When the green revolution began in the 1960s, it was before the revolution in molecular genetics: IR8, the first miracle rice, was bred without knowledge of the genes that blessed it with high yields. Breeders today can zero in on genes, but they still use traditional techniques and ever more complex pedigrees. That’s how they’ve created rice varieties adapted to rising sea levels—including Swarna-Sub1, popular in India, and IR64 Sub1, whose pedigree is shown here.