Unlocking the Potential of CRISPR for Crops

As noted in last month’s Food, Medicine & Health column, CRISPR/Cas9 and CRISPR/Cpf1 technology has generated considerable interest in transforming plant cells (Yin, Gao, and Qiu 2017). In recent research initiatives, genes from the monocots corn, sorghum, sugarcane, and indica rice were successfully transformed, which suggests that these food crop transformations could contribute to advance plant growth and maturation (e.g., ripening); alter complex agronomic traits; increase nutritio…