Scientific flora raising has enable food provision to keep pace with a growing universe in a way that was once reckon unsufferable . However , fit in to a unexampled study , we ’ve been doing it wrongly , concentrate on the individual plant rather than the collective .
Professor Jacob Weinerof Copenhagen University experimented with 35 diverseness of spring wheat ( Triticum aestivum ) . Most plant breeding involves finding the plants that grow best under exceptional shape and breeding them intensively . More recently , it has focused on finding specific factor that maximize yield . Weiner lead in the opposite focussing , growing some varieties alone in monocultures , and amalgamate others together in polycultures .
report inEcology , Weiner found the types of wheat that thrive in various environment were not necessarily the ones that did well as monocultures . The varieties that did advantageously in a mixed environment did so at the disbursal of those around them , for example by producing extra base to slip others ' food .
When set in a monoculture , these selfish assortment had no one to mooch off and did roughly as badly as the polyculture ’s worst performers . The best - perform monoculture plant life were middle - runners in a mixed group .
" The crops can be compared to a sport team , ” Weiner tell in astatement . “ If every player is rewarded for scoring the finish , the squad will not grade as many goals as it would , had the player cooperate . In the same way , we ca n’t increase crop production by selecting the most successful plant individual for procreation . "
variety chosen for their cooperative nature bring on 35 per centum more metric grain than those gaining high individual yields at the expense of their neighbor .
The success of any group of social animals always bet in part on members being able to place the interests of the collective over their own short - condition welfare . Finding that it also applies to plant life could revolutionize how crop are engender in future .
Weiner thinks breeding for cooperation has great potential . The traits we have looked for in crop , such as faster growth or more effective nutritious usage , are those that have already gain works in the wild so natural option has take them almost as far as it is possible to go .
When unselfish traits , like the stature ofdwarf wheatthat stops it from blowing over , have been selected , it has usually been accidental . Weiner pop the question actively face for these characteristics .
" We can only do better than instinctive selection if we adjudicate to do something born selection will not do , such as breed unselfish plants " Weinersaid .
