High Performance Networking in Agricultural Research

Marco van den BergWilliam G. Padolina

International Rice Research Institute

http://irri.org

Exciting times in rice research

Bioinformatics

Simultaneous revolutions in biology, communications, and computational power

Remote computational power generates new

generation of questions and applications

Vast arrays of data generated

worldwide

Remote data storage and analysis capacities

universally accessible

Global Rice Science Partnership

Omics

• Genomics, Proteomics, etc.• 2005 - Rice genome sequence published• 2006 - SUB1 gene identified• 2009 - Swarna-SUB1 variety developed• 2010 - Released to farmers• 2011 - Start sequencing 10,000 varieties

(500 TeraBytes raw data 4 TB net data)• 2012 - Drought-tolerant gene• 201? - Sequenced >108,000 rice varieties

National Institute of Agrobiological Sciences/Institute of the Society for Techno-innovation of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries Japan The Institute for Genomic Research USA Chinese Academy of Sciences China INRA-URGV France Cirad-Amis France The University of Arizona USA Academia Sinica Taiwan National Cheng Kung University Taiwan National Yang-Ming University University of Delhi India Indian Agricultural Research Institute Rutgers University USA National Institute of Agricultural Science and Technology Republic of Korea Rice Gene Discovery Unit Kasetsart University Thailand Centro de Genomica e Fitomelhoramento Brazil John Innes Centre UK Washington University USA University of Wisconsin USA Center for Information Biology and DNA Data Bank of Japan National Institute of Genetics Japan National Institute of Advanced Industrial Science and Technology Japan National Institute of Agrobiological Sciences Japan Medical Research Institute Japan Biological Informatics Consortium Japan Cornell University USA Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory USA McGill University Canada York University Canada International Rice Research Institute Philippines Graduate School of Natural Sciences Nagoya City University Japan Brookhaven National Laboratory USA

Rice Sequencing Consortium (2005)

DNA Data TransferBuilding a bigger picture with advanced communications links

Dr. Detlef Weigel (Max Planck Institute):This is a milestone that is key for the next phase of exploiting the genes that have been accumulated over millennia in the many rice strains available at IRRI and in gene banks at other rice breeding institutes worldwide

Dr Ken McNally (IRRI)Tens of gigabytes of data generated in the initial study were shared with collaborators and published on external databases to make them available to researchers around the world. Data volumes will rise dramatically in the future

Global Rice Information Gateway Real-time crop information medium-term supply and demand outlook policy briefs comprehensive rice data sets at all levels

Rice monitoring and forecasting system for each country will be developed by combining techniques such as satellite-based remote sensing with weather and crop modeling, and econometric modeling.

Heavy TrafficEuropean Space Agency ENVISAT

 

2011: 200 scenes x 60 MB = 12 GB2012: 15,000 scenes = 900 GB

First Mile = The Farmer Connecting farmers with research

• Site Specific Nutrient Management• Use the farmer as the sensor• Simple, local language interface• Web & Voice Operational in Philippines,

Android in Beta test• Next: Indonesia, China, Bangladesh• In development: Crop Manager

Precision agriculture services to poor farmers

Service Platform

R&D

DecisionSupport

ToolsWeb / Phone

Tools to protect investment

Crop DoctorPest Management

LoansSavings

Farmer Guidelines

Crop InsuranceInput Supply

Tools for Wise Investments

Nutrient ManagerCrop Manager

Research

Farmer Participatory Testing

Consolidation of KnowledgeVerification

SimulationsModeling

Localization

Agricultural Research Funding Falls ShortIRRI Budget 1960-2009

000 US$ 2009