Cited by 71CRISPR and Genetic EngineeringPlant Stress Responses and ToleranceGenetically Modified Organisms Research

Gene editing for plant resistance to abiotic factors: a systematic review

Open access
Nascimento, Fernanda dos Santos, Rocha, Anelita de Jesus, Soares, Julianna Matos da Silva, Mascarenhas, Marcelly Santana, Ferreira, Mileide dos Santos, Morais Lino, Lucymeire Souza, Ramos, Andresa Priscila de Souza, Diniz, Leandro Eugenio Cardamone +4 more·2023·Plants

Abstract

Agricultural crops are exposed to various abiotic stresses, such as salinity, water deficits, temperature extremes, floods, radiation, and metal toxicity. To overcome these challenges, breeding programs seek to improve methods and techniques. Gene editing by Clustered Regularly Interspaced Short Palindromic Repeats—CRISPR/Cas—is a versatile tool for editing in all layers of the central dogma with focus on the development of cultivars of plants resistant or tolerant to multiple biotic or abiotic stresses. This systematic review (SR) brings new contributions to the study of the use of CRISPR/Cas in gene editing for tolerance to abiotic stress in plants. Articles deposited in different electronic databases, using a search string and predefined inclusion and exclusion criteria, were evaluated. This SR demonstrates that the CRISPR/Cas system has been applied to several plant species to promote tolerance to the main abiotic stresses. Among the most studied crops are rice and Arabidopsis thaliana, an important staple food for the population, and a model plant in genetics/biotechnology, respectively, and more recently tomato, whose number of studies has increased since 2021. Most studies were conducted in Asia, specifically in China. The Cas9 enzyme is used in most articles, and only Cas12a is used as an additional gene editing tool in plants. Ribonucleoproteins (RNPs) have emerged as a DNA-free strategy for genome editing without exogenous DNA. This SR also identifies several genes edited by CRISPR/Cas, and it also shows that plant responses to stress factors are mediated by many complex-signaling pathways. In addition, the quality of the articles included in this SR was validated by a risk of bias analysis. The information gathered in this SR helps to understand the current state of CRISPR/Cas in the editing of genes and noncoding sequences, which plays a key role in the regulation of various biological processes and the tolerance to multiple abiotic stresses, with potential for use in plant genetic improvement programs.

The claims and statistics of this paper haven’t been checked yet.

Run the check — free, no account needed. It reads the open-access text and checks the sources it cites.

A few free checks a day · papers already verified open instantly · results are public

Integrity signals

Registry

Crossref · 10.3390/plants12020305

Cites

261 of 261 references verified0 citation errors · 0 not checkable

Statistics

Claims the paper makes

The claims and statistics of this paper haven’t been checked yet.

Run the check — free, no account needed. It reads the open-access text and checks the sources it cites.

A few free checks a day · papers already verified open instantly · results are public

Claims other papers make about this one

Each is checked against this paper’s own text: does it say what the citing paper says it does?

  • Knocking out certain genes negatively impacts root development under drought conditions, ultimately enhancing overall crop resilience to water scarcity.

    “Their findings highlighted how knocking out certain genes negatively impacts root development under drought conditions, ultimately enhancing overall crop resilience to water scarcity.”

    From Emerging applications of gene editing technologies for the development of climate-resilient crops (2025) · cites this paper as Nascimento et al., 2023

    The Discussion (§3.4; page unavailable) reports that knocking out SlNPR1 in tomato and OsABA8ox2 in rice improved drought tolerance. It does not say those knockouts negatively affected root development or that impaired root development caused the improved tolerance. The References entry for OsERA1 instead describes increased primary root growth under nonstressed conditions. (LLM, conf=0.87)

    Experimental — accuracy not yet measured
  • Genes that promote root development, enhance root growth, and improve water uptake have potential as targets for CRISPR/Cas9 gene editing.

    “For instance, Nascimento et al. (2023) explored genes that promote root development, enhanced root growth, and improved water uptake, demonstrating their potential as targets for CRISPR/Cas9 gene editing.”

    From Emerging applications of gene editing technologies for the development of climate-resilient crops (2025) · cites this paper as Nascimento et al., 2023

    The References (no page available) list a CRISPR/Cas9 study of OsERA1 that reports increased primary root growth in rice under nonstressed conditions. Section 3.4 discusses genes targeted for abiotic-stress tolerance, but the copy does not show that Nascimento et al. explored genes that promote root development or improve water uptake, or that the reported root growth improved water uptake. (LLM, conf=0.78)

    Experimental — accuracy not yet measured

Self-check

Percentages, sums and reported differences re-computed from the paper’s own numbers.

The self-check needs the paper’s full text.

Cites

1 retracted

Flagged first, then by citations

1 of the 262 references couldn’t be matched to a known paper.

Research works printed but not linked: 1

  1. [73]Cohen J. To Feed Its 1.4 Billion, China Bets Big on Genome Editing of Crops 2019 Available online: https://www.science.org/content/article/feed-its-14-billion-china-bets-big-genome-editing-crops (accessed on 21 March 2022)

Cited by

Sorted by citations

Authors
Nascimento, F. D. S., Rocha, A. D. J., Soares, J. M. D. S., Mascarenhas, M. S., Ferreira, M. D. S., Morais Lino, L. S., Ramos, A. P. D. S., Diniz, L. E. C., Mendes, T. A. D. O., Ferreira, C. F., Santos-Serejo, J. A. D., & Amorim, E. P.
Affiliations
  • Universidade Estadual de Feira de Santana (BR)
  • Embrapa Mandioca e Fruticultura, Cruz das Almas 44380-000, BA, Brazil
  • Embrapa (BR)
  • Embrapa Soja, Londrina 86000-000, PR, Brazil
  • Universidade Federal de Viçosa (BR)
Venue
Plants
Publisher
MDPI AG
Published
2023-01-09
Volume
12
Issue
2
Pages
305
ISSN
2223-7747 (ISSN-L)
OpenAlex
W4313889986
Cited by
71
References
262
Citations by year
2026: 18 · 2025: 25 · 2024: 22 · 2023: 6
FWCI
1.88
Type
journal article
Language
en
Open access
Locations
  • Plants (publishedVersion, cc-by)
  • PubMed Central (publishedVersion, cc-by)
  • PubMed (publishedVersion)
  • DOAJ (DOAJ: Directory of Open Access Journals) (submittedVersion, cc-by-sa)
Funders
IITA/The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation (OPP1093845)
Topics
  • Life Sciences › Biochemistry, Genetics and Molecular Biology › Molecular Biology › CRISPR and Genetic Engineering
  • Life Sciences › Agricultural and Biological Sciences › Plant Science › Plant Stress Responses and Tolerance
  • Life Sciences › Agricultural and Biological Sciences › Plant Science › Genetically Modified Organisms Research
Keywords
CRISPR gene editing, abiotic stress tolerance, plant stress tolerance, salt stress, drought stress, temperature extremes, flooding stress, metal toxicity, rice, Arabidopsis thaliana, tomato, Cas9, CRISPR/Cas12a, stress signaling pathways, plant genetic improvement

About these checks

Registry, retraction, Cites and statistics results are computed, not judged, with one exception: a printed reference that no index lists is read once by a model before it counts as a citation error. Claims are extracted by a model and kept only when their quote appears verbatim in the text; each cited source is then checked, with a model’s help, for whether it says what the claim relies on. Those verdicts can be wrong — read the claim’s quote and the cited source before relying on one.

Statistics and arithmetic are recomputed, not judged.

Confidence bands are shown only for fields calibrated on our annotated test set. None is calibrated yet, so no band is shown.

What counts as a claim ›How we measure confidence ›How we check this ›

Are you an author, or do you see a problem with this page? Request a review