The batch of the 2022 Student Team from the Faculty of Biology UGM chaired by Birrul Qisty Mutmainnah Nazara with her two colleagues Firchamy Vuqi Aulia and Anisah Qurrotu’Ainii won 3rd place in the National Scientific Writing Competition under the guidance of Dr. Wiko Arif Wibowo S.Si. This competition was organized by the Porseni of the Faculty of Agriculture, Universitas Sumatera Utara from January 5th to February 25th, 2023 with the theme “Implementation of the Smart Farming Concept in Realizing Sustainable Agriculture in Indonesia after the Covid-19 Pandemic”. The activity took place in three stages, abstract submission, full paper submission, and the final event which was the presentation of works for the 10 teams that passed in front of the jury.
This time, Qisty and her team chose the agro-complex subtheme, with the working title “Implementation of the Grafting-Digital Gene Expression Method on Cacao Plants (Theobroma cacao) as a Leading Commodity in the IKN Region (Capital of the Archipelago)“. The background for writing this scientific paper is the problem of flooding that occurred in one of the IKN sub-districts and the threat of decreasing cocoa production in the region. Based on the problems that have been described in the area, Qisty and the team plan to find a solution by initiating a breakthrough of a grafting method based on the Digital Gene Expression Profile which shows the compatibility of the two plants to be grafted.
Through this method, two types of cacao plant varieties are combined to produce high-quality plants that are resistant to pests and diseases caused by flooding which are expected to become the leading commodity of IKN. Through this work, Qisty and her team also hope to provide benefits of the application of Digital Gene Expression Profile-based grafting technology to the public. They also hope, through this competition, they can encourage and motivate other students.
