The ICAR-Indian Institute of Oilseeds Research (ICAR-IIOR), Hyderabad, has launched “Oilseeds Kisaan Mitra,” a WhatsApp-based AI advisory service.
The initiative aims to harness digital technology to benefit the farming community. It enables oilseed farmers across India to access free, trusted, and instant crop advisory through WhatsApp.
Scientists at the Indian Council of Agricultural Research (ICAR)-Central Rice Research Institute (CRRI) in Cuttack, Odisha, led by Kutubuddin Ali Molla, have developed and validated a platform named “Plant-OpenCRISPR1” (POC1).
This represents the first AI-designed genome-editing platform in the world for plants, developed utilizing rice as a model crop. The POC1 platform facilitates advanced gene knockout, base editing, and prime editing in rice crops using AI-designed enzymes, surpassing conventional Clustered Regularly Interspaced Short Palindromic Repeats (CRISPR) technologies.
It is to be noted that the research findings have been accepted for publication in the international journal “New Phytologist”.
Union Minister JP Nadda and Union Minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan have launched the ‘SEHAT Mission’ (Science Excellence for Health through Agricultural Transformation) in New Delhi. The mission is jointly launched by the Indian Council of Agricultural Research (ICAR) and the Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR) under the Ministry of Agriculture and Farmers Welfare (MoA&FW).
The initiative aims to connect agriculture, nutrition, and public health through scientific collaboration to build a framework for ‘Healthy Food, Healthy Farms and a Healthy India’.
Dr. Ch. Srinivasa Rao, the Director and Vice-Chancellor of the Indian Council of Agricultural Research-Indian Agricultural Research Institute (ICAR-IARI), has been conferred the 9th “Prof. MS Swaminathan Award” for the 2024-25 period in Hyderabad. The award carries a Gold Medal and a cash prize of ₹2 lakh