As any avid gardener will tell you, plants with sharp thorns and prickles can leave you looking like you’ve had a run-in with an angry cat. Wouldn’t it be nice to rid plants of their prickles entirely but keep the tasty fruits and beautiful flowers? I’m a geneticist who, along with my colleagues, recently discovered the gene that accounts for prickliness across a variety of plants, including roses, eggplants and even some species of grasses. Genetically tailored, smooth-stemmed plants may eventually arrive at a garden center near you.
Acceleration of nature Plants and other organisms evolve naturally over time. When random changes to their DNA, called mutations, enhance survival, they get passed on to offspring. For thousands of years, plant breeders have taken advantage of these variations to create high-yielding crop varieties.
In 1983, the first genetically modified organisms, or GMOs, appeared in agriculture. Golden rice, engineered to combat vitamin A deficiency, and pest-resistant corn are just a couple of examples of how genetic modification has been used to enhance crop plants. Two recent developments have changed the landscape further.
The advent of gene editing using a technique known as CRISPR has made it possible to modify plant traits more easily and quickly. If the genome of an organism were a book, CRISPR-based gene editing is akin to adding or removing a sentence here or there. This tool, combined with the increasing ease with which scientists can sequen.