A rapid and efficient method to obtain germline gene editing in plants

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Breeding new improved crops generally involves identifying a plant gene that brings an improved characteristic, for example increased yield or disease resistance, and then putting that improved gene into the crop variety that is grown commercially (often replacing the existing gene that was there). The new gene editing techniques that have recently been developed (and have made news headlines) now enable researchers to change the sequence of an existing gene in a plant in a very specific way so that it confers the improved characteristic without the need to transfer foreign genes into the crop plant. Most commonly such gene editing approaches in plants involve genetic transformation and as a result those plants are classed as GMOs. This project will develop an alternative approach that will enable precise gene editing of plants for crop improvement without the need to make transgenic plants. As with gene therapy, which is used in medicine for treatment of some diseases, we will use a virus (in this case a plant virus) as a vector to get the components needed for gene editing into the plant cell. Plant viruses have long been used to express foreign genes in plants, for example for the production of vaccines. The problem is that plants have a mechanism to exclude viruses from their meristems which are the parts of the plant that go on to make flowers and seed. This is problematic for gene editing as it prevents the new improved version of the gene from being inherited in the next generation.The novelty of this research project is that we will create a virus vector that is able to get into the meristems of plants and so the gene editing will be able to occur in the meristem. This means that seed can be harvested that contains the improved version of the gene. In this way scientists and crop breeders will be able to create a large number of gene edited plants without having to make transgenic plants.Another advantage of being able to use this new virus vector for gene editing is that it is able to infect more than 400 species, an order of magnitude more than can be currently genetically transformed, and so it will greatly expand the number of crops that can be improved by gene editing, including many crops that are grown in developing countries.