Repairing a domestication mutation in tomato leads to an earlier yield
Peer-Reviewed Publication
Updates every hour. Last Updated: 3-Jul-2025 23:11 ET (4-Jul-2025 03:11 GMT/UTC)
Genome editing with CRISPR-Cas is often associated with the induction of mutations. However, a team of researchers from the Swiss University of Lausanne now shows that it can also be used to repair natural mutations.
Cells degrade components that are no longer needed through autophagy. New results show that a weak molecular interaction is essential for this process.
By modifying this interaction, it is possible to artificially trigger autophagy, which could then enable the degradation of deposits in neurodegenerative diseases such as Alzheimer's, or support cancer therapies.
The study was published in the journal Nature Cell Biology and was led by Prof. Dr. Claudine Kraft, a member of the CIBSS Cluster of Excellence at the University of Freiburg, and Dr. Florian Wilfling from the Max Planck Institute of Biophysics in Frankfurt.