1 00:00:05.543 --> 00:00:09.181 The last reason, and I think maybe this might be the most important one, 2 00:00:09.181 --> 00:00:11.210 that we need to know how plants survive, 3 00:00:11.210 --> 00:00:13.970 how plants work, it's that we need to feed the world. 4 00:00:13.970 --> 00:00:19.530 You know, we need to realize that out of seven billion people in the world today, 5 00:00:19.530 --> 00:00:21.490 this might be a little scary. 6 00:00:21.490 --> 00:00:26.370 Less than half get the amount of food and the amount of nutrition they need. 7 00:00:26.370 --> 00:00:30.190 Over half the world is what we call insecure, food insecure. 8 00:00:30.190 --> 00:00:33.420 Now this is not only people who are hungry, you know, the pictures of children 9 00:00:33.420 --> 00:00:37.060 with large stomachs, but about a third of the world that get enough food, 10 00:00:37.060 --> 00:00:40.180 in terms of volume, but not enough food, in terms of nutrition. 11 00:00:41.420 --> 00:00:44.230 And now we have a new problem in the world that quite a lot, 12 00:00:44.230 --> 00:00:48.310 over 10% are actually getting too much calories, they're overweight. 13 00:00:48.310 --> 00:00:51.330 So less than half the world is food insecure. 14 00:00:51.330 --> 00:00:55.840 800 million people go hungry each day. 15 00:00:55.840 --> 00:00:59.200 And the majority of these hungry people we know is in either Africa or 16 00:00:59.200 --> 00:01:00.960 in Southern Asia. 17 00:01:00.960 --> 00:01:02.580 Why is there so much hunger? 18 00:01:02.580 --> 00:01:06.130 Well, one of the reasons is that our population of humans in the world is 19 00:01:06.130 --> 00:01:09.170 rapidly expanding, actually logarithmically. 20 00:01:09.170 --> 00:01:13.210 If when I was born there were only three billion people in the world, 21 00:01:13.210 --> 00:01:15.040 when my parents were born there where two billion, 22 00:01:15.040 --> 00:01:17.380 and when my grandparents were born only one billion. 23 00:01:18.900 --> 00:01:21.642 Today, there are seven billion people, and 24 00:01:21.642 --> 00:01:25.046 most models have us reaching nine billion by 2050. 25 00:01:25.046 --> 00:01:27.980 So there's huge increase in the human population. 26 00:01:29.610 --> 00:01:32.340 This increase in population, of course, 27 00:01:32.340 --> 00:01:36.830 is leading to a decrease in the amount of land that's available for agriculture. 28 00:01:36.830 --> 00:01:37.450 And this, of course, 29 00:01:37.450 --> 00:01:41.120 makes sense, as we have more people, they have to live somewhere. 30 00:01:41.120 --> 00:01:45.720 That land that used to be used for growing crops is now used for people. 31 00:01:46.760 --> 00:01:51.630 So, we have this contradiction that as the amount of population goes up, 32 00:01:51.630 --> 00:01:53.470 the amount of land is going down. 33 00:01:53.470 --> 00:01:58.384 So that while 24% of the earth surface is arable, by 2050, 34 00:01:58.384 --> 00:02:00.685 that's only going to be 20%. 35 00:02:00.685 --> 00:02:04.189 How are we going to be able to feed the world with less land, 36 00:02:04.189 --> 00:02:09.037 a world that's hotter, less water, might have less nutrients available, 37 00:02:09.037 --> 00:02:11.064 and an increasing population? 38 00:02:12.455 --> 00:02:17.673 Well, I believe that plant biology can go a long way to solve these problems, 39 00:02:17.673 --> 00:02:22.425 because plant biologists, by understanding how plants sense the environment, 40 00:02:22.425 --> 00:02:24.895 by understanding what a plant knows, 41 00:02:24.895 --> 00:02:29.655 we can develop plants that are resistance to drought or tolerant to drought. 42 00:02:29.655 --> 00:02:34.890 We can develops plants that need less water, less fertilizer. 43 00:02:34.890 --> 00:02:39.021 We can develop plants that are more resistant to pathogens, 44 00:02:39.021 --> 00:02:42.600 such as fungus, and bacteria, or bugs, insects. 45 00:02:42.600 --> 00:02:44.510 And we can make plants that are more nutritious. 46 00:02:44.510 --> 00:02:52.890 You know, a single gene can really lead to a plant that is resistant to drought. 47 00:02:52.890 --> 00:02:55.610 Another way that plant biologists are doing this, 48 00:02:55.610 --> 00:02:57.730 is by utilizing what we called wild plants. 49 00:02:58.810 --> 00:03:03.190 As we mentioned with wheat, wheat was cultivated from a wild, growing wheat. 50 00:03:03.190 --> 00:03:06.450 And in Israel today, this wild wheat is still growing. 51 00:03:06.450 --> 00:03:07.770 We call this the mother of wheat. 52 00:03:07.770 --> 00:03:09.660 It grows wild on the side of the road. 53 00:03:10.970 --> 00:03:15.150 What some of my colleagues have been able to do is to take this wild wheat and 54 00:03:15.150 --> 00:03:17.640 cross it with the cultivated wheat. 55 00:03:17.640 --> 00:03:22.310 And what they've developed is a new strain that is actually hardier, 56 00:03:22.310 --> 00:03:25.800 it contains more protein, and it contains more minerals. 57 00:03:26.970 --> 00:03:32.720 So think about this, by just utilizing what we know in plant biology, 58 00:03:32.720 --> 00:03:36.580 we can develop a strain of wheat that is more nutritious. 59 00:03:36.580 --> 00:03:39.010 And so how could this affect world security? 60 00:03:39.010 --> 00:03:41.760 I think you can agree with me that this could be very, very important. 61 00:03:43.670 --> 00:03:45.440 But there's another reason for studying plants. 62 00:03:46.670 --> 00:03:47.790 Plants make us happy. 63 00:03:49.420 --> 00:03:54.120 Loads of psychological research have shown that not only we are in a better mood when 64 00:03:54.120 --> 00:03:56.460 plants are around us, we're also more productive. 65 00:03:58.470 --> 00:04:01.340 But for those of you who might be interested in more practical aspects of 66 00:04:01.340 --> 00:04:02.980 life, there are other reasons to study plants. 67 00:04:02.980 --> 00:04:08.540 And that's that plants can be a bioreactor for fuels. 68 00:04:08.540 --> 00:04:12.680 Think about the money that would be involved in making biofuels, 69 00:04:12.680 --> 00:04:15.990 ecologically valid fuels from plants. 70 00:04:15.990 --> 00:04:19.970 We can now manipulate the oil in sugar content of plants for 71 00:04:19.970 --> 00:04:24.660 our own uses, and so that plants can become our own oil industry. 72 00:04:24.660 --> 00:04:27.660 Think of the millions, if not, billions of dollars involved in this.