The data, collected in partnership with the Oregon-based nonprofit Resource Innovation Institute and the University of California, Berkeley’s Cannabis Research Center, show that California’s cannabis industry uses only a fraction of the water that is used to grow grapes, rice, wheat, and other agricultural commodities in the state.
by Britt E. Erickson | August 28, 2022
They analyzed scrapings from inside the jars by gas chromatography and mass spectrometry, which showed traces of organic acids commonly found in fermented grapes, confirming that the jars had been used for wine. Chemical markers also showed that one jar had contained red wine and the other two held white wine.
by Brianna Barbu | August 14, 2022
She returned to school, studying grape genomics at the University of California, Davis. She went on to earn a PhD in physical chemistry from the University of California, Berkeley, where she used X-ray crystallography and nuclear magnetic resonance spectroscopy to study biomolecules. Next, she moved to the National Institutes of Health as a postdoctoral fellow, where, in addition to doung lab work, she authored her first book, Pocket Guide to Biomolecular NMR. 2010–12 Turning points While doing her postdoc, Doucleff moonlighted as a freelance writer, penning articles for health magazines after a day in the lab.
by Bethany Halford | July 29, 2022
Eyer started out as a harvest intern at wineries in Chile and the US, helping out as the grapes were harvested, crushed, and fermented. The job was a combination of cellar hand and lab tech, analyzing the grape juice and monitoring its fermentation. 2015–21 Blending a career Getting a full-time job in wine making wasn’t easy.
by Laura Howes | June 12, 2022
Carol Lin, an associate professor in the School of Energy and Environment at the City University of Hong Kong, is developing a fermentation process in which waste cellulose fibers are converted into a sugar solution by an enzyme generated by a species of mold found on grapes. This enables the efficient separation of cellulosic fibers from polyester.
by Alex Scott | March 28, 2022
Affected plants include grapes, peanuts, rice, sugar beets, and sweet potatoes, as well as nontolerant soybeans and nonagricultural plants and trees. Farm groups representing soybean and cotton growers question the data from the incident reports. They claim that it is unclear whether some complaints were submitted to multiple agencies and were therefore counted twice.
by Britt E. Erickson | January 02, 2022
Among the agricultural products the company is developing are pesticides targeting the Colorado potato beetle; the varroa mite, which is a destructive honeybee parasite; and a powdery mildew that blights soft fruits like grapes and strawberries. GreenLight has submitted the potato beetle pesticide to the US Environmental Protection Agency for approval.
by Emily Harwitz | November 28, 2021
Although pheromone-based mating disruption is used in specialty crops like apples and grapes, it hasn’t taken off in row crops like corn, soybeans, and rice because producing insect sex pheromones—with their diverse chemical nature and often unusual cyclic structures—by chemical synthesis is too difficult and expensive.
by Vanessa Zainzinger, special to C&EN | November 21, 2021