Chathurika Wijewardana, crop science researcher
Chathu Wijewardana is a crop science researcher. She works with soybeans, the most popular oilseed crop in the world. This crop provides protein, oil, and many essential nutrients.
She looks at the effects of environmental issues like water availability (droughts or flood) and temperature extremes (either heat or cold) during seed development. Weather extremes can cause harmful effects on soybean seed quality. Her research looks at what conditions affect how well soybean seeds germinate.
Germination rate is how many seeds are successful in growing. It is important for growers. For example, if we buy a seed packet of beans at the store but only half the seeds germinated, that’s frustrating in our gardens. For farmers, it’s frustrating and causes a big economic impact!
Wijewardana is specifically looking at the effects of drought stress on future crop performance. In fact, she’s looking at whether a soybean seed’s performance is influenced by what happened to a generation of seeds two seasons back–the soybean’s grandparents!
In mini-greenhouses, Wijewardana and her team simulate drought conditions. The greenhouses allow the team to control how much water the plants receive, as well as the temperatures they are exposed to.
They expose soybean plants to various levels of drought, collect the seeds, and then plant these seeds again in a natural environment. They look at this next generation to see how the plants develop. They have found that soybean plants whose seeds were not exposed to drought have a good root system. But soybean plants exposed to drought conditions have fewer roots. This will affect how these plants grow.
The timing of the drought is important, too, according to Wijewardana’s research. Soybean plants are more sensitive to drought at the reproductive stage. This is when they are producing flowers, pods and seeds. The researchers study impact of drought on several yield components like the number of flowers, pods, and seeds. They found that exposure to drought during seed formation can cause substantial yield reductions that could be unfavorable for the soybean growers.
Her research team is showing that drought not only affects this year’s yield. it also affects the performance of seeds for many generations. This emphasizes the importance of water management in the field and developing drought-tolerant soybeans through crop breeding. Growers can irrigate their fields at the most important reproductive stages if the weather conditions have brought them a drought. The team’s research helps agronomists and farmers know how best to manage their fields, so they can continue to feed the world no matter what the weather conditions are.
Watch Wijewardana in action. Read Dr. Wijewardena's blog about seed germination factors here.
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