A driving force of technology

Everybody loves the smell of fresh bread. For thousands of years its core ingredient—wheat—has helped fuel the rise of modern civilisation.

But did you know that wheat has also been powering the technology industry?

The world’s reliance on wheat as a food source has driven technological advances to manage the crop efficiently. GPS-guided tractors, Internet of Things, high performance computing, you name it!

Unravelling the wheat genome

Wheat has a large and complex genome which proved challenging to analyse. New gene-sequencing hardware and processing algorithms were innovated to understand the complexity of its genome—generating a deluge of data that require HPC for analysis.

Published in 2018, the complete wheat genome allows researchers to enhance its yield and resistance to diseases, as well as improving its nutritional value to meet the world’s ever-growing food requirements.

Ushering in sustainable farming

Precision agriculture technology—enabled by HPC-powered artificial intelligence (AI) and data analytics—is paving the way for smarter and more sustainable farming techniques.

For instance, drone-based monitoring systems can capture detailed images of vast areas, while wheat heads are detected and analysed using AI running on HPC.

That equips farmers with a cost-effective and accurate method to monitor both wheat health and yield!