St. Louis, MO and Research Triangle Park, NC – October 7, 2015 – Today Benson Hill , The Photosynthesis Company™, announced that it has received grant funding from the United Soybean Board. The grant will fund the application of Benson Hill’s proprietary techniques for crop yield improvement to soybean, leveraging PSKbase™, a computational and systems biology-based platform developed at Benson Hill . The program outputs will accelerate the application of Benson Hill’s technology to soybean and create opportunities to further increase crop yield by improving photosynthesis.
The goal of the United Soybean Board-funded research is to increase the value of the domestic soybean crop. An important component of this work is to increase soybean yield without sacrificing seed quality. “There is an immense potential for yield increase in C3 crops like soybean by optimizing photosynthetic metabolism,” said Todd Mockler, CTO at Benson Hill. “We have used PSKbase™ for gene discovery in other C3 crops and are excited about the opportunity to deploy our yield-improving technologies in soybean, the second most planted crop in North America. Given their close ties with soybean growers, we are thrilled to work with the United Soybean Board on this ambitious program.”
“The United Soybean Board is committed to funding innovative research so that US soybean growers can maintain their position as world leaders in soybean production,” said Gregg Fujan, United Soybean Board Director, Supply Target Area Coordinator, and soybean grower from Nebraska. “We believe that the project Benson Hill will undertake as part of this program can contribute to improved photosynthetic efficiency, leading to yield increases that will drive the continued growth of the soybean industry.”
About Benson Hill :
Benson Hill is an agricultural solutions company primarily focused on the development of traits to increase crop productivity. The company employs an integrated, systems-based approach to trait discovery and validation, and has developed a robust pipeline of next-generation trait candidates. Benson Hill and its partners are dedicated to addressing the foremost challenge in sustainable production agriculture – boosting crop yields on existing acreage and with limited inputs. More information can be found at bensonhill.com. – @bensonhillinc
