New Orleans, nicknamed the "Big Easy", is known far and wide for jazz music, cafes, spicy cuisine and the annual celebration of Mardi Gras. This vibrant city is also home to ARS's Southern Regional Research Center.

In honor of the Mardi Gras season, we're featuring research from the Big Easy including enhancing the quality and nutritional value of rice, boosting the cotton nonwoven industry, preventing of off-flavors in fish and developing efficient processing and quality in sugar for food and bioenergy production.

Check out these stories to learn more

Using More Cotton May Help Clean the Environment - A research team at the ARS Southern Regional Research Center in New Orleans, LA, is looking at ways to increase the use and utility of cotton fibers.

ARS Scientists Improve Nutrients and Add Value to Rice Crop - Rice, already the primary staple for half the world's population, is getting a makeover from a research team in New Orleans, LA. The results are a more healthful grain and many potential new products.

Refining the Appeal of a Regional Favorite - ARS researchers are throwing overboard the off-flavors in catfish to ensure better quality of U.S. catfish compared to imports.

Sugar Byproducts May Help Refresh the Environment - Scientists are turning that waste into products that can refresh the soil. Two examples involve mill mud and bagasse.

Rotten Tomatoes? Good for Movie Ratings, Bad for Your Meals

Anthracnose is a “rotten” disease that causes tomatoes to bruise and rot. It hangs onto branches and then when it rains drips down on the tomatoes, infecting them. Farmers typically use water management strategies and fungicides to minimize the amount of anthracnose that sticks to the tomato. ARS researchers are looking for an even better solution: breeding new lines of tomatoes that are resistant to anthracnose disease. Check out the video.

Fish the Desert? Farm the Inner City? With Aquaponics, Yes!

Aquaponics is an innovative blend of aquaculture and hydroponics. Fish and plants are grown together in a system where the fish live in a tank and their waste – poop and ammonia – is broken down by bacteria into fertilizer for plants. Carl Webster, research biologist at the ARS Harry K. Dupree Stuttgart National Aquaculture Research Center in Stuttgart, AR, explained that the “wastewater” is an irrigation source that plants find nutritious and delicious in a soilless hydroponic environment. The plants associated with aquaponics typically include crops like lettuce, spinach, herbs, and even tomatoes, cucumbers, beans, and peppers.

The result of this combination is a steady supply of fresh fish – channel catfish, hybrid striped bass, and tilapia – and vegetables that can be produced year-round just about anywhere, from an abandoned inner-city warehouse to a climate-controlled facility in the middle of a desert.

According to the United Nations, there will be more than 9 billion people living on our planet by 2050.

“We need to be smarter about how we grow food,” said Benjamin Beck, research leader at the ARS Aquatic Animal Health Research Unit in Auburn, AL. “Minimizing the space used to grow food and/or by growing more than one crop at the same time could help relieve pressure on land production of crops while still providing a locally grown source of food.”

Biodegradable Spray Keeps the Toxins Away

Aflatoxins are highly toxic substances produced by some species of Aspergillus fungi and can contaminate common crops such as corn, peanuts, and cotton. In high enough doses, these toxins are known to cause liver damage or cancer, ultimately threatening the health of both animals and people.

In Stoneville, MS, a team of ARS researchers developed a new bioplastic-based spray to fight aflatoxins using natural ingredients like cornstarch and beneficial microbes such as fungi and bacteria strains. The spray is relatively inexpensive, easy to apply, storable, biodegradable, and capable of significantly reducing aflatoxin contamination. 

Learn more:

• Biodegradable Spray Helps Battle Crop Pathogens
• Protecting Plants May Start with the Seed

ARS Lab Participates in Expedition Colorado

On May 5, 2022, 10 staff members from the ARS Soil Management and Sugar Beet Research Unit in Fort Collins, CO participated in Expedition Colorado, an annual field trip held at Colorado State University for 4th grade students in the Poudre School District to teach students about natural resources and conservation practices.

Approximately 1,400 students went through various stations at the Lory Student Center which included an ARS hosted workshop on different types of soils and plants.

Vertical Farming Is Moving Up

Vertical farming is the practice of growing crops in vertically stacked layers. It allows farmers to grow fresh produce indoors year-round and could be part of the solution to growing crops where there is a limited availability of land and water.

It sounds like a futuristic concept, but gears are already in motion for practical implementation. Small fruiting crops like tomatoes as well as leafy greens have great potential for vertical farming production. Tomatoes can be grown hydroponically (in a nutrient-rich solution rather than in soil) in a greenhouse.

ARS plant pathologist Dr. Kai-Shu Ling and research horticulturalist Dr. James Altland discuss vertical farming in the August 2021 issue of Under the Microscope.