Improving Soybean Yield

Problem

How can crop yields be enhanced as drought and extreme heat increasingly jeopardize food security?

Findings

Researchers found that by silencing the expression of a critical gene in soybeans, the plants are fooled into sensing they are under stress even though they are growing in perfect conditions. The progeny of these plants, cross-bred with the original stock, remember the stress-induced responses for generations and produce more vigorous, resilient, and productive plants.

Impact

The critical gene found in soybeans is also found across all plants and could be deployed to increase yields by simply changing the way existing genes are expressed.

• Yields increased by as much as 14 percent.
• Because no new genes are introduced, the plant is not considered a genetically modified organism and does not require special regulatory approval.

Related Research Area: Advanced Agricultural and Food Systems

Research Credit

Team

• Sally Mackenzie, Sunil Kenchanmane Raju, Mon-Ray Shao, Robersy Sanchez, Ying-Zhi Xu, Ajay Sandhu, and George Graef

Participating Departments

• Plant Science

Competitive Funding

• National Science Foundation; Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation

Emerging Discoveries

Grafting with epigenetically-modified rootstock yields surprise

October 22, 2020

Novel grafted plants — consisting of rootstock epigenetically modified to “believe” it has been under stress — joined to an unmodified scion, or above-ground shoot, give rise to progeny that are more vigorous, productive and resilient than the parental plants.

Plants pass on 'memory' of stress to some progeny, making them more resilient

May 05, 2020

By manipulating the expression of one gene, geneticists can induce a form of “stress memory” in plants that is inherited by some progeny, giving them the potential for more vigorous, hardy and productive growth, according to Penn State researchers, who suggest the discovery has significant implications for plant breeding.

'Scaring' soybeans into defensive mode yields better plants a generation later

November 13, 2018

By temporarily silencing the expression of a critical gene, researchers fooled soybean plants into sensing they were under siege, encountering a wide range of stresses. Then, after selectively cross breeding those plants with the original stock, the progeny "remember" the stress-induced responses to become more vigorous, resilient and productive plants, according to a team of researchers.

Published Research

MSH1-induced heritable enhanced growth vigor through grafting is associated with the RdDM pathway in plants

• Kundariya, H., Yang, X., Morton, K., Sanchez, R., Axtell, M. J., Hutton, S. F., Fromm, M., & Mackenzie, S. A. (2020). MSH1-induced heritable enhanced growth vigor through grafting is associated with the RdDM pathway in plants. Nature communications, 11(1), [5343]. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41467-020-19140-x 

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Segregation of an MSH1 RNAi transgene produces heritable non-genetic memory in association with methylome reprogramming

• Yang, X., Sanchez, R., Kundariya, H., Maher, T., Dopp, I., Schwegel, R., Virdi, K., Axtell, M. J., & Mackenzie, S. A. (2020). Segregation of an MSH1 RNAi transgene produces heritable non-genetic memory in association with methylome reprogramming. Nature communications, 11(1), [2214]. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41467-020-16036-8

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An epigenetic breeding system in soybean for increased yield and stability

• Raju, S. K. K., Shao, M. R., Sanchez, R., Xu, Y. Z., Sandhu, A., Graef, G., & Mackenzie, S. (2018). An epigenetic breeding system in soybean for increased yield and stability. Plant Biotechnology Journal, 16(11), 1836-1847. https://doi.org/10.1111/pbi.12919  

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