Sustainable food systems-a health perspective.

Malnutrition in all forms, ranging from undernourishment to obesity and associated diet-related diseases, is one of the leading causes of death worldwide, while food systems often have major environmental impacts. Rapid global population growth and increases in demands for food and changes in dietary habits create challenges to provide universal access to healthy food without creating negative environmental, economic, and social impacts. This article discusses opportunities for and challenges to sustainable food systems from a human health perspective by making the case for avoiding the transition to unhealthy less sustainable diets (using India as an exemplar), reducing food waste by changing consumer behaviour (with examples from Japan), and using innovations and new technologies to reduce the environmental impact of healthy food production.

Development and characterization of microsatellite markers for Lilium longiflorum (Liliaceae).

Premise Of The Study: Ten microsatellite primers were developed to obtain information on genetic variation in Lilium longiflorum, a bulbous species showing high intraspecific genetic differentiation. •

Methods And Results: Of 61 microsatellite loci isolated using the dual suppression PCR technique, 10 loci were effective to characterize and estimate genetic variation in two populations of L. longiflorum.

Hybridization and asymmetric introgression between Rhododendron eriocarpum and R. indicum on Yakushima Island, southwest Japan.

We examined natural hybridization between two morphologically and ecologically divergent species on Yakushima Island-the light-purple flowered Rhododendron eriocarpum native to seaside habitats and the red flowered R. indicum native to riverside habitats. By investigation of morphological traits and amplified fragment length polymorphisms (AFLP) we found that hybrid individuals morphologically and genetically intermediate between the two species grow mainly in the seaside areas of the island.