Research Advances in Plant Biotechnology

In Research Advances in Plant Biotechnology the potential of high technological approaches in plant genetic engineering as well as their practical applications are considered. The efficiency of plant genetic transformation remains a challenge due to limitations of intracellular transportation of genes and other biomolecules through the cell wall, damaging of cells/tissues, gene disruption, and high-cost of application of the transformation methods. From stable interest to the development of new techniques for gene delivery into plant cells, key achievements of carbon nanotubes (CNTs) and fullerene derivatives to serve as vehicles for the delivery of genetic material into plant cells and plastids are discussed. Besides CNTs and fullerenes, the mineral nanoparticles (mesoporous silica NPs, metal oxide, calcium phosphate), and cationic polymers have been proposed also for plant transformation. In the monograph, the results of practical development of efficient gene transfer techniques based on using these nanomaterials and applicable for plants are presented, too. Then the multiple strategies of site-specific recombinases application in plant genetic engineering with outlining of prospective directions of growth for this molecular tool are detailed. Currently, the CRISPR/Cas system is a powerful method for editing the genome of various organisms. The achievements and prospects of CRISPR/Cas usage for genome editing of fungi are considered in a separate chapter. Because salinity is one of major problems for modern agriculture around the world and creation of salt tolerant cultivars via conventional breeding cannot keep the pace with continuously rising food demand, one contribution to the book critically evaluates the possible roles or capacities of genes from different functional groups to improve plant salt tolerance via genetic engineering. Another chapter presents the results of systematic studies of the effects of new ecologically friendly polycomponent biostimulants of microbiological origin (developed in Ukraine on the basis of either 2,6-dimethylpyridine-N-oxide, or metabolic products of root endophyte fungus from the roots of ginseng, or metabolites of several strains of soil Streptomyces) on improving commercially useful traits in important agricultural crops, including improved growth, productivity and increased resistance to pathogenic fungi, parasitic nematodes and insects. Special attention is paid to the analysis of molecular-genetic mechanisms of the effect of microbial biostimulants at organismal, cellular, and molecular levels. The results of these studies proved that the mechanism of bioprotective effect of microbial biostimulants involves the delivery of RNA interference (RNAi) into plant cells, i.e. induction of synthesis of endogenous small regulatory si/miRNAs with immuno-protective, antipathogenic and antiparasitic properties. In the final chapter, the legal approaches to the regulation of plants produced through new breeding techniques such as gene editing are considered.