The extensive use of fertilizers and pesticides to sustain agricultural production has a significant environmental impact, highlighting the need for more eco-friendly alternatives. One promising approach is to promote the use of arbuscular mycorrhizal fungi, which naturally colonize plant roots and establish beneficial symbiotic relationships.

There is an increasing commercial demand for plant varieties resistant to climate change and diseases, more productive with fewer inputs... There is also a growing interest for recovering native varieties, whose conservation contributes to the maintenance of biodiversity. The CSIC in Galicia works to recover varieties of interest.

CSIC and the Universitat Politècnica de València have developed a new generation of plant vaccines based on RNA molecules. Highly specific, they can be applied in a non-transgenic way. Their main use is the control of diseases caused by viruses, as an alternative to traditional pesticides.

The CSIC and the Universitat Politècnica de València have developed a new generation of treatments based on highly specific microRNAs. These treatments can be applied to plants in a non-transgenic way to control the expression of genes of interest. It serves as an alternative to current treatments relying on traditional agrochemicals.

A CSIC team has developed a process to manufacture activated carbon filters from rice straw and wood shavings. The process makes it possible to obtain more efficient filters than conventional ones for the elimination of emerging organic pollutants in water. Companies interested in licensing the patent are being sought.

CSIC scientists have identified food peptides that induce the secretion of appetite-suppressing (anorexigenic) hormones and hormones involved in glucose metabolism. They are now looking for pharmaceutical or food companies interested in licensing the patent to develop products for the treatment of obesity and diabetes. Very recent experiments show that peptides prevent blood sugar spikes.

Scientists at the Institute of Molecular and Cellular Biology of Plants (CSIC-UPV) and the Rocasolano Institute of Physical Chemistry (CSIC) have managed to stimulate plant resistance to drought by modifying a molecular plant’s receptor, which is activated by a mimetic molecule. The results have been patented.

A team at CSIC's Institute of Polymer Science and Technology has developed a new packaging adhesive that allows adhesion and separation properties to be reversible at will. It combines the advantages of multilayer packaging with improved recycling.