The smallest known insect genome belongs to an Antarctic midge that has to survive two polar winters as a larva to reach its week or so sexual adulthood. The DNA instructions for Belgica antarctica fit in a mere 99 million of the paired basic chemical units that encode living creatures. That’s a

Scientists have found a gene in wild tomatoes that enables farmed tomato plants to be grown 24 hours a day under natural and artificial light, boosting yields by up to 20 per cent.Back in the 1920s, experiments showed that modern tomato plants suffer potentially fatal damage to their leaves when

The Antarctic midge, the only insect native to the southern continent, has surprised researchers with an unusually streamlined genome.The pared down genome may explain how the midge has been able to survive in the hostile landscape, say researchers in a new study published in Nature

Researchers are developing mathematical models to identify genetic material that could help improve food crops' resilience to climate change. Impacts - such as drought, pest and disease - could hit harvests and undermine global food security. Scientists hope the models will speed up the process of