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1.
Plant Biotechnol J ; 20(9): 1716-1729, 2022 09.
Article in English | MEDLINE | ID: mdl-35560779

ABSTRACT

Tef is a staple food and a valuable cash crop for millions of people in Ethiopia. Lodging is a major limitation to tef production, and for decades, the development of lodging resistant varieties proved difficult with conventional breeding approaches. We used CRISPR/Cas9 to introduce knockout mutations in the tef orthologue of the rice SEMIDWARF-1 (SD-1) gene to confer semidwarfism and ultimately lodging resistance. High frequency recovery of transgenic and SD-1 edited tef lines was achieved in two tef cultivars by Agrobacterium-mediated delivery into young leaf explants of gene editing reagents along with transformation and regeneration enhancing morphogenic genes, BABY BOOM (BBM) and WUSCHEL2 (WUS2). All of the 23 lines analyzed by next-generation sequencing had at least two or more alleles of SD-1 mutated. Of these, 83% had tetra-allelic frameshift mutations in the SD-1 gene in primary tef regenerants, which were inherited in subsequent generations. Phenotypic data generated on T1 and T2 generations revealed that the sd-1 lines have reduced culm and internode lengths with no reduction in either panicle or peduncle lengths. These characteristics are comparable with rice sd-1 plants. Measurements of lodging, in greenhouse-grown plants, showed that sd-1 lines have significantly higher resistance to lodging at the heading stage compared with the controls. This is the first demonstration of the feasibility of high frequency genetic transformation and CRISPR/Cas9-mediated genome editing in this highly valuable but neglected crop. The findings reported here highlight the potential of genome editing for the improvement of lodging resistance and other important traits in tef.


Subject(s)
Eragrostis , Genes, Plant , Alleles , CRISPR-Cas Systems , Eragrostis/genetics , Gene Editing , Mutation , Plant Breeding , Plants, Genetically Modified/genetics
2.
Commun Biol ; 5(1): 344, 2022 04 11.
Article in English | MEDLINE | ID: mdl-35410430

ABSTRACT

For many important crops including sorghum, use of CRISPR/Cas technology is limited not only by the delivery of the gene-modification components into a plant cell, but also by the ability to regenerate a fertile plant from the engineered cell through tissue culture. Here, we report that Wuschel2 (Wus2)-enabled transformation increases not only the transformation efficiency, but also the CRISPR/Cas-targeted genome editing frequency in sorghum (Sorghum bicolor L.). Using Agrobacterium-mediated transformation, we have demonstrated Wus2-induced direct somatic embryo formation and regeneration, bypassing genotype-dependent callus formation and significantly shortening the tissue culture cycle time. This method also increased the regeneration capacity that resulted in higher transformation efficiency across different sorghum varieties. Subsequently, advanced excision systems and "altruistic" transformation technology have been developed to generate high-quality morphogenic gene-free and/or selectable marker-free sorghum events. Finally, we demonstrate up to 6.8-fold increase in CRISPR/Cas9-mediated gene dropout frequency using Wus2-enabled transformation, compared to without Wus2, across various targeted loci in different sorghum genotypes.


Subject(s)
Gene Editing , Sorghum , CRISPR-Cas Systems , Edible Grain/genetics , Gene Editing/methods , Plants, Genetically Modified/genetics , Regeneration/genetics , Sorghum/genetics
3.
Redox Biol ; 36: 101596, 2020 09.
Article in English | MEDLINE | ID: mdl-32506038

ABSTRACT

Experimental and molecular epidemiological studies indicate important roles for adipose tissue or high-fat diet (HFD) in tumor growth and metastasis. Gastric cancer (GC) possesses a metastatic predilection for the adipocyte-rich peritoneum. However, the precise molecular relevance of HFD in the peritoneal metastasis of GC remains unclear. Here, we showed that HFD causes obvious fat accumulation and promotes peritoneal dissemination of GC in vivo. Peritoneum-derived adipocytes induces robust lipid droplet (LD) accumulation and fatty acid oxidation in GC cells through transcriptional upregulation of DGAT2 in a C/EBPα-dependent manner and prevents anoikis during peritoneal dissemination. Treatment of GC cells with FAs or coculture with adipocytes induces intracellular formation of LDs and production of NADPH to overcome oxidative stress in vitro. Importantly, overexpression of DGAT2 was identified as an independent predictor of poor survival that promotes lung and peritoneal metastasis of GC, and genetic or pharmacological inhibition of DGAT2, via disruption of lipid droplet formation in a lipid-rich environment, enhances the sensitivity of GC to anoikis in vitro and inhibits peritoneal metastasis in vivo. Overall, our findings highlight the notion that DGAT2 may be a promising therapeutic target in GC with peritoneal implantation and provide some evidence for uncovering the link between obesity and tumor metastasis.


Subject(s)
Stomach Neoplasms , Diacylglycerol O-Acyltransferase/metabolism , Homeostasis , Humans , Lipid Droplets/metabolism , Obesity/genetics , Obesity/metabolism , Oxidation-Reduction , Stomach Neoplasms/genetics , Stomach Neoplasms/metabolism
4.
Front Plant Sci ; 11: 535, 2020.
Article in English | MEDLINE | ID: mdl-32431725

ABSTRACT

Modern maize hybrids often contain biotech and native traits. To-date all biotech traits have been randomly inserted in the genome. Consequently, developing hybrids with multiple traits is expensive, time-consuming, and complex. Here we report using CRISPR-Cas9 to generate a complex trait locus (CTL) to facilitate trait stacking. A CTL consists of multiple preselected sites positioned within a small well-characterized chromosomal region where trait genes are inserted. We generated individual lines, each carrying a site-specific insertion landing pad (SSILP) that was targeted to a preselected site and capable of efficiently receiving a transgene via recombinase-mediated cassette exchange. The selected sites supported consistent transgene expression and the SSILP insertion had no effect on grain yield. We demonstrated that two traits residing at different sites within a CTL can be combined via genetic recombination. CTL technology is a major step forward in the development of multi-trait maize hybrids.

5.
Nat Biotechnol ; 38(5): 579-581, 2020 05.
Article in English | MEDLINE | ID: mdl-32152597

ABSTRACT

We created waxy corn hybrids by CRISPR-Cas9 editing of a waxy allele in 12 elite inbred maize lines, a process that was more than a year faster than conventional trait introgression using backcrossing and marker-assisted selection. Field trials at 25 locations showed that CRISPR-waxy hybrids were agronomically superior to introgressed hybrids, producing on average 5.5 bushels per acre higher yield.


Subject(s)
Plant Proteins/genetics , Quantitative Trait Loci , Zea mays/growth & development , CRISPR-Cas Systems , Crop Production , Gene Editing/methods , Genetic Introgression , Sequence Deletion , Zea mays/genetics
6.
Plant Biotechnol J ; 15(2): 207-216, 2017 02.
Article in English | MEDLINE | ID: mdl-27442592

ABSTRACT

Maize ARGOS8 is a negative regulator of ethylene responses. A previous study has shown that transgenic plants constitutively overexpressing ARGOS8 have reduced ethylene sensitivity and improved grain yield under drought stress conditions. To explore the targeted use of ARGOS8 native expression variation in drought-tolerant breeding, a diverse set of over 400 maize inbreds was examined for ARGOS8 mRNA expression, but the expression levels in all lines were less than that created in the original ARGOS8 transgenic events. We then employed a CRISPR-Cas-enabled advanced breeding technology to generate novel variants of ARGOS8. The native maize GOS2 promoter, which confers a moderate level of constitutive expression, was inserted into the 5'-untranslated region of the native ARGOS8 gene or was used to replace the native promoter of ARGOS8. Precise genomic DNA modification at the ARGOS8 locus was verified by PCR and sequencing. The ARGOS8 variants had elevated levels of ARGOS8 transcripts relative to the native allele and these transcripts were detectable in all the tissues tested, which was the expected results using the GOS2 promoter. A field study showed that compared to the WT, the ARGOS8 variants increased grain yield by five bushels per acre under flowering stress conditions and had no yield loss under well-watered conditions. These results demonstrate the utility of the CRISPR-Cas9 system in generating novel allelic variation for breeding drought-tolerant crops.


Subject(s)
Droughts , Edible Grain/genetics , Plant Proteins/genetics , Stress, Physiological/genetics , Zea mays/genetics , Base Sequence , Biodiversity , CRISPR-Associated Proteins/metabolism , CRISPR-Cas Systems , Crops, Agricultural/genetics , Ethylenes , Gene Editing , Gene Expression Regulation, Plant , Plants, Genetically Modified , Polymerase Chain Reaction , Promoter Regions, Genetic , RNA, Messenger/genetics
7.
Plant J ; 76(5): 888-99, 2013 Dec.
Article in English | MEDLINE | ID: mdl-24112765

ABSTRACT

The I-CreI homing endonuclease from Chlamydomonas reinhardti has been used as a molecular tool for creating DNA double-strand breaks and enhancing DNA recombination reactions in maize cells. The DNA-binding properties of this protein were re-designed to recognize a 22 bp target sequence in the 5th exon of MS26, a maize fertility gene. Three versions of a single-chain endonuclease, called Ems26, Ems26+ and Ems26++, cleaved their intended DNA site within the context of a reporter assay in a mammalian cell line. When the Ems26++ version was delivered to maize Black Mexican Sweet cells by Agrobacterium-mediated transformation, the cleavage resulted in mutations at a co-delivered extra-chromosomal ms26-site in up to 8.9% of the recovered clones. Delivery of the same version of Ems26 to immature embryos resulted in mutations at the predicted genomic ms26-site in 5.8% of transgenic T(0) plants. This targeted mutagenesis procedure yielded small deletions and insertions at the Ems26 target site consistent with products of double-strand break repair generated by non-homologous end joining. One of 21 mutagenized T(0) plants carried two mutated alleles of the MS26 gene. As expected, the bi-allelic mutant T(0) plant and the T(1) progeny homozygous for the ms26 mutant alleles were male-sterile. This paper described the second maize chromosomal locus (liguless-1 being the first one) mutagenized by a re-designed I-CreI-based endonuclease, demonstrating the general utility of these molecules for targeted mutagenesis in plants.


Subject(s)
DNA Restriction Enzymes/metabolism , Genes, Plant , Plant Infertility/genetics , Zea mays/genetics , Amino Acid Sequence , Chlamydomonas reinhardtii/enzymology , DNA Breaks, Double-Stranded , DNA End-Joining Repair , Gene Targeting , HEK293 Cells , Humans , Molecular Sequence Data , Mutagenesis , Plants, Genetically Modified/genetics , Plants, Genetically Modified/physiology , Transformation, Genetic , Zea mays/physiology
8.
ACS Nano ; 7(3): 2161-71, 2013 Mar 26.
Article in English | MEDLINE | ID: mdl-23373613

ABSTRACT

Understanding how a magnetic field affects the interaction of magnetic nanoparticles (MNPs) with cells is fundamental to any potential downstream applications of MNPs as gene and drug delivery vehicles. Here, we present a quantitative analysis of how a pulsed magnetic field influences the manner in which MNPs interact with and penetrate across a cell monolayer. Relative to a constant magnetic field, the rate of MNP uptake and transport across cell monolayers was enhanced by a pulsed magnetic field. MNP transport across cells was significantly inhibited at low temperature under both constant and pulsed magnetic field conditions, consistent with an active mechanism (i.e., endocytosis) mediating MNP transport. Microscopic observations and biochemical analysis indicated that, in a constant magnetic field, transport of MNPs across the cells was inhibited due to the formation of large (>2 µm) magnetically induced MNP aggregates, which exceeded the size of endocytic vesicles. Thus, a pulsed magnetic field enhances the cellular uptake and transport of MNPs across cell barriers relative to a constant magnetic field by promoting accumulation while minimizing magnetically induced MNP aggregation at the cell surface.


Subject(s)
Cell Membrane/metabolism , Magnetite Nanoparticles , Animals , Biological Transport, Active , Dogs , Drug Delivery Systems , Madin Darby Canine Kidney Cells , Magnetic Fields , Magnetite Nanoparticles/chemistry , Magnetite Nanoparticles/ultrastructure , Nanotechnology , Temperature
9.
Methods Mol Biol ; 847: 399-416, 2012.
Article in English | MEDLINE | ID: mdl-22351025

ABSTRACT

Double-strand breaks are very potent inducers of DNA recombination. There is no recombination between DNA molecules unless one or two DNA strands are broken. It has become feasible to introduce double-strand breaks at specific chromosomal loci by using dedicated, redesigned endonucleases with altered DNA-binding specificities. Such breaks are mainly repaired by error-prone nonhomologous recombination pathways in somatic cells, thus frequently producing mutations at the preselected chromosomal sites. Although the art and science of reengineering protein properties have been advancing quickly, an empirical validation of new endonucleases in a particular experimental environment is essential for successful targeted mutagenesis experiments. This chapter presents methods that were developed for a comprehensive evaluation of the DNA-binding and DNA-cutting activities of homing endonucleases in maize cells; however, they can be adopted for similar evaluation studies of other endonucleases and other plant species that are amenable for Agrobacterium-mediated transformation.


Subject(s)
DNA Breaks, Double-Stranded , DNA, Plant/genetics , Endonucleases/genetics , Endonucleases/metabolism , Zea mays/genetics , Agrobacterium/genetics , DNA Repair , DNA, Plant/chemistry , DNA, Plant/metabolism , Genetic Engineering , Mutagenesis , Mutation , Plants, Genetically Modified/genetics , Recombination, Genetic
10.
Plant J ; 61(1): 176-87, 2010 Jan.
Article in English | MEDLINE | ID: mdl-19811621

ABSTRACT

The liguleless locus (liguleless1) was chosen for demonstration of targeted mutagenesis in maize using an engineered endonuclease derived from the I-CreI homing endonuclease. A single-chain endonuclease, comprising a pair of I-CreI monomers fused into a single polypeptide, was designed to recognize a target sequence adjacent to the LIGULELESS1 (LG1) gene promoter. The endonuclease gene was delivered to maize cells by Agrobacterium-mediated transformation of immature embryos, and transgenic T(0) plants were screened for mutations introduced at the liguleless1 locus. We found mutations at the target locus in 3% of the T(0) plants, each of which was regenerated from independently selected callus. Plants that were monoallelic, biallelic and chimeric for mutations at the liguleless1 locus were found. Relatively short deletions (shortest 2 bp, longest 220 bp) were most frequently identified at the expected cut site, although short insertions were also detected at this site. We show that rational re-design of an endonuclease can produce a functional enzyme capable of introducing double-strand breaks at selected chromosomal loci. In combination with DNA repair mechanisms, the system produces targeted mutations with sufficient frequency that dedicated selection for such mutations is not required. Re-designed homing endonucleases are a useful molecular tool for introducing targeted mutations in a living organism, specifically a maize plant.


Subject(s)
DNA Restriction Enzymes/metabolism , Mutagenesis/genetics , Zea mays/genetics , DNA Restriction Enzymes/genetics , Plant Proteins/genetics , Polymerase Chain Reaction , Promoter Regions, Genetic/genetics
11.
Plant Mol Biol ; 70(6): 669-79, 2009 Aug.
Article in English | MEDLINE | ID: mdl-19466565

ABSTRACT

We have demonstrated that targeted mutagenesis can be accomplished in maize plants by excision, activation, and subsequent elimination of an endonuclease in the progeny of genetic crosses. The yeast FLP/FRT site-specific recombination system was used to excise and transiently activate the previously integrated yeast I-SceI homing endonuclease in maize zygotes and/or developing embryos. An artificial I-SceI recognition sequence integrated into genomic DNA was analyzed for mutations to indicate the I-SceI endonuclease activity. Targeted mutagenesis of the I-SceI site occurred in about 1% of analyzed F1 plants. Short deletions centered on the I-SceI-produced double-strand break were the predominant genetic lesions observed in the F1 plants. The I-SceI expression cassette was not detected in the mutant F1 plants and their progeny. However, the original mutations were faithfully transmitted to the next generation indicating that the mutations occurred early during the F1 plant development. The procedure offers simultaneous production of double-strand breaks and delivery of DNA template combined with a large number of progeny plants for future gene targeting experiments.


Subject(s)
Mutagenesis , Zea mays/genetics , Base Sequence , Crosses, Genetic , DNA Breaks, Double-Stranded , DNA Probes/genetics , DNA, Bacterial/genetics , DNA, Plant/genetics , DNA, Recombinant/genetics , Deoxyribonucleases, Type II Site-Specific/genetics , Deoxyribonucleases, Type II Site-Specific/metabolism , Gene Expression , Gene Targeting , Genes, Fungal , Genetic Vectors , Molecular Sequence Data , Plants, Genetically Modified , Polymerase Chain Reaction , Saccharomyces cerevisiae/enzymology , Saccharomyces cerevisiae/genetics , Saccharomyces cerevisiae Proteins/genetics , Saccharomyces cerevisiae Proteins/metabolism , Zea mays/embryology , Zea mays/metabolism
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