131600Novel biomaterial engineering technologies, molecular and hormone analyses to improve lettuce seed priming and production in stressful environmentsClosedBEIS-Funded ProgrammesInnovate UKSeed priming is conducted by seed technology companies improve the quality of vegetable seeds including lettuce. Primed lettuce seeds provide alleviated dormancy, fast and uniform germination, followed by sturdy and uniform seedlings to ensure improved primary leafy salad crop production even in stressful environments. In this multi-disciplinary collaboration project between Germains Seed Technology (Norfolk, www.germains.com) and the seed science lab at Royal Holloway University of London (RHUL, Prof G Leubner and Dr T Steinbrecher, www.seedbiology.eu) we will use novel biomaterial engineering technologies, growth imaging and molecular/hormone analytics to provide innovative diagnostic tools which will enable to further improve the lettuce seed priming process. The feasibility and commercial potential of these novel agricultural technologies will be explored with the vision to further improve priming, plantlet raising and primary crop production of leafy salad.