One of the core aims at Norwich Research Park is to maximise the value and impact of the publicly-funded research that is conducted at the four world leading research institutes, university and university hospital based there. That is often achieved by commercialising the research through start-up companies, who are able to raise investment from the private sector to bring the products and ideas to market.
Earlier this year, the John Innes Centre, based at Norwich Research Park, with its industrial and academic partners, was awarded funding from the Government’s Defra Farming Innovation Programme (in partnership with Innovate UK) to help deliver four ambitious projects that will unleash the potential of precision breeding.
Precision breeding describes a range of technologies, such as gene editing, that can deliver the same type of genetic changes achieved by traditional breeding techniques but in a more rapid, efficient and targeted way. Gene editing can help to develop plants and crops that are disease-resistant, climate resilient and offer better nutritional value, without adding genes from other species.
Using precision breeding techniques to bring foods to market in England was given the green light by new legislation – the UK Government’s Genetic Technology (Precision Breeding) Act 2023 – which became law last year.
The Defra funding, totalling £21.5m, will enable 15 research-industry collaborations across the country to harness precision breeding techniques in the development of sustainable new crops, the opening of new markets and help farmers to cut emissions, strengthen resilience and boost productivity.
Four of these projects are being run at the John Innes Centre.
Two of the projects will assist farmers facing major disease challenges growing the versatile commercial crops oilseed rape and sugar beet. Both these vital break crops are under threat from pests and pathogens, with farmers in urgent need of sustainable solutions following the withdrawal of environmentally-damaging chemical controls.
One of the projects will help to bring gene-edited Vitamin D3-enriched tomatoes to market for UK consumers and another will use gene editing techniques to engineer dandelions to produce a sustainable source of UK-produced rubber, using aeroponic (soil-less) cultivation in indoor farms.
Prof Cristóbal Uauy, Director of the John Innes Centre, said, “We are delighted to be partners in four of the projects chosen in Defra’s national farming innovation precision breeding initiative. The fact that our scientists and their industry partners have been chosen to run four out of a total of 15 projects is a superb endorsement of the John Innes Centre’s and Norwich Research Park’s value as a hub of precision breeding expertise.”
“With these enterprises we will help protect two major agricultural crops from damaging diseases, enhance the nutritional content of the world’s leading horticultural crop, the tomato, while supporting an agritech project involving a completely new UK crop, the dandelion. While the science itself is fascinating, the real-world impact these innovations could have on society, agriculture and farmers cannot be underestimated.”
The four projects being run by the John Innes Centre and its partners are:
Growing a new source of sustainable rubber from dandelions
This £2.4m project brings together Norwich Research Park-based start-up QuberTech, the John Innes Centre and LettUsGrow, a specialist in aeroponic indoor cultivation. This consortium will precision breed dandelions, which naturally produce latex in their root system that can be used to manufacture natural rubber, using aeroponic farming systems that enable plants to grow without soil.
Dandelions produce levels of latex in their roots that, historically, were seen as too low to be commercially viable and environmentally sustainable. However, this innovation offers a sustainable UK-based supply of a valuable global commodity which is at risk due to climate change and supply chain vulnerabilities.
Dr Noam Chayut, of the John Innes Centre, said: “We have been working to source dandelions from partners around the world to build a resource from which we can choose varieties most suited to rubber production. This resource will enable us to use gene editing and analytical tools to domesticate the plants and optimise them to produce a higher-grade product in greater quantities.”
Dr Neil Clelland, Co-founder of QuberTech, said: “This project fully supports QuberTech’s technical and commercial milestones, enabling us to build a new, domestic rubber supply that strengthens UK resilience, supports sustainable agriculture and demonstrates how novel precision-bred crops can deliver real economic and environmental benefits.”
Developing resistance to Virus Yellows disease in sugar beet
£1.7m has been awarded to fund a three-year partnership between Prof Steven Penfield’s research group, British Sugar and biotech company Tropic, that is also based at Norwich Research Park. The project will use gene editing technology to build genetic resistance to Virus Yellows disease in the sugar beet crop, described as an ‘existential threat’ to production and calculated as causing 25 per cent yield losses at a cost of £43m to growers.
Prof Penfield said: “This investment will help us to apply our precision breeding expertise in protecting sugar beet, which is so critical as a break crop, a source of sustainable fuels and a key ingredient in a future, greener biotech economy.”
Building a variant of oilseed rape that is resistant to Light Leaf Spot disease
This project will employ gene editing to build resistance against several damaging diseases of oilseed rape, including light leaf spot, a disease that cost growers an estimated £300m in 2022. £2.5m has been committed to a three-year collaboration that includes Dr Rachel Wells’s research group together with researchers at the University of Hertfordshire, crop breeders and farmers.
Dr Wells, said, “I am excited to move our resistant plant material from the laboratory to field scale trials to see how it performs in a real-world setting.”
Tom Allen-Stevens of BOFIN (British On-Farm Innovation Network) said: “This project is game-changing for farmers. It will put precision-bred oilseed rape technology on to their farms for the first time across Europe.”
Sunshine Tomatoes: a farming future through precision breeding
This £1.1m three-year project aims to commercialise the Sunshine Tomato, a gene-edited vitamin-enriched tomato that addresses the critical global health challenge of vitamin D deficiency.
The tomato, produced by Prof Cathie Martin’s research group, is set to become one of the first food crops approved under the new legislation. The project will help to ensure that consumers gain the benefits delivered by the planned new products that include fresh tomatoes, sun-dried tomatoes and plant-derived vitamin D supplements. The project will also receive financial support from John Innes Enterprises, the commercial arm of the John Innes Centre.
Prof Martin said: “The funding recognises the significance and potential of our achievements in bringing the vitamin D3 gene-edited tomato to human trials. The additional support from John Innes Enterprises will give us greater flexibility in product development and enable healthier, affordable products to be developed to meet consumer demand.”
Dr Jonathan Clarke, on behalf of John Innes Enterprises, said: “This innovative project aims to show that by using gene editing we can improve the nutritional composition of a staple, widely consumed horticultural crop as part of a longer-term strategy to improve human health.”
Roz Bird, CEO of Anglia Innovation Partnership, the campus management company for Norwich Research Park said, “The fact that Defra has chosen to deploy a quarter of its national programme funding to exciting projects at Norwich Research Park is yet more evidence of the unique breadth and depth of scientific activity on the campus in agri-food, health, nutrition and the environment and our ability to translate fantastic science into impactful, real-world, solutions. Anyone interested in finding out more should consider attending our precision breeding event, hosted by JIC, on the 24th September taking place at the John Innes Conference Centre.”
