Norman N. borlaug - short Profile

stem rust - Ug99 race

1. SHORT PROFILE OF NORMAN E. BORLAUG (1914 – 2009) Submitted by M.SIVA (2019-11-131)

2. Born March 25, 1914 on a farm near Cresco, Iowa to Henry and Clara Borlaug . Died at 95 on September 12, 2009 in Dallas,North Texas..His wife named Margaret Gibson He obtained initial education in a one-room rural school house. Nels Borlaug ,his grandfather urged him to continue higher studies. Borlaug's skills as an athlete (mainly in wrestling ) opened the door for him to attend the University of Minnesota . Borlaug received all three of his academic degrees from the University of Minnesota B.S . in F orestry (1937), and an M.S . (1940) and Ph.D. (1942 ) from the Department of Plant Pathology with a minor in plant genetics. After Completing B.S in Forestry ,he worked for the U.S. Forestry Service at stations in Massachusetts and Idaho. He was greatly influenced during his graduate work by the famous professor of plant pathology E. C. Stakman and also by H. K. Hayes, a renowned plant breeder. Borlaug worked at DuPont in Wilmington, Delaware, from 1942 to 1944. Where he worked as a Microbiologist until wartime service.

3. Borlaug’s wheat research started in 1944 with a Rockefeller Foundation -sponsored program in Mexico. In 1948, Borlaug released four dramatically improved varieties— Kentana 48, Yaqui 48, Nazas 48, Chapingo 48 All in all he produced at least 40 important wheat varieties He obtained the source of the semi-dwarf genes of Rht1 and Rht2 from a variety called Norin 10 through the experts from Japan. H e called his disciples - hunger fighters ” Another major innovation of Borlaug’s wheat breeding program in Mexico became known as shuttle breeding This approach result in developing “ day length insensitivity ” allowed his wheat lines to be grown widely across the world, including India and Pakistan, where millions of people had been starving because of food shortages.

4. These new wheat varieties and improved crop management practices transformed agricultural production in Mexico during the 1940's and 1950's and later in Asia and Latin America, sparking what today is known as the " Green Revolution ." From (1960–63) Borlaug served as director of the Inter-American Food Crop Program With the establishment of the International Maize and Wheat Improvement Center (CIMMYT) in Mexico in 1963, Dr. Borlaug assumed leadership (Director)of the Wheat Program, a position he held until his official retirement in 1979. In 1970 Norman E. Borlaug was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize for a lifetime of work to feed a hungry world. In 1973 ,criticism about Green Revolution. Critics maintained that the greater use of inorganic fertilizer required by the Green Revolution varieties would lead to pollution. In 1983, Dr. Borlaug joined as a Distinguished Professor of International Agriculture at Texas A & M University. In 1986,Borlaug created his own prize in agriculture - the World Food Prize ( WFP) -- that he hoped would come to be known as the equivalent of a Nobel Prize .

5. The prize of $250,000 has now been awarded to many outstanding agriculturalists; Borlaug chaired the selection committee until his death. In 1988, he became President of the Sasakawa Africa Association and a Senior Consultant to Global 2000. From 1990-92, he was a member of the U.S. President’s Council of Advisors for Science and Technology. Long after his official retirement, Borlaug was reinspired to act by another environ-mental problem - stem rust. However, in 1999, a new form of this disease, first identified in Uganda, was found to be virulent on 80 to 90 percent of the world’s wheat varieties. Borlaug recognized the potentially devastating impact of this new strain, called Ug99 , and he alerted policymakers in 2004, when he was 90 years old, in a report titled “Sounding the alarm on global stem rust.” The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation funded a major effort to combat the disease; now called the Borlaug Global Rust Initiative , this program involves scientists from around the world, and they have made substantial progress in finding resistance.

6. On March 25, 2012, on his 98th birthday, a bronze life statue of Borlaug was unveiled at his beloved experiment station near Ciudad Obregon. CIMMYT library maintains a list of Borlaug’s publications, issued between 1941 and 2007, which total approximately 500 peer-reviewed articles, reports, and commentaries. The book Norman Borlaug on World Hunger ( Dil 1997) provides reprints of 32 selected speeches and writings . Because of his achievements to prevent hunger, famine and misery around the world, it is said that Dr. Borlaug has "saved more lives than any other person who has ever lived."(Phillips 2010) Awards : Nobel Peace Prize (1970 ) Presidential Medal of Freedom (1977) Congressional Gold Medal ( 2007) National Medal of Science (2006) 50 honorary doctorates

7. The Borlaug Global Rust Initiative (BGRI) is an international consortium of over 1,000 scientists from hundreds of institutions working together. To reduce the world’s vulnerability to stem, yellow, and leaf rusts of wheat; Facilitate sustainable international partnerships to contain the threat of wheat rusts; Enhance world productivity to withstand global threats to wheat security. Key components of the BGRI: It include a global wheat community with systems for: cereal rust monitoring and surveillance; gene discovery; improved testing, multiplication and adoption of replacement varieties; training and capacity building ; understanding non-host resistance to stem rust; and increasing levels of investments and coordination in wheat rust research and development . The BGRI was initiated by ICAR, ICARDA, CIMMYT, UN-FAO and Cornell University in 2008. It is fostered by the Durable Rust Resistance in Wheat project, which serves as the secretariat. BGRI

8. The Durable Rust Resistance in Wheat Project, a collaborative effort begun in April 2008 and ended in 2016, which now includes 22 research institutions around the world and led by Cornell University, It seeks to mitigate rust threats through coordinated activities that will replace susceptible varieties with durably resistant varieties, created by accelerated multilateral plant breeding and delivered through optimized developing country seed sectors. The project also aims to harness recent advances in genomics to introduce non-host resistance (immunity) into wheat . Improved international collaboration in wheat research to meet growing world demand for food—an estimated 50% production increase in wheat alone is needed by 2020—is another major goal of this project. The DRRW is funded by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation and the UK Department for International Development DRRW

9. Sources of Resistance against Ug99 race Triticum aestivum Triticum turgidum Triticum monococcum Triticum timopheevi Aegilops speltoides Aegilops tauschii Triticum araraticum Thinopyrum elongatum Thinopyrum intermedium Secale cereale Resistant varities in India againt Ug99 GW 273 GW 322 HIN 1500 HD 2781 MP 4010 HUW 510 MACS 2846 HI 8498 UP 2338 DL 153-2 HW 1085 Raj 4120 PBW 343