Is CRISPR/Cas9-based multi-trait enhancement of wheat forthcoming?

Clustered Regularly Interspaced Short Palindromic Repeats (CRISPR) technologies have been implemented in recent years in the genome editing of eukaryotes, including plants. The original system of knocking out a single gene by causing a double-strand break (DSB), followed by non-homologous end joining (NHEJ) or Homology-directed repair (HDR) has undergone many adaptations. These adaptations include employing CRISPR/Cas9 to upregulate gene expression or to cause specific small changes to the DNA sequence of the gene-of-interest.

Null mutants of a tomato Rho of plants exhibit enhanced water use efficiency without a penalty to yield.

Improving water use efficiency in crops is a significant challenge as it involves balancing water transpiration and CO uptake through stomatal pores. This study investigates the role of SlROP9, a tomato Rho of Plants protein, in guard cells and its impact on plant transpiration. The results reveal that SlROP9 null mutants exhibit reduced stomatal conductance while photosynthetic CO assimilation remains largely unaffected.

Dynamic metabolite QTL analyses provide novel biochemical insights into kernel development and nutritional quality improvement in common wheat.

Despite recent advances in crop metabolomics, the genetic control and molecular basis of the wheat kernel metabolome at different developmental stages remain largely unknown. Here, we performed widely targeted metabolite profiling of kernels from three developmental stages (grain-filling kernels [FKs], mature kernels [MKs], and germinating kernels [GKs]) using a population of 159 recombinant inbred lines. We detected 625 annotated metabolites and mapped 3173, 3143, and 2644 metabolite quantitative trait loci (mQTLs) in FKs, MKs, and GKs, respectively.

The reference genome and abiotic stress responses of the model perennial grass Brachypodium sylvaticum.

Perennial grasses are important forage crops and emerging biomass crops and have the potential to be more sustainable grain crops. However, most perennial grass crops are difficult experimental subjects due to their large size, difficult genetics, and/or their recalcitrance to transformation. Thus, a tractable model perennial grass could be used to rapidly make discoveries that can be translated to perennial grass crops.

Plasma membrane aquaporins regulate root hydraulic conductivity in the model plant Setaria viridis.

The high rate of productivity observed in panicoid crops is in part due to their extensive root system. Recently, green foxtail (Setaria viridis) has emerged as a genetic model system for panicoid grasses. Natural accessions of S.

Limitations and advantages of using metabolite-based genome-wide association studies: Focus on fruit quality traits.

In the last decades, linkage mapping has help in the location of metabolite quantitative trait loci (QTL) in many species; however, this approach shows some limitations. Recently, thanks to the most recent advanced in high-throughput genotyping technologies like next-generation sequencing, metabolite genome-wide association study (mGWAS) has been proposed a powerful tool to identify the genetic variants in polygenic agrinomic traits. Fruit flavor is a complex interaction of aroma volatiles and taste being sugar and acid ratio key parameter for flavor acceptance.

Sounds emitted by plants under stress are airborne and informative.

Stressed plants show altered phenotypes, including changes in color, smell, and shape. Yet, airborne sounds emitted by stressed plants have not been investigated before. Here we show that stressed plants emit airborne sounds that can be recorded from a distance and classified.

Guard cell activity of PIF4 and HY5 control transpiration.

Whole-plant transpiration, controlled by plant hydraulics and stomatal movement, is regulated by endogenous and environmental signals, with the light playing a dominant role. Stomatal pore size continuously adjusts to changes in light intensity and quality to ensure optimal CO intake for photosynthesis on the one hand, together with minimal water loss on the other. The link between light and transpiration is well established, but the genetic knowledge of how guard cells perceive those signals to affect stomatal conductance is still somewhat limited.

The effect of circular soil biosolarization treatment on the physiology, metabolomics, and microbiome of tomato plants under certain abiotic stresses.

Soil biosolarization (SBS) is an alternative technique for soil pest control to standard techniques such as soil fumigation and soil solarization (SS). By using both solar heating and fermentation of organic amendments, faster and more effective control of soilborne pathogens can be achieved. A circular economy may be created by using the residues of a given crop as organic amendments to biosolarize fields that produce that crop, which is termed circular soil biosolarization (CSBS).

The Alteration of Tomato Chloroplast Vesiculation Positively Affects Whole-Plant Source-Sink Relations and Fruit Metabolism under Stress Conditions.

Changes in climate conditions can negatively affect the productivity of crop plants. They can induce chloroplast degradation (senescence), which leads to decreased source capacity, as well as decreased whole-plant carbon/nitrogen assimilation and allocation. The importance, contribution and mechanisms of action regulating source-tissue capacity under stress conditions in tomato (Solanum lycopersicum) are not well understood.

ABA homeostasis and long-distance translocation are redundantly regulated by ABCG ABA importers.

The effects of abscisic acid (ABA) on plant growth, development, and response to the environment depend on local ABA concentrations. Here, we show that in , ABA homeostasis is regulated by two previously unknown ABA transporters. Adenosine triphosphate–binding cassette subfamily G member 17 (ABCG17) and ABCG18 are localized to the plasma membranes of leaf mesophyll and cortex cells to redundantly promote ABA import, leading to conjugated inactive ABA sinks, thus restricting stomatal closure.

Genomic basis underlying the metabolome-mediated drought adaptation of maize.

Background: Drought is a major environmental disaster that causes crop yield loss worldwide. Metabolites are involved in various environmental stress responses of plants. However, the genetic control of metabolomes underlying crop environmental stress adaptation remains elusive.

Guard cells control hypocotyl elongation through HXK1, HY5, and PIF4.

The hypocotyls of germinating seedlings elongate in a search for light to enable autotrophic sugar production. Upon exposure to light, photoreceptors that are activated by blue and red light halt elongation by preventing the degradation of the hypocotyl-elongation inhibitor HY5 and by inhibiting the activity of the elongation-promoting transcription factors PIFs. The question of how sugar affects hypocotyl elongation and which cell types stimulate and stop that elongation remains unresolved.

Arabidopsis leaf hydraulic conductance is regulated by xylem sap pH, controlled, in turn, by a P-type H -ATPase of vascular bundle sheath cells.

The leaf vascular bundle sheath cells (BSCs) that tightly envelop the leaf veins, are a selective and dynamic barrier to xylem sap water and solutes radially entering the mesophyll cells. Under normal conditions, xylem sap pH below 6 is presumably important for driving and regulating the transmembranal solute transport. Having discovered recently a differentially high expression of a BSC proton pump, AHA2, we now test the hypothesis that it regulates the xylem sap pH and leaf radial water fluxes.

A Cytoplasmic Receptor-like Kinase Contributes to Salinity Tolerance.

Receptor-like cytoplasmic kinases (RLCKs) are receptor kinases that lack extracellular ligand-binding domains and have emerged as a major class of signaling proteins that regulate plant cellular activities in response to biotic/abiotic stresses and endogenous extracellular signaling molecules. We have identified a rice RLCK (OsRLCK311) that was significantly higher in transgenic pSARK-IPT rice () that exhibited enhanced growth under saline conditions. Overexpression of OsRLCK311 full-length protein (RLCK311FL) and the C-terminus of OsRLCK311 (ΔN) in Arabidopsis confirmed its role in salinity tolerance, both in seedlings and mature plants.

Tomato yellow leaf curl virus (TYLCV)-resistant tomatoes share molecular mechanisms sustaining resistance with their wild progenitor Solanum habrochaites but not with TYLCV-susceptible tomatoes.

The wild tomato species Solanum habrochaites (Sh) has been used as a source for tomato yellow leaf curl virus (TYLCV) resistance in a breeding program to generate a TYLCV-resistant tomato line. Susceptible (S) and resistant (R) lines have been developed through this program. We compared the behavior of R, S and Sh tomato plants upon infection to find out whether the resistant phenotype of R plants originated from Sh.

Measuring the Hydraulic Conductivity of Grass Root Systems.

Root-system hydraulic conductivity (RSHC) is an important physiological characteristic that describes the inherent ability of roots to conduct water across a water-potential gradient between the root and the stem xylem. RSHC is commonly used as an indicator of plant functioning and adaptability to a given environment. A simple, fast, and easy-to-use protocol is described for the quantification of RSHC at the seedling stage in two important monocot species grown in hydroponic solution: Setaria viridis, a C4 model plant, and wheat, a C3 crop plant.

Correlation-based network analysis combined with machine learning techniques highlight the role of the GABA shunt in Brachypodium sylvaticum freezing tolerance.

Perennial grasses will account for approximately 16 billion gallons of renewable fuels by the year 2022, contributing significantly to carbon and nitrogen sequestration. However, perennial grasses productivity can be limited by severe freezing conditions in some geographical areas, although these risks could decrease with the advance of climate warming, the possibility of unpredictable early cold events cannot be discarded. We conducted a study on the model perennial grass Brachypodium sylvaticum to investigate the molecular mechanisms that contribute to cold and freezing adaption.

Silencing of OsCV (chloroplast vesiculation) maintained photorespiration and N assimilation in rice plants grown under elevated CO.

High CO concentrations stimulate net photosynthesis by increasing CO substrate availability for Rubisco, simultaneously suppressing photorespiration. Previously, we reported that silencing the chloroplast vesiculation (cv) gene in rice increased source fitness, through the maintenance of chloroplast stability and the expression of photorespiration-associated genes. Because high atmospheric CO conditions diminished photorespiration, we tested whether CV silencing might be a viable strategy to improve the effects of high CO on grain yield and N assimilation in rice.

Combined network analysis and machine learning allows the prediction of metabolic pathways from tomato metabolomics data.

The identification and understanding of metabolic pathways is a key aspect in crop improvement and drug design. The common approach for their detection is based on gene annotation and ontology. Correlation-based network analysis, where metabolites are arranged into network formation, is used as a complentary tool.

Hormone balance in a climacteric plum fruit and its non-climacteric bud mutant during ripening.

Hormone balance plays a crucial role in the control of fruit ripening. We characterized and compared hormone balance in two Japanese plum cultivars (Prunus salicina Lindl.), namely Santa Rosa, a climacteric type, and Sweet Miriam, its non-climacteric bud-sport mutant.

Salt tolerance of two perennial grass Brachypodium sylvaticum accessions.

We studied the salt stress tolerance of two accessions isolated from different areas of the world (Norway and Tunisia) and characterized the mechanism(s) regulating salt stress in Brachypodium sylvaticum Osl1 and Ain1. Perennial grasses are widely grown in different parts of the world as an important feedstock for renewable energy. Their perennial nature that reduces management practices and use of energy and agrochemicals give these biomass crops advantages when dealing with modern agriculture challenges such as soil erosion, increase in salinized marginal lands and the runoff of nutrients.