Climate Change and CRISPR Rice

CRISPR gene-editing technology could generate climate-friendly crops. With $11 million from the Chan Zuckerberg Initiative, researchers seek to do just that. The money will be used to make plants and soil better at capturing carbon dioxide, starting with rice. The effort was unveiled last week by Jennifer Doudna, co-inventor of CRISPR and Nobel laureate.

“[Jennifer] and I saw eye to eye on climate and how big of a problem it is in the world. And we just didn’t want to sit on the sidelines anymore,” Innovative Genomics Institute (IGI) executive director Brad Ringeisen said.

Climate experts agree that reducing greenhouse gas emissions from burning fossil fuels to generate energy or power trains, aircraft, and cars is the only method to combat climate change. Humans have thrown so much planet-warming pollution into the atmosphere that we also need to clean up the mess and prevent further climate disruption. Plants can help. During photosynthesis, plants absorb carbon dioxide. They transmit carbon to the soil.

CRISPR may be used to make precise modifications in a plant’s genome to achieve desired features. IGI’s carbon-removal mission includes three gene-editing targets. It starts with improving plant photosynthesis so they can capture more CO2. Second, IGI wants longer-rooted crops. Roots transfer carbon to soil (as well as from the rest of their bodies when they die). Longer roots can deposit carbon deeper in the earth, preventing its re-emission. The Salk Institute for Biological Studies received $30 million from the Bezos Earth Fund in 2020 to impact plant genes and develop crops with stronger roots.

The third part of IGI’s research is improving the soil’s ability to trap greenhouse gasses. Soil doesn’t store carbon long. It’s released when soil bacteria break down plants. Modern agriculture techniques, such as tilling, accelerate this process and allow the soil to lose carbon. According to Ringeisen, IGI’s CRISPR study could lead to a product that can be applied to dirt to help it keep carbon longer.

All of these projects are still in the works. Ringeisen expects “real world influence in seven to 10 years” from the Chan Zuckerberg Initiative’s $11 million. Even if they can genetically design plants and soil bacteria in that timeframe, scaling up to affect the climate will be difficult.

“Plants are already extremely efficient carbon fixing machines, resulting from millions of years of evolution, so I still remain to be convinced that CRISPR can do much to improve carbon sequestration at the scale we need,” says César Terrer, an assistant professor at MIT who studies plant-soil interactions.

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Terrer is not participating in the project, but he was previously a fellow at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory. He warns that focusing on ways to manipulate nature to help with climate change can divert us from cutting greenhouse gas pollution.

Livestock and fertilizer contribute heavily to agriculture’s carbon footprint. Soggy rice paddies are good for methane-producing bacteria. IGI is also working on this topic, by tryng to modify roots and soil bacteria.

According to Ringeisen, the rice genome is easier to modify than other crops. Pamela Ronald is one of the scientists working in IGI’s program. Her study led to the development of rice varieties that endure flooding longer than other types utilizing genetic engineering that’s more like precision breeding. According to Ronald’s lab at UC Davis, over 6 million farmers in India and Bangladesh grow that rice.

IGI’s work goes beyond rice. Ringeisen suggests gene-editing sorghum to boost carbon removal. He hopes any new types they produce will offer farmers more abundant yields from more effective photosynthesis. But that’s years away. After three years of CRISPR rice research, IGI aims to launch worldwide field trials with farmers.