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CRISPR/Cas9 technology for improving agronomic traits and future prospective in agriculture

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Main conclusion

In this review, we have focused on the CRISPR/Cas9 technology for improving the agronomic traits in plants through point mutations, knockout, and single base editing, and we highlighted the recent progress in plant metabolic engineering.

Abstract

CRISPR/Cas9 technology has immense power to reproduce plants with desired characters and revolutionizing the field of genome engineering by erasing the barriers in targeted genome editing. Agriculture fields are using this advance genome editing tool to get the desired traits in the crops plants such as increase yield, improve product quality attributes, and enhance resistance against biotic and abiotic stresses by identifying and editing genes of interest. This review focuses on CRISPR/Cas-based gene knockout for trait improvement and single base editing to boost yield, quality, stress tolerance, and disease resistance traits in crops. Use of CRISPR/Cas9 system to facilitate crop domestication and hybrid breeding are also touched. We summarize recent developments and up-gradation of delivery mechanism (nanotechnology and virus particle-based delivery system) and progress in multiplex gene editing. We also shed lights in advances and challenges of engineering the important metabolic pathways that contain a variety of dietary metabolites and phytochemicals. In addition, we endorsed substantial technical hurdles and possible ways to overcome the unpredictability of CRISPR/Cas technology for broader application across various crop species. We speculated that by making a strong interconnection among all genomic fields will give a gigantic bunt of knowledge to develop crop expressing desired traits.

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Fig. 1
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taken from KEGG genome for plants (www.genome.jp/kegg/pathway). PAL phenylalanine ammonia lyase, C4H cinnamate 4-hydroxylase, 4CL 4coumarate CoA ligase, CHS chalcone synthase, FNS flavone synthase, FLS Flavonol synthase, IFS Isoflavone synthase, DFR Dihydroflavonol 4-reductase, ANS Anthocyanidin synthase, LAR leucoanthocyanidin reductase, LCR Leucoanthocyanidin reductase

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Acknowledgements

Special thanks to the Postdoctoral Project from GXU and National Natural Science Foundation of China for providing grants to accomplish this article.

Funding

Supported by the Postdoctoral Project from GXU. This work was supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China grant no: 31771775 and 31171524 and China Postdoctoral Science Foundation grant number: 2021M693797.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. State Key Laboratory for Conservation and Utilization of Subtropical Agro-Bioresources, College of Agriculture, Guangxi University, 100 Daxue Rd., Nanning, Guangxi, 530004, People’s Republic of China

    Muhammad Junaid Rao & Lingqiang Wang

  2. Guangxi Key Laboratory of Sugarcane Biology, College of Agriculture, Guangxi University, 100 Daxue Rd., 8, Nanning, Guangxi, 530004, People’s Republic of China

    Muhammad Junaid Rao & Lingqiang Wang

  3. Key Laboratory of Horticultural Plant Biology (Ministry of Education), Key Laboratory of Biology and Genetic Improvement of Horticultural Crops (Ministry of Agriculture), Huazhong Agricultural University, Wuhan, Hubei, 430070, People’s Republic of China

    Muhammad Junaid Rao

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  1. Muhammad Junaid Rao
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  2. Lingqiang Wang
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Correspondence to Lingqiang Wang.

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Communicated by Gerhard Leubner.

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Rao, M.J., Wang, L. CRISPR/Cas9 technology for improving agronomic traits and future prospective in agriculture. Planta 254, 68 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00425-021-03716-y

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