Distinguished Guest Lecture Series

History and Archive

Timetable for 2012

• Tuesday 31st January, 2012, 10.00 am Charles Hawker Conference Centre

The 2nd J.A. Prescott Lecture

Date/Time: Tuesday 31st January 2012, 10 am
Location: Charles Hawker Conference Centre, Waite Campus
Speaker: Professor Ismail Cakmak, Biological Sciences & Bioengineering Program, Faculty of Engineering & Natural Sciences, Sabanci University, Istanbul, Turkey.

Details on Ismail's interests and current work can be seen here: http://myweb.sabanciuniv.edu/cakmak/

The audience is invited to stay and talk with the speaker at the morning tea that follows the seminar.

Zinc Deficiency: A Global Nutritional Problem in Crop Production and Human Nutrition (A Possible Australian Contribution to this Global Problem)

Zinc deficiency is a well-documented global micronutrient deficiency problem in human populations and also in agricultural soils. Major health complications caused by Zn deficiency include impaired brain development and function and weakened immune system to deadly infectious diseases. Zinc deficiency is known to be responsible for deaths of nearly 450,000 children under 5 years old annually (Black et al., 2008, Lancet). Analyses made by a panel of 8 top-economists (including 5 Nobel Laureates) under the Copenhagen Consensus in 2008 (www.copenhagenconsensus.com) identified Zn deficiency, together with vitamin A deficiency, as the top priority global issue. Low dietary intake of Zn is the major reason for high incidence of Zn deficiency in humans, in those regions where both soils are low in chemically available Zn and cereal grains are the major source of calorie intake. Majority of cereal-cultivated soils have a range of adverse soil chemical factors which limit the capacity of crops to absorb adequate amount of Zn from soils. Increasing Zn concentration of food crops is, therefore, an important global agronomic target and humanitarian challenge.

Developing new genotypes with high root Zn-uptake and seed Zn-deposition capacity, by using selective plant breeding, is a cost-effective and sustainable approach. However, the success of a breeding programs highly depends on sufficient amount of readily available pools of Zn in the soil. A zinc fertilizer strategy represents a quick (and complimentary) solution to alleviate Zn deficiency-related problems in human populations. Such a fertilizer strategy can also contribute to better yields in potentially Zn-deficient soils. Increasing evidence is available from field trials showing that foliar application of Zn fertilizers both fortifies grain Zn concentration up to 2- or 3-fold as well as improving crop yields. Australia, as a major wheat exporting country, can play a significant role in reducing the high incidence of Zn deficiency in its existing wheat export markets in Asia and Africa. A major part of wheat exported from Australia is shipped to the developing world. A national program should be developed to biofortify a part of the wheat produced in Australia by using agronomic tools as a short-term solution. This Zn-biofortified wheat would be exported to selected target countries/regions where Zn deficiency is already know to pose a serious health problem and where Australia has an existing aid program. Targeted human groups should be monitored for selected nutrition and development parameters to assess the health impacts of the Zn-enriched Australian wheat in those countries.

The audience is invited to stay and talk with the speaker and colleagues over refreshments directly following the lecture.

For more information or to make an appointment with Ismail please contact michael.mclaughlin@adelaide.edu.au

J.A. Prescott

Professor J.A. Prescott was the first Professor of Agricultural Chemistry appointed at the Waite Research Institute, University of Adelaide, in 1924 in its formative years. He was later appointed as Chief of the Division of Soils CSIR in 1929, and from 1938 to 1955 he was the Director of the Waite Agricultural Research Institute, South Australia. His research in soil science and climatology saw him elected a fellow of the Royal Society of London in 1951 and a foundation fellow of the Australian Academy of Sciences in 1954. For a detailed biograpy see here.