MOSS: A novel genetic technology for low-cost and rapid crop breeding in response to climate change and population booming

植物直接提供人类消耗的80%以上的食物，是牲畜的主要营养来源。然而，环境因素、植物疾病和虫害不断威胁着粮食供应。据估计，到2050年，世界人口将达到100亿，粮食需求将增加70%（FOA）。随着可耕地退化和气候变化，目前的农业系统将难以满足这一需求。由于目前农作物品种的年产量增长（约1.5%）无法满足到2050年的全球粮食需求，因此迫切需要能够承受气候变化并提高产量的更好的农作物品种。叶绿体和线粒体是植物中的天然发电站，但由于缺乏有效的技术，许多作物中的叶绿体和线粒体尚未得到改善。如果我们能改进重要的叶绿体和线粒体基因（细胞质基因），我们可以开发安全，气候适应性强，高产作物快速和廉价.Chlomita生物科学，曼彻斯特大学的分支机构，已经开发出一种技术，可以利用作物叶绿体/线粒体基因资源，在1-2年内快速培育气候适应性和高产作物，与传统的解决方案相比具有更少的资源投资。在这个项目中，Chlomita将通过开发一种线粒体特性来证明这项技术的能力，这种线粒体特性将导致高性能杂交作物的生产速度比目前可用的方法快70%。我们的解决方案将显著降低种子公司的育种成本，并使农民更负担得起高性能种子。

Plants directly provide over 80 % of the food consumed by humans and are the primary source of nutrition for livestock. However, environmental factors, plant diseases and pests constantly threaten the availability of food supply. The world population is estimated to reach 10 billion by 2050, increasing the demand for food by 70% (FOA). With the degradation of arable land and climate change, the current agricultural system will struggle to meet this demand. Better crop varieties that can withstand climate change and increase yield are urgently needed as the current annual yield gain (~1.5%) in crop varieties cannot meet the global food demand expected by 2050\. Chloroplasts and mitochondria are the natural powerhouses in plants but have not been improved in many crops due to the lack of effective technology. If we can improve important chloroplasts and mitochondria genes (cytoplasmic genes), we can develop safe, climate-resilient, high-yielding crops rapidly and cheaply.Chlomita Bioscience, a University of Manchester Spinout, have developed a technology that can tap into the resources in crop chloroplast/mitochondrial genes, to rapidly breed climate-resilient and high-yielding crops within 1-2 years, with less resource investment than conventional solutions. For this project, Chlomita will demonstrate the capability of the technology by developing a mitochondrial trait leading to high-performing hybrid crops \>70% faster than currently available methods. Our solution will significantly reduce the breeding cost for seed companies and make high-performing seeds more affordable to farmers.