A scientific revolution in agriculture is in progress. Examples of high-level science applied to agriculture:
High-Speed Breeding. Trying to develop a blight-resistant kind of oat, Plant Pathologist H. E. Wheeler of Louisiana State University envied the wholesale methods of bacteriologists. When they want a bacterial strain that is resistant to, say, penicillin, they treat a culture containing millions or billions of bacteria with the drug. Only a few may survive, but the survivors multiply rapidly, and soon the culture is alive with the resistant strain.
Plant breeding takes more time. The traditional way is to cross a desirable variety with a wild or...
To continue reading:
or
Log-In
