Molecular engineering in plants articles within Nature Communications

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  • Article
    | Open Access

    Asparaginyl endopeptidases (AEPs) are plant proteases that can also function as ligases, catalyzing the production of cyclic plant peptides. Here, the authors identify structural features that govern AEP ligase activity, providing insights to aid the discovery and engineering of ligase-type AEPs.

    • M. A. Jackson
    • , E. K. Gilding
    •  & D. J. Craik

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Efficient gene targeting in higher plants remains challenging. Here, the authors develop a sequential transformation method for CRISPR/Cas9-mediated gene targeting in Arabidopsis and demonstrate its functionality at five genomic sites in two endogenous loci.

    • Daisuke Miki
    • , Wenxin Zhang
    •  & Jian-Kang Zhu

  • Article
    | Open Access

    A systematic analysis of lignin biosynthetic genes to quantitatively understand their effect on wood properties is still lacking. Here, the authors integrate transcriptomic, proteomic, fluxomic and phenomic data to quantify the impact of perturbations of transcript abundance on lignin biosynthesis and wood properties.

    • Jack P. Wang
    • , Megan L. Matthews
    •  & Vincent L. Chiang

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Availability of irrigation water will be an increasing barrier to global crop yield increases. Here the authors show transgenic tobacco plants overexpressing Photosystem II Subunit S have less stomatal opening in response to light and a 25% reduction in water loss per CO2 assimilated under replicated field trials.

    • Katarzyna Głowacka
    • , Johannes Kromdijk
    •  & Stephen P. Long

  • Article
    | Open Access

    The newly recognized Fusarium wilt pathogen tropical race 4 is threatening worldwide banana production. Here, the authors transform Cavendish bananas with a resistance gene, RGA2, from diploid banana or a nematode-derived gene, Ced9, and confer resistance to natural infection under field conditions.

    • James Dale
    • , Anthony James
    •  & Robert Harding

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Designer organelles could allow the isolation of synthetic biological pathways from endogenous components of the host cell. Here the authors engineer a peroxisomal protein import pathway orthogonal to the naturally occurring system.

    • Laura L. Cross
    • , Rupesh Paudyal
    •  & Stuart L. Warriner

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Targeted homologous recombination between parental chromosomes could facilitate precision breeding of crop plants. Here, Filler Hayutet al. show that CRISPR-Cas9 can be used to induce DNA double strand breaks in somatic tissue and achieve targeted recombination between homologs at an endogenous locus in tomato.

    • Shdema Filler Hayut
    • , Cathy Melamed Bessudo
    •  & Avraham A. Levy

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Cpf1 is a type V CRISPR effector protein that has different target and guide RNA requirements compared to Cas9, thus offering an addition tool for precision genome editing. Here Kimet al. show that Cpf1 ribonucleoprotein can be introduced into protoplasts and used for transgene-free gene editing in plants.

    • Hyeran Kim
    • , Sang-Tae Kim
    •  & Sang-Gyu Kim

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Genome editing in plants typically requires the expression of Cas9 and guide RNA from stably transformed plasmid DNA. Here, the authors show that successful editing can be achieved after delivery of the Cas9-guide RNA complex as a ribonucleoprotein to maize embryos via biolistics.

    • Sergei Svitashev
    • , Christine Schwartz
    •  & A. Mark Cigan

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Plant synthetic biology offers the potential to re-engineer crops, but requires efficient methods to prepare constructs for transformation. Here Shih et al. develop jStack, a method that utilizes yeast homologous recombination and a library of DNA parts, to efficiently assemble plant transformation vectors.

    • Patrick M. Shih
    • , Khanh Vuu
    •  & Dominique Loqué

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Plant genome editing typically relies upon transgenic intermediates, which is a concern given the current regulatory requirements concerning GMOs. Here, Zhang et al. describe a method to edit wheat genomes by transiently expressing CRISPR/Cas9 DNA or RNA, and are able to generate mutant plants with no detectable transgenes.

    • Yi Zhang
    • , Zhen Liang
    •  & Caixia Gao

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Switching target protein accumulation and activity by portable conditional degrons is potentially useful for both basic research and bioengineering. Here the authors present a versatile system to tune protein levels in live animals and plants using a temperature-sensitive N-end rule degradation signal.

    • Frederik Faden
    • , Thomas Ramezani
    •  & Nico Dissmeyer

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