Authors: Yun-Jeong Han, Jeong-Il Kim
The development of herbicide-resistant plants is the need of time to help the agriculture economy move ahead. Lack of this trait in plants can impact their growth during herbicide applications leading to loss of crops. Imparting herbicide-resistant traits using genetic engineering will not only help plants/ crops survive better but also control the unwanted weeds. For these reasons, researchers are developing new methods and technologies to pass on herbicide resistance traits in plants. The CRISPR/Cas9 based gene-editing technology is considered to be highly precise and effective to carry out modification at genetic levels offering great efficiency in enhancing the crops. In the present study, the researchers used CRISPR based gene-editing technology to confer herbicide-resistant traits in plants by targeting genes such as 5-enolpyruvylshikimate-3-phosphate synthase (EPSPS), acetolactate synthase (ALS), splicing factor 3B subunit 1 (SF3B1), and cellulose synthase A catalytic subunit 3 (CESA3). Besides this, researchers also added additional candidate genes to enhance the herbicide resistance properties of plants through inducing mutations using the CRISPR Cas9 gene-editing tool.