b'todays generation does keeping accurate records using the latest digital technology. We need the same commitment that made those old pocket notebooks so valuable to the way data is handled todayand thats digitally, Cubbage says. Helping growers take ownership of that data and ensuring its consistent is one missing piece to seeing the seed industry truly utilize all precision ag has to offer. I know its frustrating for the research-ers and the seed companies because the data is just very messy, Cubbage says. To do this, tech companies like Bushel and others are working towards help-ing the agriculture industry build the necessary digital infrastructure to allow information to be transmitted seamlessly across the supply chain, effectively doing away with the paper scale ticket farmers have been used to for decades.Sensors, like you find on drones and in the field, have a potential to adapt new AI But it will also take consistent trainingtechnology in a way that could be game changing for the farm. to build these digital best practices.Quantum Breeding solutions that are a significant leap for- $1 billion on that alone.Historically, plant breeding has beenward, Byrum says, mentioning this revo- Proteomics studies the compositions, treated like an "arms race, with the ration- lution will be both disruptive and exciting. structures, interactions and functions ale that more is better.Todays competitive advantage inof proteins and their cellular activities. More yield testing plots, more molec- breeding is dependent on scale andThis can reveal how specific genes are ular markers, more screening and selec- efficiency but what if scale and effi- expressed while traditional genomics only tion techniques of x. But every systemciency are no longer the key competitivereveals what genes are present. across domains eventually experiencesbarriers? he asks. The potential is toBiotech 2.0 will be huge. I believe the diminishing returns and eventually, onedeliver products to a grower with greaterbiotech space is ripe to explode, Byrum needs to ask how to reimagine the prob- precision and speed with lower cost ofsays.lem, Byrum says. development. Colby believes seed companies can It is time for a mathematical revolu- continue to lead the charge in embracing tion in agriculture, he says.Not FictionFuture! the advances offered by ag tech, both He explains that in the past, compu- The future of food is happening now, andbecause of their size and positioning in tational power did not exist to conductseed companies need to be ready to leadthe industry.the ideal mathematical approaches, butas technology continues to evolve. The seed industry is so specialized, now both data and computational powerEven outside of ag, on the AI and theso like they\'ve done for the last 20 years, are often not limiting and we need torobotics side of things, we probably havethey\'ll be able to capitalize on a lot of this embrace the future of quantum comput- no idea just how fast it\'s moving behindtech earlier than others in the ag world, ing. This is something that is only reallythe scenes. Were looking at a warp speedhe says.being utilized outside the ag industry inwe probably aren\'t ready for and itsAnd thats critical to continuing to feed spaces such as finance and military going to have a huge impact on thingsthe world.applications. that are happening, Cubbage says.The quicker we can get new genet-There is opportunity in the ag start- Byrum expects to see a huge impactics that are needed to the farm gate, the up ecosystem to fill this gap. On theon the discovery space, comparable tobetter off we\'re going to be. A lot of these technology side, I estimate that a purethe biotech and big genomics wave of thetechnologies, from the field to the lab, are quantum technology solution to be avail- 90s and 2000s, going to be able to help ensure that our able in five to 10 years. The good newsNow were focused on proteomics orseed stocks are better than theyve ever is that you do not need to wait becauseprotein genomics, Byrum says, mention- been and they can meet the demands of there are several paths that utilize partialing that China has committed to spendingthe farmer, Colby says.SW26/ SEEDWORLD.COMJUNE 2023'