Functional relocation of the maize chloroplast atpB gene to the nucleus restores photosynthetic competence to a gene-edited non-photosynthetic mutant.

ABSTRACT: With the increasing food demands of a global population projected to reach 9.6 billion by 2050, there is an urgent need to increase crop productivity. Bioengineering approaches to boost crop yields include enhancing photosynthetic capacity, though relatively few efforts focus on C4 crop species despite their significant presence in agriculture. Multiple photosynthesis engineering examples utilize overexpression of components of the nuclear-encoded machinery, while work on chloroplast-encoded photosynthetic genes is limited to the few dicot species where plastid transformation technology exists. We present here a novel approach to photosynthetic gene engineering in maize using a nuclear-encoded, chloroplast-targeted TALE-cytidine deaminase enzyme to create non-photosynthetic knockout mutant

SUBMITTER: Mangu VR 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC12392951 | biostudies-literature | 2025 Sep

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature