07.07.2020

Enhancing plant performance through combinatorial engineering of signaling networks.

Tina Romeis (IPB) and her team at the FU Berlin together with researchers from the MPI-MP Potsdam and the University of Münster recently published a study on drought tolerance and plant water-use efficiency. The pressure on agriculture to use water more efficiently ('more crop per drop') is high in light of global change. Complex plant traits such as water-use efficiency and drought tolerance are determined by many physiological processes whose interplay is not well understood. In their study, the researchers used a combinatorial engineering approach to optimize signaling networks involved in the control of stress tolerance. Screening a large population of combinatorically transformed plant lines, they identified a combination of calcium-dependent protein kinase genes that confers enhanced drought stress tolerance and improved growth under water-limiting conditions. Targeted introduction of this gene combination into plants increased plant survival under drought and enhanced growth under water-limiting conditions. With their work, the researchers present a strategy for engineering complex signaling networks to improve plant performance under adverse environmental conditions, which does not depend on prior understanding of network function.

Original publication:
Schulz P, Piepenburg K, Lintermann R, et al. Improving plant drought tolerance and growth under water limitation through combinatorial engineering of signaling networks [published online ahead of print, 2020 Jul 5]. Plant Biotechnol J. 2020;10.1111/pbi.13441. doi:10.1111/pbi.13441