About this Research Topic

Background

Environmental stresses caused by climate change, pests, and diseases significantly affect crop growth and productivity, posing severe threats to food security. Conventional crop breeding has been used to address these issues. Although crop breeding is a versatile tool in developing new varieties with improved agronomic characteristics in various food crops, this approach is time-consuming, laborious, and expensive. With the ever-increasing population and growing environmental pressures, there is an urgent need to develop climate-resilient crops with sustainable yield and nutrition. Modern biotechnology (such as double-stranded RNA interference and molecular breeding) and genetic engineering/genome editing (such as zinc finger nucleases, transcription-activator-like effector nucleases, and CRISPR/Cas9 systems) are undoubtedly powerful tools to improve crops and tackle agricultural challenges. However, the future of modern biotechnology depends on continuous improvement and consensus on biosafety and policy implementation to ensure a transparent approval process while maintaining safe use in agriculture.



The advances in biotechnology and gene/genome editing have revolutionized the field of agricultural biotechnology. These innovative technologies have attracted global attention and made significant developments in crops with high commercial value. However, only a few biotechnological-assisted or genome-edited crops have entered the final stages of commercialization. Numerous challenges for these technologies need to be overcome to facilitate their applications in crops. These include the lack of high-quality complete reference genomes, the sparse knowledge of potential modification targets, efficient delivery systems, off-target effects, and the unclear legal status of genome-edited crops.

This Research Topic aims to collect recent updates and novel findings on technological advances and applications of genome editing and/or modern biotechnology in crop improvement, as well as ethical and regulatory concerns.



We welcome submissions of different types of articles (original research papers, perspectives, hypotheses, opinions, reviews, and methods contributing to gene editing and genomics in crop improvements), including but not limited to:

• New agricultural biotechnologies: current and future

• Genome editing techniques for crop improvement

• Genetic improvement and novel delivery systems

• Optimization and applications of any genome editing tools in crops

• Biosafety concerns, regulations, and policies on genetic engineered/genome-edited crops

Keywords: Agricultural biotechnology, biosafety, crop improvement, genetic engineering, genome editing, molecular breeding, RNA interference

Important note: All contributions to this Research Topic must be within the scope of the section and journal to which they are submitted, as defined in their mission statements. Frontiers reserves the right to guide an out-of-scope manuscript to a more suitable section or journal at any stage of peer review.

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