Grant: Engage Plus Grants Program

Inocucor Technologies Inc. (Inocucor) is a Canadian company specializing in the development of sustainableplant-microbial agricultural products. Healthy soils include proliferating communities of plantgrowth-promoting bacteria which contribute to higher crop yields. Therefore, enriching soils with the beneficialbacterial communities and treating plants with biostimulants represent products provided by Inocucor. TheCompany's 1st generation IN-M1 product is currently on sale in 22 US states for high value produce and theCompany's 2nd generation product is registered in 15 states for row crops. Since global temperatures are on therise, Canadian farmers have been experiencing warmer than usual growth seasons. Although warmertemperatures may increase photosynthetic activity and cause earlier reproductive development, the yield willnot necessarily increase due to reduced soil water content. This will induce photoinhibition of photosynthesiswhich reduces rates of photosynthesis, plant growth and seed yield. Recent results indicated that application ofIN-M1 to wheat plants grown at higher than normal temperatures likely increases leaf chlorophyllaccumulation. Furthermore, winter but not spring wheat plants grown at higher than normal temperatures andtreated with IN-M1 had increased seed yield by up to 40%! Inocucor would like to confirm the link betweenIN-M1 product, shoot photosynthesis and grain yield in response to higher than normal growth temperaturespredicted to be associated with global warming. The company expects that the proposed research will provide ablueprint information that can then be used to design new bacterial soil biostimulants to improve the yield ofheat and drought stressed crops that will have the potential to benefit Canadian agriculture.