Email: w.ma@Murdoch.edu.au

Two challenges that the global wheat industry is facing are a lowering nitrogen-use efficiency (NUE) and an increase in the reporting of wheat-protein related health issues. Sulphur deficiencies in soil have also been reported as a global issue.

The current study used largescale field and glasshouse experiments to investigate the sulphur fertilization impacts on sulphur deficient soil. Here we show that sulphur addition increased NUE by more than 20% through regulating glutamine synthetase. Alleviating the soil sulphur deficiency highly significantly reduced the amount of gliadin proteins up to 82%, indicating that soil sulphur levels is related to the biosynthesis of proteins involved in wheat-induced human pathologies.

The sulphur-dependent wheat gluten biosynthesis network was studied using transcriptome analysis and amino acid metabolomic pathway studies. Results revealed that S-adenosylmethionine plays the key role in modulating the biosynthesis of gluten components.

The study concluded that sulphur deficiency in modern farming systems is not only having a profound negative impact on wheat productivity but is also impacting on wheat consumers’ health.