The institute’s most ambitious project would transform rice fundamentally and perhaps increase yields dramatically. Rice, wheat, and many other plants use a type of photosynthesis known as C3, for the three-carbon compound they produce when sunlight is absorbed. Corn, sugarcane, and some other plants use C4 photosynthesis. Such crops require far less water and nitrogen than C3 crops do, “and typically have 50 percent higher yields,” says William Paul Quick of IRRI. His plan is to convert rice into a C4 crop by manipulating its own genes.