Location: Cereal Disease Lab
Project Number: 5062-21220-025-040-S
Project Type: Non-Assistance Cooperative Agreement
Start Date: Aug 23, 2025
End Date: Aug 22, 2026
Objective:
1. Develop and optimize genome editors for cereal crops
2. Implement and supervise an efficient protocol of genome editing for cereal crops by wide crosses with maize expressing genome editing components
3. Characterize rust resistance genes and improve rust resistance in cereal crops using genome editing tools
Approach:
Cereal crops such as wheat, barley, and oat are important commodities in U.S. agricultural industry and grain exports. Rust diseases are among the most important causes of yield and economic losses in these crops in the U.S. and worldwide. This research project will develop and deploy new genome editing tools for deciphering and improving resistance to rust diseases in cereal crops. Maize transformation will be conducted by the Agrobacterium-mediated method using highly efficient genome editing constructs that have been optimized in protoplasts. The transgenic maize plants with high expression of genome editing components (editor and guide RNA) will be used to pollinate cereal crops to produce doubled haploid plants with target genes edited. The gene-edited plants will be evaluated for resistance to rust diseases. Ultimately the goal is to provide a highly efficient genome editing system for developing more resistant varieties for use by the research community.