Dirk Schenke, Daguang Cai,

Applications of CRISPR/Cas to Improve Crop Disease Resistance: Beyond Inactivation

of Susceptibility Factors,
iScience,
Volume 23, Issue 9,
2020,
101478,
ISSN 2589-0042,
https://doi.org/10.1016/j.isci.2020.101478.
(https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2589004220306702)
Abstract: Summary
Current crop production systems are prone to increasing pathogen pressure.
Fundamental understanding of molecular plant-pathogen interactions, the
availability of crop and pathogen genomic information, as well as emerging genome
editing permits a novel approach for breeding of crop disease resistance. We
describe here strategies to identify new targets for resistance breeding with focus
on interruption of the compatible plant-pathogen interaction by CRISPR/Cas-mediated
genome editing. Basically, crop genome editing can be applied in several ways to
achieve this goal. The most common approach focuses on the “simple” knockout by
non-homologous end joining repair of plant susceptibility factors required for
efficient host colonization. However, genome re-writing via homology-directed
repair or base editing can also prevent host manipulation by changing the targets
of pathogen-derived effectors or molecules beyond recognition, which also decreases
plant susceptibility. We conclude that genome editing by CRISPR/Cas will become
increasingly indispensable to generate in relatively short time beneficial
resistance traits in crops to meet upcoming challenges.
Keywords: Biological Sciences; Biotechnology; Plant Biotechnology; Plant Biology;
Plant Genetics