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Virus lurking inside banana genome has been destroyed with CRISPR
Genome editing has been used to destroy a virus that lurks inside many of the bananas grown in Africa. Other teams are trying to use it to make the Cavendish bananas sold in supermarkets worldwide resistant to a disease that threatens to make it impossible to grow this variety commercially in future. The banana streak virus can not only be spread from plant to plant by insects like most plant viruses. It also integrates its DNA into the banana's genome. In places like west Africa, where bananas are a staple food, most bananas now have the virus lurking inside them.
[...] But Leena Tripathi at the International Institute of Tropical Agriculture in Kenya has now used the CRISPR genome editing method to target and destroy the viral DNA inside the genome of a banana variety called Gonja Manjaya.
The plan is to use these plants to breed virus-free plants for farmers. Her team is also using CRISPR to make the bananas resistant to the virus, so they are not simply re-infected. But the legal status of genome-edited plants in the west African countries where Gonja Manjaya is grown remains uncertain. "I think right now they are in discussions about whether it requires legislation," says Tripathi.
The banana streak virus does not infect the popular Cavendish banana. But a fungal strain called Tropical Race 4 is devastating Cavendish plantations as it spreads around the world. Before the 1960s the most popular banana was the reportedly more delicious Gros Michel, which farmers had to stop growing because of the spread of another fungal strain called Tropical Race 1.
PAPER (DOI: 10.1038/s42003-019-02) (DX)
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday February 01 2019, @07:32PM (2 children)
Then why all the trouble to preserve trash?
Or, if humans will happily consume trash, why bother preserving the good stuff?
(Score: 3, Insightful) by AthanasiusKircher on Friday February 01 2019, @09:30PM (1 child)
Because the Cavendish ships well, not as well as the Gros Michel, but it can be transported around the world. Most banana varieties require much more careful shipping to avoid bruises and/or will overripen before they reach a destination. If I remember correctly, the Cavendish can be picked more unripe and will have a relatively long storage life so it arrives okay for consumers halfway around the world.
FYI - most of the widely available varities of produce are chosen or bred for shipping, not flavor or nutrition or whatever. Compared to fresh and more perishable local varieties, they often taste like trash.
(Score: 2) by Dr Spin on Friday February 01 2019, @10:26PM
, the Cavendish can be picked more unripe and will have a relatively long storage life
They are stored unripe under gas, and then when required, immersed in a different gas to ripen them.
If you put your ripe bananas next to unripe avocados, the gas will ripen the avocados in hours.
They will, of course, be over ripe hours later.
I am sure someone will identify the gasses used.
Warning: Opening your mouth may invalidate your brain!