The Fruits of Applied Research

The Institutes for Applied Research - half devoted to agriculture, half to applied chemistry - is a mixture of 1950s-vintage labs, rows of box-like mobile caravan offices on blocks, miniature greenhouses and dozens of plots dotted with buckets holding an assortment of saplings, shrubs and crops. Somewhat incongruously situated in the heart of Beersheva - flanked by old apartment blocks and new modern buildings of the Ben-Gurion University campus, the surroundings are the outgrowth of the Institute's history.

The facility was established in 1957 when Beersheva was but a small isolated desert town that has since grown to hug the Institutes on all sides. It was originally called the Negev Institute for Arid Zone Research, designed to adapt and introduce new crops suitable to an arid or semi-arid climate to Israel's then fledgling agricultural sector. Now an established research facility, for the past nine years the research center has played host to ten trainees a year from developing countries with arid and semi-arid zones including China, India, Kazakhstan, Kenya and Chile, who spend six months working with Israeli researchers. Similar programs are conducted by MASHAV at the Hebrew University's Faculty of Agriculture in Rehovot and the Volcani Institute (Israel's Agricultural Research Organization) outside Tel Aviv.

Dr. David Mills, coordinator for the Beersheva program, explained that during their stay, trainees receive housing, medical coverage and a living stipend while participating in diverse projects that range from industrial crops to medicinal herbs, from selection of salt-resistant varieties of vegetables and ornamental shrubs for landscaping suitable for arid zones to commercial production of a desert variety of truffles and plant tissue cultures and genetic engineering. However mentors and mentees all agree that the subject of the individual work of the participants - no matter how engaging or how germane to their own countries - is only half the story.

In essence, working with a veteran Israeli researcher is a prism that exposes the participants to modern scientific methodology - a whole new way of looking at things. Mills labels this a different intellectual milieu and approach to research. It is both broader in scope and far more systematic, encompassing planning and design of the experiment, monitoring the results, and in analyzing data according to standards prevailing in developed countries, he said.

Dr. Mills revealed that in the past all candidates for the program came directly from abroad, having heard about the program from past graduates, via the program's internet site, or through Israeli diplomatic missions in their respective countries. However, two years ago it was decided to select some of the participants in the trainee program from among the able graduates of the Arid Crops Course. Those chosen to stay this year were Mirash Zhekisheva, a university student from Kazakhstan, Emmanuel Otonko, an agronomist in extension work from Nigeria, Bishnu Chapagain, a horticulturist in agricultural development from Nepal, and Abudu Abdireyim, a water engineer in survey and planning from a Turkameinian region in the north of the Peoples Republic of China

Mirash Zhekisheva (Kazakhstan), who was working on her dissertation on hybridization of spring wheat prior to coming to Israel to participate in the Arid Crop Course, says that at home her research focused on selection of promising strains. Working with Dr. Sam Mendlinger, a senior researcher in plant genetics, she says, "This was my first encounter with environmental research. I was prompted to stay in order to see how research work is conducted in Israel. In Kazakhstan we established experimental plots of cereal crops, but they were in the open, influenced by all sorts of factors we could not control or evaluate - from rainfall to diseases from adjacent fields. And, because of distance we could not monitor them daily."

"Here I have controlled conditions for the experiment," Zhekisheva said as we stood in one of the three small greenhouses filled with rows of plastic buckets planted with oats that housed the experiment she was just winding up. The pot experiment for which she was responsible focused on evaluating optimal density for planting, oats using nine density combinations and different water regimes for four different strains of oats from different regions in Israel. During the last two months of her stay, she was scheduled to work on a stress experiment with tomatoes "an opportunity to learn other methodologies," she said.

Part of the difficulty Mirash Zhekisheva envisions in "transplanting" the methodology for what she labeled "more scientific, controlled experiments" to her own research is scarcity of basic materials - not only mini greenhouses, a well-equipped lab and easy access to a computer to do the statistical analysis, but even cardboard identification tags for the buckets and paper bags for collecting barley kernels for analysis in the lab can be hard to obtain. She added that not only has the pot experiment provided a basis for comparison of research methods - broadening concepts of the possibilities for enhancing research when conditions for researchers are optimal; access to the Institute's well-stocked library with state-of-the-art professional literature has been a tremendous boon for writing her dissertation, first thing on the agenda when Mirash Zhekisheva returns to Kazakhstan. "I hope in the future, when I work on my advanced degree, I will be able to conduct my research in a way similar to what I have seen in Israel," she concluded.

Bishnu Chapagain (Nepal) worked with Dr. Zeev Wiesman, an expert in oil trees and plant waxes. Chapagain's project - experimentation in fertilization by spraying foliage - is very germane to his work as a horticulturist. He carried out two pot experiments using two species as models - tomatoes in a greenhouse and olive saplings in an open plot - measuring the benefit of fertilizer that was sprayed on the leaves and subsequently taken up by the plan. Spraying is an alternative to mainstay methods - spreading fertilizer in the soil or fertigation (i.e., providing nutrients together with irrigation water) to be taken up by the root system. The effects - a host of indices such as height of plants, quantity of flowers, and not only yield but also size and quality of the fruit - were systematically recorded daily and leaf and fruit specimens analyzed in the lab vis-a-vis application of different types and concentrations of fertilizer, and compared with control groups.

This technology is particularly attractive because it can work independently of other factors, he says. A combination of fertilizing fields and flood irrigation is both wasteful and detrimental to the environment. One can spread fertilizer by hand at the roots of the plant, but in semi-arid countries where modern irrigation technologies are still rare, and farmers are dependent on precipitation, if there is no rain the plant can't use the nutrients.

"We did some investigation of spraying fertilizer in Nepal, but research was on a much more elementary level," he said matter-of-factly. "At most we experimented with a handful of plants, observing at what threshold concof fertilizer damaged the leaves. This provided basic data - a rule of thumb that concentrations of 2-3% won't do damage." Chapagain says that working with Dr. Zeev Weisman has taught him to conduct scientific experiments "on a different scope and with a much higher degree of accuracy and complexity" as to the number of variables and methods of analysis.

Of particular value are techniques for quality analysis of oils including lab analysis of leaves, buds and fruit before and after spraying. " It leads to another much deeper level of understanding," he clarified. "We are not only exposed to more sophisticated lab equipment and lab techniques. We learn how to set up an experiment, how to conduct it, and how to analyze the data, including computer-aided analysis."

At the same time, he added, his research at the Institute carried other valuable "spin-offs." Running the experiment entailed hands-on experience in using drip irrigation components - albeit on a very small scale, implementing what he had learned in the Arid Crops Course under actual "operating conditions." He says running the experiment provided familiarity with components (types of lines, couplings and drippers and misters) and how to assemble them; operating water timers and filters, and even learning "the hard way" that too much water pressure will lead to couplings opening up, Bishnu Chapagain added ruefully. Moreover, the experiment was the first time he encountered use of trellising of tomato vines.

The impact of such a method of providing nutrients to orchards and crops is multifold. Abudu Abdireyim, a water engineer from China, who worked with Dr. Amnon Bustan, added that an alternative such as spraying fertilizer on the leaves can not only reduce quantities of fertilizer that must be bought with hard currency while at the same time preventing overuse of fertilizer that is damaging the environment in his country and elsewhere.

The goal of the experiment is to optimize a spraying regime - pinpoint "windows" in the growth cycle during flowering, budding and maturation of fruit where application of fertilizer by spraying can enhance productivity and quality. Abdireyim says that for developing countries, this method can be beneficial even when it is not coupled with drip irrigation - the agrotechnology he read about that drew him to request to come to Israel in the first place. Realistically, as attractive and exciting as drip irrigation is, it is an agrotechnology that despite its proven benefits is often too expensive to be used on a wide-spread basis in developing countries. While spraying fertilizer may not carry the same dramatic results as artificial irrigation and fertigation, it can be applied on a mass scale.

While Bishnu Chapagain's project was on the horticulture level, Abudu Abdireyim's own experiment dealt with the physiology of plants - a long-term project still in its initial stages designed to both locate salt-resistant species suitable for cultivation and understand the underlying mechanism that allows salt-tolerant plants to survive. The long-term goal is to eventually locating the gene responsible for preventing salt from entering the plant and "much further down the road" possibly introducing the gene into other varieties by genetic engineering - making them suitable for marginal soils.

Today, in the early stages of research, the project in which Abdireyim participated centered on evaluating the salt-tolerance levels of a plant called Salt Grass that grows in brackish marshes. Working with one particular strain among a number that have been gathered by Institute staff in various locations in North and South America and propagated in one of the Institute's small greenhouses, Abdireyim grew sprigs of salt grass planted in various concentrations of salt water (aquaculture), observing and recording the growth rate and other parameters under different concentrations of salinity. Interestingly enough, at a very high concentration equal to seawater, the shoot at first withered then recovered, turning into a robust plant as if Salt Grass can adjusts or adapts itself for survival - a phenomena that will deserve further study.

Israeli researchers hope understanding the molecular apparatus of the system of proteins and enzymes responsible for pumping salts out of the roots will eventually allow scientists to introduce them into other species through genetic engineering, such as wheat. But even in the preliminary stages, research with species like Salt Grass can be valuable to developing nations.

The grass - which has commercial value as low-grade forage for livestock - can be used as a "pioneer plant," a first-step in reclaiming soils where salinity stemming from poor agricultural practices such as flood irrigation and overuse of fertilizers in hot climates where there is high evaporation has rendered fields inhospitable to all but the hardiest plants. Thus, this kind of research holds much promise for Central Asian Republics such as the Aral Sea Basin region in Northern China, says Abdireyim. "I hope we can introduce this kind of salt-tolerant grass to my country when I return. as a step for reclaiming depleted soils and marginal land," he said, but clarified that the immediate impact is "a different way of thinking."

"I think the most important thing I have gained is another way of solving problems. It goes beyond this method or that. It's a matter of broadening our outlook to take into account that there may be many other options than the way we have traditionally done things. It boils down to a new perspective on both research and agricultural techniques," said Abdireyim.

Emmanuel Otonko, from Nigeria, also engaged in a project connected with salinity. His mentor, Dr. Amnon Bustan, says that combating salinity is a problem common to agriculturists in both developing and developed countries - among the latter due to intensive cultivation.

"Working as an agronomist with an NGO on community development, I did some basic experimentation evaluating new commercial fertilizers on cereal crops and legumes - mainly cow peas and groundnuts, a staple in my country. There was no connection with salinity," said Otonko. "Here the subject was chickpeas - a legume neither Otonko nor his mentor had grown before.

Emmanuel Otonko tested three cultivars of chickpeas and how they respond in a pot experiment under five different levels of salinity, from fresh water to highly-saline water. Numerous parameters were monitored, including the growth cycle of each cultivar: when it flowers and when pods are produced and mature, absolute yield and relative yields. "Early production is important, for if we can find plants whose growth cycle is short, it may be a positive factor that will produce better yields, since the effect of salinity is cumulative," explained Bustan. "The shorter the life cycle of a plant under stress due to salinity, the less salt uptake."

Otonko says the experiment opened up a whole new area for investigation. It made him aware that salinity may be a factor in agriculture in his native country. "I hadn't thought a lot about salinity as a factor, but in my region one can see that certain crops cultivated close to the sea don't do well, indicating there may be a tie to proximity to the sea," he explained. "This deserves further investigation to see whether this phenomenon is tied to a salinity problem. Furthermore, I now know how to carry out this kind of experiment."

Otonko stresses that investigation of chickpeas as a possible crop goes beyond specific plants. "It's a matter of changing your outlook. The experiment with chickpeas underscores that there may be other or better crops than traditional ones. The main staples in Nigeria are cowpeas, yams, cassava, but they are not very viable in my region. Thus, a crop like chickpeas, that can withstand water stress, may be better." But even more so, Emmanuel Otonko added that he has been struck by the focus, not only the structure of the experiment: Applied research based on keen awareness of cost-benefit in the parameters examined, not just looking at a plant's behaviorunder conditions of salinity.

"I know when I go back to Nigeria, my experiments will be much more thorough. Equally important, applied research like this is "business-oriented researches." From what I've seen here, everything is carried out with a clear link between environmental factors and market factors. In this kind of research one views environmental factors as they effect the lives of the farmers, he emphasized. "It's a different orientation."

Otonko added that he was impressed by the close relationship between Israeli researchers and Israeli farmers. At present, the research community in Nigeria is much more insulated and removed from the farming population. The experiment demonstrated how the Israeli "research culture" mobilizes two-way feedback and collaboration with farmers who conduct large-scale experimentation and how the overall orientation of applied research incorporates effectively passing the fruits of research on to the farmer, he noted. "When I get back to Nigeria, I hope to convince decision-makers in my country to focus on this kind of applied research, emphasizing the economic benefits such work can carry for my country's economy," he said.

David Mills adds, "Taking care of these trainees gives us real pleasure. Following their professional progress, seeing them develop as scientists, their incorporation into the social texture of the Institute, the university and the neighborhood is fascinating. We realize the immense impact that this training period has on those participating, leading, we hope, to increased professional capacity. As our relations grow closer over time, the thought of their departure becomes difficult, with consolation lying in the fact that they are going home with additional expertise."