Professor of RUDN University and Chinese scientists have discovered how to increase crop yields without harming the environment

An international group of scientists, including Professor Yakov Kuzyakov of the Agro-Technological Institute of RUDN, made an important discovery in agricultural sciences. The study, published in January 2026, shows that a simple change in the arrangement of plant leaves (canopy architecture) allows simultaneously increasing the global food production by a third and achieving a sharp reduction in greenhouse gas emissions.

By 2050, humanity will need to produce twice as much food to feed the growing population. At the same time, agriculture is the main source of nitrous oxide (N₂O), a gas that destroys the ozone layer and300 timeshas a stronger impact on the climate than carbon dioxide. Scientists have tried to increase crop yields with the help of fertilizers and new varieties, but they overlooked a simple thing — the form of the plant itself.

“Clothing” for the harvest

“Imagine a wheat field. If the leaves are arranged chaotically and cover each other, the upper leaves catch almost all the light, and the lower ones are “starving” in the shade. But if the leaves are “gathered” more compactly, in bundles — like blinds that let light through — then the sun penetrates deep down. This is the architecture of the canopy.” —Yakov Kuzyakov.

Scientists have introduced a special indicator — the canopy compactness index (CI). Imagine a scale from 0 to 1. The closer to zero — the more “tufted,” compact the canopy is. The closer to one — the more evenly the leaves are distributed across the canopy, like a dense brush.

Using 16 years of NASA satellite images (MODIS) and data from thousands of fields worldwide, the team applied artificial intelligence to separate the influence of weather, soil, and fertilizers from the influence of leaf shape. The result surprised even the researchers themselves.

• More light = more food.Rice, wheat, corn, and soy with a compact canopy architecture consistently yielded higher harvests. The optimal index is approximately0.55–0.58(moderately compact canopy).
• Less shadow = less gas.With this form of plant canopy, nitrogen oxide (N₂O) emissions dropped sharply.

Mechanism of Salvation

“The connection is simple and elegant. A compact canopy works like a solar panel with redirected light: the lower ‘shaded’ leaves receive enough radiation for photosynthesis, so before they used to ‘idle.’ The plant begins to produce more organic matter — hence the yield growth. But there is also a second, hidden effect,” —Yakov Kuzyakov.

It turned out that plants need more nitrogen for active photosynthesis. It begins to absorb nitrogen from the soil more actively, leaving fewer resources for soil bacteria that produce the harmful nitrous oxide.

“The process audit has a double benefit: we not only increase biomass, but also ‘cut off oxygen’ (literally — nitrogen) to the process of greenhouse gas formation. The efficiency of nitrogen use (NUE) is skyrocketing,” —Yakov Kuzyakov.

Increase of 336 million tons

If farmers around the world could slightly adjust the shape of their sowing windows to the global average optimum (50th percentile), the results would be impressive.

In this case, according to scientists’ forecasts, the global crop yield will increase by336 million tonsin year. This is enough to feed800 million people — practically the entire population of Africa suffering from hunger. At the same time, N2O emissions will be reduced byÂ41.6%.Such a result is difficult to achieve even with a complete ban on fertilizers. The economic effect of these indicators is assessed in108 billion dollarsUSA in the year.

How to implement this in life?

Scientists do not propose complex gene engineering for tomorrow. Everything already exists in nature.

• Selection. It turns out that the shape of the crown (the angle of leaf inclination, and density) is encoded in the gene. Scientists have shown that in Asia and Africa, rice varieties grow with a radically different CI index.
• Measurement simplicity. Any agronomist can buy a quadcopter with a camera, photograph the field, and a special program (similar to how scientists processed satellite images) will promptly show the compactness index. There is no need to wait years for soil analysis results.
• Practice. You can simply select the variety for your region, where the leaves are arranged more “intelligently”, or slightly adjust the planting density.

A look into the future

The study led by a Chinese colleague with the participation of Professor RUDN opens new opportunities for improving crop yields.

“We were accustomed to fighting with the soil: pouring fertilizers, water, changing it. But it turned out that you can simply ‘trim’ the crown or choose the right variety. The plant itself will begin to regulate the nitrogen cycle. This is the path to sustainable agriculture without harm to the environment,” —Yakov Kuzyakov.

Now the global scientific community faces the task: to create varieties for each region with a given compactness index, in order to feed the world and save the climate without waiting for 2050.