Zinc (Zn) is an essential micronutrient for plants and humans. Nearly 50% of the agriculture soils of world are Zn-deficient. The low availability of Zn reduces the yield and quality of the crops. The zinc-regulated, iron-regulated transporter-like proteins (ZIP) family and iron-regulated transporters (IRTs) are involved in cellular uptake of Zn, its intracellular trafficking and detoxification in plants. In addition to Zn, ZIP family transporters also transport other divalent metal cations (such as Cd 2+ , Fe 2+ , and Cu 2+). ZIP transporters play a crucial role in biofortification of grains with Zn. Only a very limited information is available on structural features and mechanism of Zn transport of plant ZIP family transporters. In this article, we present a detailed account on structure, function, regulations and phylogenetic relationships of plant ZIP transporters. We give an insight to structure of plant ZIPs through homology modeling and multiple sequence alignment with Bordetella bronchiseptica ZIP (BbZIP) protein whose crystal structure has been solved recently. We also provide details on ZIP transporter genes identified and characterized in rice and other plants till date. Functional characterization of plant ZIP transporters will help for the better crop yield and human health in future.

Phosphorus (P) is the second most growth limiting macronutrient after nitrogen and plays several important roles in all organisms including plants. In soil, P is available in both organic and inorganic forms. P deficiency reduces the growth and yield of several crop plants. Plants respond to P deficiency by the phenotypic changes especially by the modification of root architecture. Molecular marker-assisted breeding (MAB) has been proposed as an important tool to identify and develop improved varieties of crop plants with efficient P-use efficiency (PUE). Identification of quantitative trait loci (QTLs) for traits related to PUE has been considered as the first step in markerassisted selection (MAS) and improvement of crop yield programmes. In this review, we describe in detail on architectural changes of roots under P deficiency that are reported in various crops and discuss the efforts made to improve PUE using molecular marker tools. Details on QTLs identified for low P-stress tolerance in various crop plants are presented. These QTLs can be used to improve PUE in crop plants through MAS and breeding, which may be beneficial to improve the yields under P-deficient soil. Development of new and improved varieties using MAB will limit the use of nonrenewable fertilizers and improve PUE of key crop plants in low input agriculture.inorganic phosphate, marker-assisted breeding, phosphorus, phosphorus use efficiency, quantitative trait loci, root architecture

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The clustered regularly interspaced short palindromic repeats (CRISPR) and CRISPR-associated protein (CRISPR/Cas) system has altered life science research offering enormous options in manipulating, detecting, imaging, and annotating specific DNA or RNA sequences of diverse organisms. This system incorporates fragments of foreign DNA (spacers) into CRISPR cassettes, which are further transcribed into the CRISPR arrays and then processed to make guide RNA (gRNA). The CRISPR arrays are genes that encode Cas proteins. Cas proteins provide the enzymatic machinery required for acquiring new spacers targeting invading elements. Due to programmable sequence specificity, numerous Cas proteins such as Cas9, Cas12, Cas13, and Cas14 have been exploited to develop new tools for genome engineering. Cas variants stimulated genetic research and propelled the CRISPR/Cas tool for manipulating and editing nucleic acid sequences of living cells of diverse organisms. This review aims to provide detail on two classes (class 1 and 2) of the CRISPR/Cas system, and the mechanisms of all Cas proteins, including Cas12, Cas13, and Cas14 discovered so far. In addition, we also discuss the pros and cons and recent applications of various Cas proteins in diverse fields, including those used to detect viruses like severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus-2 (SARS-CoV-2). This review enables the researcher to gain knowledge on various Cas proteins and their applications, which have the potential to be used in next-generation precise genome engineering.