Medicine is not health care, food is health care: plant metabolic engineering, diet and human health

Martin, Cathie; Li, Jie

doi:10.1111/nph.14730

Cited by 101 publications

(88 citation statements)

References 207 publications

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“…Moreover, while focusing on increasing crop yields, the improvement of crop quality and acutely that of micronutrients has been largely overlooked. The consequent nutritional imbalance has brought serious health problems (Martin and Li, 2017), and as such next-generation crops enriched in micronutrients are required to address human dietrelated chronic disease (Francis et al, 2017).…”

Section: Conclusion and Future Perspectivesmentioning

confidence: 99%

De Novo Domestication: An Alternative Route toward New Crops for the Future

2019

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Current global agricultural production must feed over 7 billion people. However, productivity varies greatly across the globe and is under threat from both increased competitions for land and climate change and associated environmental deterioration. Moreover, the increase in human population size and dietary changes are putting an ever greater burden on agriculture. The majority of this burden is met by the cultivation of a very small number of species, largely in locations that differ from their origin of domestication. Recent technological advances have raised the possibility of de novo domestication of wild plants as a viable solution for designing ideal crops while maintaining food security and a more sustainable lowinput agriculture. Here we discuss how the discovery of multiple key domestication genes alongside the development of technologies for accurate manipulation of several target genes simultaneously renders de novo domestication a route toward crops for the future.

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Section: Conclusion and Future Perspectivesmentioning

confidence: 99%

De Novo Domestication: An Alternative Route toward New Crops for the Future

2019

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“…The increasing human population confronts agriculture with unprecedented challenges. More food of higher nutritional content will be needed to feed the anticipated world population of 8-10 billion by 2050 (Foley et al, 2011;Martin, 2013;Mattoo, 2014;Martin and Li, 2017). This is particularly challenging given a decline in crop yields and increasing water shortages in many regions of the world (Rosegrant and Cline, 2003).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Sustainable Crop Production Systems and Human Nutrition

Roberts

Mattoo

2019

Front. Sustain. Food Syst.

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There is a pressing need for redesigning agriculture to achieve sustainability and for utilizing modern genetic tools, including genetic engineering, to add nutritional value to crops for the benefit of the diverse human population. Collectively, plant foods contain most minerals, macronutrients (calories), and micronutrients essential for human nutrition. These plant foods also contain a range of bioactive compounds that can play important roles in the prevention of chronic diseases including heart disease, cancer, stroke, diabetes, Alzheimer's, cataracts, and age-related functional decline. However, these bioactive nutrients are often present at marginal concentrations in edible plant tissues in regard to human nutrition/prevention of disease. The quantity of these nutrients in edible plant tissues is primarily dependent on crop genetics and regulated by complex and overlapping mechanisms in response to developmental and environmental cues. Environmental cues are naturally occurring-temperature, light intensity, and other stressors, or result from crop production system components-fertilizer, tillage operations, etc. One strategy for sustainable, next-generation crop development is to design cropping systems that have minimal or lesser impact on the environment and to use genetic approaches to enhance crop nutritional content. This strategy is appealing since crop genetics is the primary driver of plant nutrient content and because purely managing crop production fields to optimize crop nutrient content is extremely challenging if not impossible. As an example we present the development of a next-generation sustainable tomato production system with beneficial impacts on tomato physiology and nutritional quality of the tomato fruit. Our analysis of the metabolomes of tomato cultivars in this and other cropping systems highlights the need for robust cultivars that consistently express nutritional and other desirable traits across cropping systems and under differing environmental conditions.

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“…However, some of these metabolites are sometime produced in very limiting amounts. Plant metabolic engineering can address some of these natural limitations for nutritional improvement of foods or to create green factories that produce valuable compounds (Martin and Li, 2017; Yuan and Grotewold, 2015). Yet, the complex regulation of plant metabolic pathways and the particularly time-consuming approaches for stable genetic transformation of plant tissues highly limit quick progress in plant metabolic engineering.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Efficient production of saffron crocins and picrocrocin in Nicotiana benthamiana using a virus-driven system

Martí¹,

Diretto²,

Aragonés³

et al. 2019

Preprint

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22Crocins and picrocrocin are glycosylated apocarotenoids responsible, respectively, 23 for the color and the unique taste of the saffron spice, known as red gold due to its 24 high price. Several studies have also shown the health-promoting properties of these 25 compounds. However, their high costs hamper the wide use of these metabolites in 26 the pharmaceutical sector. We have developed a virus-driven system to produce 27 remarkable amounts of crocins and picrocrocin in adult Nicotiana benthamiana 28 plants in only two weeks. The system consists of viral clones derived from tobacco 29 etch potyvirus that express specific carotenoid cleavage dioxygenase (CCD) enzymes 30 from Crocus sativus and Buddleja davidii. Metabolic analyses of infected tissues 31 demonstrated that the sole virus-driven expression of C. sativus CsCCD2L or B. 32 davidii BdCCD4.1 resulted in the production of crocins, picrocrocin and safranal. 33 2 Using the recombinant virus that expressed CsCCD2L, accumulations of 0.2% of 34 crocins and 0.8% of picrocrocin in leaf dry weight were reached in only two weeks. 35 In an attempt to improve apocarotenoid content in N. benthamiana, co-expression 36 of CsCCD2L with other carotenogenic enzymes, such as Pantoea ananatis phytoene 37 synthase (PaCrtB) and saffron -carotene hydroxylase 2 (BCH2), was performed 38 using the same viral system. This combinatorial approach led to an additional crocin 39 increase up to 0.35% in leaves in which CsCCD2L and PaCrtB were co-expressed. 40 Considering that saffron apocarotenoids are costly harvested from flower stigma 41 once a year, and that Buddleja spp. flowers accumulate lower amounts, this system 42 may be an attractive alternative for the sustainable production of these appreciated 43 metabolites. 44 45

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Medicine is not health care, food is health care: plant metabolic engineering, diet and human health

Cited by 101 publications

References 207 publications

De Novo Domestication: An Alternative Route toward New Crops for the Future

De Novo Domestication: An Alternative Route toward New Crops for the Future

Sustainable Crop Production Systems and Human Nutrition

Efficient production of saffron crocins and picrocrocin in Nicotiana benthamiana using a virus-driven system

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