Great Power Technology.

Chapter 347 Advances in gene-enhanced rice production

"Climate? You mean weather weapons?"

Ye Zhou asked.

"Yes, limited-range, controlled-use weather weapons."

Hearing Chen Hao's answer, Ye Zhou lowered his head and pondered for a moment, then continued to ask:
"But what's the difference between this and a nuclear weapon? It's also a weapon of mass destruction... I see, you mean climate weapons are not weapons of destruction?"

"That's it. Climate weapons, or meteorological weapons, are actually a 'secondary deterrent', which can to a certain extent achieve the destruction of productivity caused by nuclear weapons, but at the same time, their destruction of means of production and human beings is limited."

"During the duration of the war, meteorological weapons can continuously weaken the productivity of the opponent on a large scale, and exert a strike efficiency far exceeding that of conventional weapons."

"At the same time, his effect is not irreversible."

"Just imagine, if you want to strike an industrial area, if you can't use nuclear bombs, what you need is a huge amount of conventional weapons, large-scale air strikes, and the strike efficiency is extremely low."

"But what about doing it with a weather weapon?"

"You just need one continuous rainstorm to bring production to a standstill in an entire industrial area."

"That's what's called secondary deterrence, or companion deterrence."

"The moment the war begins is the moment when productivity declines across the board. The benefits gained from the war cannot make up for the disadvantages caused by the continuous decline in productivity."

"Then any rational policymaker would consider whether it is worthwhile to start a war under the current circumstances."

"For example, this time, the failure on the food battlefield will cost the Ugly Country hundreds of billions of dollars, but if the war starts, they will lose trillions of dollars."

"Choose one of the two, and the conclusion is obvious."

"Unless the current situation directly meets the conditions for ultimate deterrence, a hot war cannot be waged."

"That said, it's impossible to fight a war no matter how close we get to it when we have multiple layers of secondary deterrents in place."

"Because in this case, if you don't fight, as long as you fight, it must be the end of mankind."

"---Speaking of this, isn't the Golden Crow you've been thinking about a kind of secondary deterrent? It's just that its level of deterrence is higher than weather weapons."

After listening to Chen Hao's explanation, Ye Zhou silently deduced it repeatedly in his mind, and finally raised his head.

"Well...you are right, I limited my vision. In fact, this is a very simple logic-in this era, no two countries do not have a relationship of interest, and we It is more related to the interests of the opponent."

"In fact, this alone has already brought a lot of obstacles to the hot war."

Chen Hao nodded in satisfaction, and replied:
"It's good to think clearly. It is right to have a sense of crisis, but if this sense of crisis is too much, it will be against you."

With that said, Chen Hao stood up again, patted the soil behind his buttocks and said:
"Okay, I actually didn't bring you here to let you see anything special, it's purely to let you meet the popularity and bask in the sun."

"But speaking of it, if I want to bask in the sun, I have a better place. Do you want to go shopping?"

Ye Zhou stood up after him, and asked:
"Where?"

"Ocean blue!"

Chen Hao replied with a smile.

……

Four hours later, the two of them arrived at their destination on this walk-and-go trip.

Led by a researcher named Xu Lei, the two strolled along the ridge of an experimental field of the Hailan Academy of Agricultural Sciences, feeling the evening wind blowing with the fragrance of soil and rice.

Under the setting sun in the evening, the verdant seedlings were dyed with a light red halo. Although this crop of rice has not yet reached the harvest time, but at first glance, there is a sense of satisfaction that makes people feel refreshed and happy.

Perhaps this is the instinct rooted in the genes?
Ye Zhou himself also lived in the countryside when he was a child. He remembered that he seemed to have a natural affinity for crops, especially rice.

When his grandparents went to the fields to harvest, he lay on a bed made of straw on one side of the field, breathing in the strong fragrance of the rice after being baked by the sun, and fell asleep until the sky was full of stars.

Yes, then, as now, most of the field work did not begin until the afternoon cools down.

In the past 20 years, many things have changed, but there are also some things that still maintain its logic for thousands of years, giving people a sense of stability and stability.

"It's really a good place to bask in the sun...I can feel the smell of the sea. Eh? This is the sea breeze, right? The sea breeze blows during the day and the land breeze blows at night, right?"

Chen Hao on the side stretched his waist and sighed, he turned his head to look at Xu Lei on the side, who smiled slightly and replied:
"Mr. Chen, to be honest, our experimental field is surrounded by mountains, no matter it is day or night, it is impossible to get the sea breeze."

"A small amount of moist salt in the sea breeze will bring uncertainty to seedling cultivation. We chose the location of the experimental field here to avoid this effect."

Hearing Xu Lei's words, Ye Zhou couldn't help laughing. He squatted down, observed the rice seedlings that had just been transplanted, and said:
"Psychological sea breeze is also sea breeze, as long as you have that meaning... Is this the seedling after KNR2 gene editing?"

"Yes, this small area is all, each square is a control group, a total of 64 groups of control groups."

Ye Zhou nodded slightly, curiously moved the seedlings that hadn't started earing, and continued with some uncertainty:
"The tillers of these seedlings... 15, 25, 32... 32 tillers for one seedling? Is it a bit too much? What is the final effective rate of ear formation?"

Xu Lei also squatted down next to Ye Zhou. She was wearing loose trousers and her T-shirt was covered with dried mud spots. When Zhou Zhou was explaining, a thrilling charm emanated from her body.

Of course, this kind of charm is not the attraction between men and women, but a more grand charm beyond gender.

Ye Zhou only glanced at it, then looked away, looking at the position of her finger.

"Ye Gong, look at this. In fact, the number of tillers in the plant in my hand is lower than that of the one you saw just now, but it has reached the level of 25."

"The general panicle number prediction in our test field should be between 30 and 35, which is about 35% higher than other unedited varieties."

"However, unlike the traditional law, the increase in the number of spikes in this area of ​​rice will not lead to a decrease in the number of spikes and grain weight, so in theory, the more spikes, the more harvest it will have."

"You just asked me if this piece of rice was edited by KNR2. In fact, it is more than that. In addition to KNR2, in the process of trying out new gene editors, we found that the new editors can easily edit the IPA1-Pro10 material. to edit."

"The function of this material is to increase the number of spikes and the average number of grains per spike at the same time."

"Judging from our current tillering situation, the goal of ear number has been achieved. Next, we have to wait for the harvest time to see the specific results."

Hearing this, Ye Zhou nodded in admiration.

Xu Lei spoke in an easy-to-understand manner. According to her, if the number of spikes and grains per spike can be increased by 35% at the same time while keeping the grain weight constant, the yield of a single rice plant can theoretically be directly increased by 82%. !

This is a terrifying number. If such an effect can be achieved, the food problem in the entire world will completely disappear for a long time in the future.

This almost doubles the boost... how long will it take for the population to double?
Of course, such an increase in production depends on many other factors, such as fertility, water source, thermal conditions, etc., but even in the worst case, this type of new breed should be able to increase production by more than 30%.

Not too much, but enough.

Ye Zhou stood up with emotion, his eyes crossed the rice field, and looked at the red sun that was gradually falling in the distance.

He didn't look away until his eyes were so painful that tears flowed out.

When he looked at Chen Hao again, the gloomy look on his face was gone.

Yes, the country and the nation I live in are like this.

When the sky falls, everyone has to eat their fill first.

And as long as you can eat enough, there is no problem that cannot be solved-even in the face of the strongest enemy, the power conceived from the grain is enough to tear them to pieces.

Thinking of this, Ye Zhou breathed a sigh of relief, and then asked:

"So, tonight, how are we going to arrange dinner?"

Chen Hao smiled slightly and replied:
"Simple, eat whole rice feast!"

(End of this chapter)