can live thousands of years, and it never stops growing. When it does stop growing, it's dead."

A genome-wide association study (GWAS) conducted by scientists at the Institute of Plant Biology and Biotechnology (IPBB) in Kazakhstan and the International Maize and Wheat Improvement Center (CIMMYT) has found new sources of genetic resistance to tan spot disease, a lesser-known pathogen of wheat. Kazakhstan is one of the main wheat-growing nations in Central Asia and farmers have struggled with tan spot epidemics since the 1980s.