Gene Edited Crops
Tim Hammerich
News Reporter
Technological breakthroughs in recent years with artificial intelligence and gene editing are opening up new possibilities for plant breeders. But will we run into some of the same controversies that the last wave of biotech crops encountered? Pairwise CEO Tom Adams says gene editing tools like CRISPR are different from GMOs, in that they are dealing with genes already native to the crop species.
Adams… “ Now, CRISPR is a technology that allows you to make relatively precise changes to genes, which is a real step forward from the conventional - it's conventional now - GMO technology where you're bringing in genes from other organisms. You're actually able to use this technology to tweak the genes that are there and typically tweaking 'em to just function similarly to how they already function in some varieties, but you can bring varieties together more quickly. So we've been able to use this technology to take the pungent flavor out of mustard greens. We've used it now to take the seeds outta blackberries and also to make much higher yielding berries. So it's a, it's a pretty, uh, diverse technology. We've also used it a lot on the big acre crops like corn and soybean. Through our partnerships with Bayer, and now with Corteva.”
Pairwise has partnerships to license their Fulcrum Gene Editing Tools to a number of agricultural companies in a variety of crops.
