Reply #16: I'm a little puzzled by your comment...

[Lexingtonian]

Have they cracked the DNA of the milieu in which the rice is grown? The myth of Gene Theory continues.

This bit puzzles me. I'm not sure I can quite answer what you are trying to ask, or tell, us but I'll be happy to try. The title of the article contains a poor choice of ideas and metaphors in summarizing its contents, that is quite true.

Should be good for more research which will, of course, require more funding.

Well, as something of a biologist (on the animal/biomedical side of the field) I don't know how to assign further research a monetary value. But surely, of the many ways American and other governments spend money, this delivers something of permanent value and is definitive knowledge. Buying more tanks or occupying Third World countries, and most other uses of government money, leaves us almost nothing tangible, by comparison, over generations and centuries, even if it has its own variety of importance. Who remembers the American war waged against Tripoli?

How well people use this advance as knowledge in the short term is hard to tell, but it leads to further development of rice as a better food crop in the long term rather inevitably.