Thread Rating:
  • 0 Vote(s) - 0 Average
  • 1
  • 2
  • 3
  • 4
  • 5

DIY African scientists gene edit vulnerable bananas for resistance to threats

#1
C C Offline
https://www.zmescience.com/science/news-...o-disease/

EXCERPTS: Bananas are one of the most important food crops in the world. [...] But ... All the cultivated banana varieties are susceptible to diseases — and Banana xanthomonas wilt (BXW) is particularly problematic...

[...] being pretty much clones doesn’t really help the case — bananas are commercially propagated through cuttings, which means that banana growers virtually clone the plants. This lack of genetic variety makes them doubly susceptible to pests and disease, and we’ve seen in the past that infections can wipe out entire cultivars of bananas (until the 1950s, the Gros Michel banana cultivar was dominant, and it was wiped out by an outbreak of the Panama disease; now, Cavendish bananas account for around half of the global production, but they too are vulnerable).

With this in mind, researchers from the International Institute of Tropical Agriculture (IITA) scientists in Kenya set out to use genetic modifications to produce more resilient bananas. They used CRISPR/Cas9, a precise but also relatively affordable gene-editing tool, a discovery that earned a Nobel Prize in 2020.

“Recent advances in CRISPR/Cas-based genome editing can accelerate banana improvement,” the researchers write in the study. “The availability of reference genome sequences and the CRISPR/Cas9-editing system has made it possible to develop disease-resistant banana by precisely editing the endogenous gene.” (MORE - details)
Reply


Possibly Related Threads…
Thread Author Replies Views Last Post
  Check⁉️ DIY: wilderness wound treatment + DIY: wild fruits lifesaver (Vanessa Blank) C C 1 149 Oct 22, 2023 07:21 PM
Last Post: Zinjanthropos
  DIY space station air leak fail + Is Venus a DIY hell or did roving Jupiter cause it? C C 0 158 Sep 30, 2020 03:00 AM
Last Post: C C
  British scientists say they could have COVID-19 vaccine by fall (DIY determination) C C 0 155 Apr 12, 2020 03:29 AM
Last Post: C C
  Before DIY protests, research what's really going on? + Janah's DIY poverty remedy C C 1 174 Feb 2, 2020 09:02 PM
Last Post: Syne
  DIY protection of chocholate treats (UK) + DIY grassroots protest of meat buying (NZ) C C 2 324 Sep 23, 2019 10:56 PM
Last Post: confused2
  Ditching DIY for 'do it for me' + Binging on DIY videos + DIY plans for tiny houses C C 0 320 Jan 26, 2019 07:11 PM
Last Post: C C
  Planning for wildfire threats (DIY general template) C C 0 302 Nov 19, 2018 07:18 PM
Last Post: C C



Users browsing this thread: 1 Guest(s)