Aligarh: A faculty member of Aligarh Muslim University (AMU), along with some German researchers, has discovered a new protein found in plants that can help plants tolerate salt stress.
Dr Tariq Aftab an Assistant Professor with the Department of Botany at AMU, along with other colleagues from Germany, identified a new protein and named it HVHORCH, which is a salt in barley plants. The protein plays an important role in helping the plants cope with salt stress.
The research took place at the Leibniz Institute of Plant Genetics and Crop Plant Research, Germany, where Dr Aftab served as a visiting scientist.
Following several years of research and trials, the report has now been published in the International Journal of Molecular Sciences. Dr Aftab said that the identification of this protein would pave the way for the growth and development of stress tolerant crop plants.
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He said, "Global climate change is likely to exacerbate the situation, with long and severe drought predictions. Excessive irrigation to deal with drought increases soil salinity and as a result, reduces yields and then crop yields become impossible.
Therefore, in order to provide sustainable food globally, it is essential that crop plants develop the ability to tolerate salt so that the land remains arable and better crop yields are possible.”
