Project Grant DESC0024762

This three-year, $1.8 million project grant from the National Science Foundation Division of Integrative Organismal Systems aims to develop rapid transformation and gene editing techniques in maize through the Biological Sciences program (CFDA 47.074). The University of Missouri System will work to establish a system for precisely inserting transgenes and editing genes at predetermined sites in the genome of maize. Researchers will create "landing pads" on five chromosomes of a...

This $1,211,545 Project Grant award from the National Science Foundation (CFDA 47.074 - Biological Sciences) will support the development of advanced Prime Editing (PE) systems in rice, tomato, and poplar plants. Prime Editing is a novel and highly versatile CRISPR-based gene editing technology that enables precise genome modifications. The key objectives of this 3-year project are to optimize Prime Editor proteins to increase their activity and editing efficiency, improve pegRNA structure and...

This $699,870 Project Grant award from the National Science Foundation's (NSF) Biological Sciences program (CFDA 47.074) supports the development of simplified and highly efficient genetic modification technologies for economically important grasses and cereal crops. The "PLANTTRANSFORM: SMART GRASS" project aims to overcome the current constraint in the plant science research community regarding the capacity to genetically modify major crop plants. The award establishes a...

This Project Grant award of $305,000 from the National Science Foundation (NSF) Technology, Innovation, and Partnerships (TIP) program (CFDA 47.084) aims to integrate cutting-edge genome engineering technology into the corn improvement pipeline for Spearhead Bio, Inc., a small business located in Olivette, Missouri. The key objectives are to generate the biological machinery needed for custom genome engineering in corn, transform corn plants, and analyze the resulting plants. The anticipated...

This Project Grant award from the National Institute of General Medical Sciences (NIGMS) Biomedical Research and Research Training program (CFDA 93.859) supports research to improve the efficiency of CRISPR gene editing in human pluripotent stem cells. The goal is to develop a novel carbon nanotube array technology that can efficiently transfer nucleic acids and proteins into these cells to enhance CRISPR-based gene editing and homology-directed recombination. The $275,045 award to Advanced Gene...

The National Science Foundation awarded a $307,400 Project Grant under its Biological Sciences program (CFDA 47.074) to the University of Missouri System to develop epigenetic editing tools for improving crop plants. The project aims to expand the capabilities of genome editing by enabling targeted changes in gene expression, rather than just DNA sequence, to generate novel traits in important crops like rice and tomato. Key objectives include adapting the epigenetic editing approach...

The National Science Foundation's Biological Sciences program awarded a $1,200,000 project grant to the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) Office of Research Administration to discover and characterize small CRISPR genome editing systems for virus-based delivery into plants. This 3-year project aims to develop new tools to enhance plant breeding and create crops with higher yields, drought resistance, and pest/temperature tolerance. The work includes screening metagenomic data to...

This Project Grant award from the National Science Foundation (CFDA 47.084 - NSF Technology, Innovation, and Partnerships program) provides $305,000 to Luminova Biotech LLC to develop a technology that enhances plant mitochondrial function using light. The aim is to accelerate plant growth and increase stress tolerance, leading to improved crop yields and reduced crop losses. The project will first demonstrate proof-of-concept in a model plant system, evaluating the technology's impact on...

The National Science Foundation (NSF) Division of Integrative Organismal Systems awarded a $277,978 Project Grant under the Biological Sciences program (CFDA 47.074) to the University of California, Berkeley. The 3-year grant, beginning on Sep 1, 2023, aims to develop new tools and resources to enable more efficient gene editing in maize, the world's most produced crop. Specifically, the project will generate maize lines that constitutively express the Cas9 gene editing enzyme and engineer...

This $225,000 Project Grant awarded by the U.S. Department of Agriculture's National Institute of Food and Agriculture under the Agriculture and Food Research Initiative (CFDA 10.310) aims to engineer improved plant genetic engineering capabilities. The key objectives are to: Develop a toolkit for making modifications to various Agrobacterium strains, including those commonly used and novel wild-type strains, to enhance the efficiency and applicability of plant genetic engineering processes....