People are willing to take such risks for the Purdue seed because sorghum is the primary food source for 300 million people in sub-Saharan Africa. Sorghum is able to withstand droughts and poor soils, and, as a crop indigenous to the region, it is widely available. But the story didn't stop with a successful program to help Africans. One of the students who graduated from the program led a team that developed Pioneer hybrid 3394, one of the best-selling corn hybrids in U.S. history. Improving sorghum varieties that are grown in this country.
Sorghum is an important livestock feed, particularly in the western states.
Gaining knowledge of crop genetics. It has one-third of the DNA per cell that corn has, so it is much easier to find important genes for crop improvement. The genes are in the same locations, though, so once we find an important gene in sorghum, we have a good idea where it is in corn. For their perseverance and years of hard work, the researchers involved with the Purdue sorghum breeding program have been given the Purdue School of Agriculture's 1998 Interdisciplinary Team Award. Witchweed, also known as striga, is a parasitic plant that can cause crop losses of up to 40 percent in parts of sub-Saharan Africa.