Genes associated with plant growth enhancement under elevated CO2 conditions is identified

March 19, 2022

Results from the analysis of genetic variation within a single species

The atmospheric carbon dioxide (CO₂) concentration has ever kept increasing. The elevation of CO₂ level in the air accelerates the plant photosynthesis rate in the short term, but observations show that the increase does not seem to last for long in many plant species. Thus, some concerns that this might contribute to food shortages that may occur as the global population grows. One of the resolutions for this issue is breeding crops adapted to the high CO₂ environment that produce high yields.

The cooperative research group of Tohoku University, Kyushu Institute of Technology, and the RIKEN Center for Sustainable Resource Science identified genes that contribute to enhancing plant growth under elevated CO₂ conditions from various ecotypes of Arabidopsis thaliana collected from various latitudes and altitudes around the world and performing comparative analyses. Expanding this research will lead to the future development of crops with high yields in an elevated CO₂ environment.

Original article

Plant Molecular Biology doi:10.1007/s11103-022-01265-w

R. Oguchi, K. Hanada, M. Shimizu, M. Mishio, H. Ozaki, K. Hikosaka,

"Enhanced growth rate under elevated CO₂ conditions was observed for transgenic lines of genes identified by intraspecific variation analyses in Arabidopsis thaliana".