Professor Martin Parry

Professor Emeritus, Professor in Plant Science for Food Security

Research Overview

With 9 billion mouths to feed by 2050, Martin wants his research to have a real impact on food security by increasing the yield of major crops whilst also increasing the efficiency of production and end use quality. He believes that one way to achieve this is to increase photosynthesis of major crops like wheat.

His aim is to understand how yield and quality are determined by gene composition and sequences in different environments (e.g. drought and temperature stress). This will enable him to manipulate the appropriate molecular and biochemical controls to increase in crop performance in a predictable way for current and future environments.

With his group, he has identified and quantified heritable genetic variation that can be exploited in crop breeding and using disruptive biotechnological approaches, has explored ways to increase photosynthesis and yield (see e.g. Lin et al., 2014 The Plant Journal 79 1-12, http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/tpj.12536/abstract; Lin et al 2014, Nature 513 547-550http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v513/n7519/full/nature13776.html).

Martin’s research has been supported by the

Martin is currently involved in a number of international projects, see ( see e.g. http://ripe.illinois.edu/).

Martin is an Associate Editor for The Plant Biotechnology Journal, ABiotech and Co-Editor for the Journal of Integrative Plant Biology.

In 2014, in recognition of his contributions to the practice, growth and development of applied biology, Martin was made an Honorary Member of the Association of Applied Biologist. In 2014 he was also awarded the China National Friendship Award by Vice Premier Ma Kai in Beijing.

PhotoBoost
01/09/2020 → 31/08/2025
Research

Realising Increased Photosynthetic Efficiency (RIPE2) : March 2020 Supplement Income Only
01/09/2020 → 31/08/2022
Research

Argentina - UK Partnership to Improve Wheat Grain Quality
31/07/2020 → 31/12/2024
Research

Increasing Wheat Yield and Quality
01/01/2019 → 31/12/2020
Research

Preparatory action to Boost Global Crop Yield for Food & Nutrition Security and fueling a Bioeconomy
01/11/2018 → 30/04/2022
Research

Realising Increased Photosynthetic Efficiency (RIPE2) : July 2019 Supplement Income Only
01/11/2018 → 31/10/2022
Research

Realising Increased Photosynthetic Efficiency (RIPE2)
01/09/2017 → 31/03/2023
Research

Bilateral NSF/BIO-BBSRC Synthesis of Microcompartments in plants for enhanced carbon fixation
01/12/2016 → 30/09/2021
Research

15-IWYP Wider and faster: high-throughout phenotypic exploration of novel genetic variation for breeding high biomass and yield in wheat
01/03/2016 → 30/09/2019
Research

15-IWYP Using Next Generation Genetic Approaches to Exploit Pheotypic Variation in Photosynthetic Efficiency to Increase Wheat Yield
01/02/2016 → 30/09/2019
Research

15-IWYP Realising increased photosynthetic efficiency to increase Wheat Yields
01/01/2016 → 30/09/2019
Research

Exploiting a Cyanobacterial CO2 concentrating Mechanism to increase Photosynthesis and Yield
01/01/2016 → 30/06/2019
Research

Combining field phenotyping and next generation genetics to uncover markers, genes and biology underlying drought tolerance in wheat
16/09/2015 → …
Research

Realizing increased photosynthetic Efficiency for sustainable increases in Crop Yield
01/09/2015 → 31/10/2017
Research

  • Plant and Crop Science