Cutting-edge USask chickpea research thrives through cold temperatures

USask's 13 signature greenhouses are situated in the northern part of campus and are home to a variety of crops, including wheat, barley, beans and chickpeas.

“The greenhouse is a good way to beat the winter blues,” said Dr. Tamanna Jahan (PhD), a post-doctoral fellow in USask’s College of Agriculture and Bioresources. “It’s sunny in here ... and I can control the environment.”

Jahan’s research focuses on chickpea breeding. Inside one of the greenhouse buildings, wide swaths of Jahan’s chickpea crop fill massive hydroponic systems in rectangular planters that can slide on rails, offering researchers access to the plants for study, watering and fertilization.

Jahan is part of the research lab led by Dr. Bunyamin Tar’an (PhD), the Ministry of Agriculture Strategic Research Program (SRP) Chair in Chickpea and Flax Breeding and Genetics. Her work focuses on nutrient levels in chickpeas, increasing the quality of crop yield. Jahan’s PhD research focuses on the idea of biofortification of chickpeas – essentially, growing lines of chickpeas with a greater amount of a particular nutrient.

Her latest research revolves around phosphorus, a critical element for the fertilization and growth of crops. Jahan is using genetic editing tools in combination with field techniques to identify and create lines of chickpeas that require less phosphorus to thrive. The project received support from the Agriculture Development Fund (ADF).

Jahan said this would mean fewer fertilizer inputs would be required by producers, which would be more environment-friendly due to less phosphorus remaining in the soil, and these chickpea lines could be used to grow crops in less nutrient-rich enviornments around the world. 

“This phosphorus is non-renewable, and it’s coming only from phosphate rock,” she said. “A huge amount of phosphorus is used by the agriculture industry, and across all crops, pulses like chickpeas need more phosphorus because of the ways their roots grow ... If we find the chickpea genotypes which require low amounts of phosphorus, we can reduce our input cost.”

And much of this research is taking place in sub-zero temperatures in USask’s greenhouses. Each greenhouse can be controlled for temperature, lighting and humidity. Despite the cold temperatures outside, Jahan can continue her research program through the coldest months in Saskatchewan.

She noted that agriculture is a large industry here in Saskatchewan, and being able to continue to explore those agriculture and bioresource-related research questions even through the dead of winter was a tremendous boost. Jahan is also able to manage her inputs – water, nutrients, fertilizer – with great precision in the controlled environment of the greenhouse.

With the tools of the greenhouse at her disposal Jahan can mimic any environmental condition she needs to confirm if her more phosphorus-efficient chickpeas are producing a greater yield. She initially tested this line of chickpea seeds using a hydroponic growing method to more closely examine the plant roots before planting these crops in more traditional soil.

Jahan has plants ready to be harvested and more that are still growing, but she hopes to develop more hardy chickpea lines that can grow in the most inclement of conditions.

“When I’m testing 200 lines of chickpeas, where will I grow them? Research is a continuous process,” she said. “Whether or not the outside is extremely cold temperatures, I cannot stop my research.”