Genome Edited Crops for Improved Food Security
Richa Bora*
Dept. of Plant Breeding & Genetics, Assam Agricultural University, Jorhat, Assam (785 013), India
Priyabrat Hazarika
Dept. of Agronomy, Assam Agricultural University, Jorhat, Assam (785 013), India
DOI: NIL
Keywords: CRISPR-Cas9, Food security, Genome editing, Site-Directed Nuclease
Abstract
Food is a basic necessity of all forms of life. There are over 50,000 edible plants but not everyone is lucky to have enough food to eat. According to FAO, food security means that everyone, at all times, has physical, social and economic access to sufficient, safe and nutritious food for an active and healthy life. In India around 195 million people are currently undernourished. Conventional plant breeding has developed numerous crop varieties but not enough to meet the demands of food requirements due to limited genetic variation and linkage drags of undesirable traits. Genome editing could be utilized as a promising tool to address these problems for achieving the goal of end hunger by 2030. With the advancement of research on Site-Directed Nuclease (SDN) methods and various genome-edited tools viz., ZFNs, Meganucleases, TALENs, and CRISPR-Cas9, improved varieties could be developed for the benefit of smallholder farmers and consumers.
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Reference
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