CRISPR-Adventskalender

In Asian monsoon regions, grain germination on the field before harvest leads to a significant deterioration in grain quality. The so-called dormant phase of the seed, i.e. the phase before germination, is therefore one of the most important agronomic characteristics of cereals, and a longer dormancy phase is an important breeding objective. Scientists at Okayama University in Japan have succeeded in specifically eliminating all chromosome sets of a gene involved in dormancy phase length with CRISPR/Cas. The plants cultivated in this way showed a significantly longer dormant phase of the seed.