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REVIEW article

Front. Genome Ed.
Sec. Genome Editing in Plants
Volume 7 - 2025 | doi: 10.3389/fgeed.2025.1524767
This article is part of the Research Topic Genome Editing Strategies for Augmenting Crop Resilience Against Climate Change View all articles

Emerging Applications of Gene Editing Technologies for the Development of Climate-Resilient Crops

Provisionally accepted
Rahul Chavhan Rahul Chavhan 1Siddhant Jaybhaye Siddhant Jaybhaye 1Vidya Hinge Vidya Hinge 1ABHIJIT SUBHASH DESHMUKH ABHIJIT SUBHASH DESHMUKH 1Shaikh Uwais Shaikh Uwais 1Pratiksha Jadhav Pratiksha Jadhav 1Ulhas S. Kadam Ulhas S. Kadam 2,3,4*Jong Chan Hong Jong Chan Hong 2,3,4*
  • 1 VD College of Agricultural Biotechnology, Latur, Latur, India
  • 2 Gyeongsang National University, Jinju, Republic of Korea
  • 3 Division of Applied Life Science, College of Natural Sciences, Gyeongsang National University, Jinju, South Gyeongsang, Republic of Korea
  • 4 Plant Molecular Biology and Biotechnology Research Center, Gyeongsang National University, Jinju, South Gyeongsang, Republic of Korea

The final, formatted version of the article will be published soon.

    Climate change threatens global crop yield and food security due to rising temperatures, erratic rainfall, and increased abiotic stresses like drought, heat, and salinity. Gene editing technologies, including CRISPR/Cas9, base editors, and prime editors, offer precise tools for enhancing crop resilience. This review explores the mechanisms of these technologies and their applications in developing climate-resilient crops to address future challenges. While CRISPR/Cas9 enables targeted modifications of plant DNA, the base editors allow for direct base conversion without inducing double-stranded breaks, and the prime editors enable precise insertions, deletions, and substitutions. By understanding and manipulating key regulator genes involved in stress responses, such as DREB, HSP, SOS, ERECTA, HsfA1, and NHX, crop tolerance can be enhanced against drought, heat, and salt stress. Gene editing can improve traits related to root development, water use efficiency, stress response pathways, heat shock response, photosynthesis, membrane stability, ion homeostasis, osmotic adjustment, and oxidative stress response. Advancements in gene editing technologies, integration with genomics, phenomics, and Artificial intelligence (AI)/machine learning (ML) hold great promise. However, challenges such as off-target effects, delivery methods, and regulatory barriers must be addressed. This review highlights the potential of gene editing to develop climate-resilient crops, contributing to food security and sustainable agriculture.

    Keywords: Genome editing, Climate-resilience crops, Abiotic & biotic stress, Climate Change, CRISPR-Cas (Clustered Regularly Interspaced Short Palindromic Repeats-CRISPRassociated) system, Base editing (BE)

    Received: 08 Nov 2024; Accepted: 07 Jan 2025.

    Copyright: © 2025 Chavhan, Jaybhaye, Hinge, DESHMUKH, Uwais, Jadhav, Kadam and Hong. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.

    * Correspondence:
    Ulhas S. Kadam, Gyeongsang National University, Jinju, Republic of Korea
    Jong Chan Hong, Plant Molecular Biology and Biotechnology Research Center, Gyeongsang National University, Jinju, 900, South Gyeongsang, Republic of Korea

    Disclaimer: All claims expressed in this article are solely those of the authors and do not necessarily represent those of their affiliated organizations, or those of the publisher, the editors and the reviewers. Any product that may be evaluated in this article or claim that may be made by its manufacturer is not guaranteed or endorsed by the publisher.