New research suggests that RNA editing techniques could help create more crops, as well as increase plants’ drought tolerance.
In early experiments, adding the gene coding for a type of protein called FTO into both rice and potato plants increased their growth by 50% in field trials. The plants grew significantly larger, developed longer root systems, and were more drought-tolerant. Analysis also showed that the plants increased their photosynthesis rates.
“The change is really impressive”Professor Chuan He from the University of Chicago in the US, who led the research together with Professor Guifang Jia at Peking University in China, shared. “Plus, it works with most plants we’ve tried so far and it’s a very simple tweak to make.”
The team hopes that genetically modified plants could help improve ecosystems to combat climate change and other stresses. “We rely on plants for so many things – from wood, oil, food to medicine – and gene editing offers a way to increase the reserves of materials we can get from most plants.”He added.
Rice supplemented with the FTO gene has the ability to grow quickly and withstand drought well. (Photo: CC0 Public Domain).
Scientists have been working for decades to boost crop production in the face of an increasingly uncertain climate and a growing global population. But previous processes have often been complex and have led to only incremental changes. The new research is different.
Since 2011, He’s lab has discovered that RNA doesn’t just read “blueprint” DNA then makes proteins to carry out tasks in a specific way. “blind”, The cell itself also has the ability to regulate some parts of the blueprint. It does so by placing chemical markers on RNA to regulate which proteins are made and how much of them.
The team immediately realized that this had major implications for biology. Since then, He and colleagues around the world have been trying to improve their understanding of this process and how it affects animals, plants, and various human diseases.
In the new study, they focused on FTO, the first known protein to erase chemical marks on RNA. It was discovered by Jia as a postdoctoral researcher in He’s group at the University of Chicago. The scientists knew that FTO acts on RNA to influence cell growth in humans and animals, so they tried inserting its gene into rice plants and were amazed to see how the plants grew.
In the lab, rice with the FTO gene added grew three times faster than normal. When they tested it in field tests, the plants grew 50 percent more in mass and yielded 50 percent more. They grew longer roots, photosynthesized more efficiently, and were better able to withstand drought stress.
The team continued testing on potatoes, a plant in a completely different family, and got similar results.
It took He and his colleagues a while to figure out how this happened. Further experiments showed that FTO starts working early in a plant’s growth to boost the total amount of biomass it produces.
Scientists think FTO controls a process called m6A, an important RNA modification. In this case, FTO works by deleting m6A RNA to block certain signals that tell plants to slow down and reduce their growth rate. Imagine a road with lots of stoplights; if you cover the red lights and leave only green lights on, the cars will move faster. Faster-growing plants mean we can produce more crops to increase yields.
In addition to food crops, the new method can also be applied to grasses, increasing their drought tolerance to protect areas regularly threatened by drought. It can also be applied to large trees, making them more resilient to storms by making them grow longer and deeper into the ground.. “There are many potential applications”He emphasized.
Details of the study have been published in the journal Nature Biotechnology.
According to VnExpress