Scientists from three of our world-leading research institutes have been selected to work on two ground-breaking international research projects to help develop the plants and food of the future. The projects are part of the £62.4m national Advanced Research and Invention Agency (ARIA) Synthetic Plants programme.
ARIA is an R&D funding agency, that is part of the Government’s Department for Science, Innovation and Technology (DSIT). It has been established to unlock technological breakthroughs that will ultimately benefit society. It funds teams of exceptional scientists and engineers to enable them to explore unchartered territory and provides them with the resources and autonomy to turn their ideas into reality. This often means conducting research at the very edge of what is scientifically and technologically possible.
The participation of the scientists from the John Innes Centre, Quadram Institute and Earlham Institute is a significant endorsement of the expertise that exists at Norwich Research Park.
Prof Martin Warren, Chief Scientific Officer at the Quadram Institute, will be working on creating a new generation of major crops that are more productive, resilient and sustainable. He’ll work with research teams in the UK, USA and Germany, led by Saul Purton at University College London (UCL) and Scott C. Lenaghan, University of Tennessee, USA.
The first phase of this project will focus on demonstrating that a functioning synthetic plant unit is possible. It will also examine the social and ethical considerations around synthetic plants. Prof Warren’s team’s specific involvement will be on developing a trait for Vitamin B12 biosynthesis in an engineered potato plant.
Prof Warren said: “This programme represents a bold leap forward in plant engineering biology. By integrating vitamin B12 biosynthesis into plastid genomes (DNA molecules), we’re not just enhancing nutritional value, we’re reimagining what crops can do for human health and environmental resilience. It’s an exciting time to be at the forefront of engineering plants that can help meet global nutritional and sustainability challenges.”
For the second ARIA project, scientists at Norwich Research Park have been recognised for their expertise in engineering biology with plants to make them disease-resistant. Led by The University of Manchester, the project includes researchers from both the John Innes Centre and the Earlham Institute. It will look at how engineering biology technologies can be developed and employed to help feed a growing population while protecting crops against climate change-related catastrophes and pests. The project will focus on one of the world’s staple crops, the potato.
Modern agriculture faces significant challenges, from climate change to food security concerns to soil degradation. Traditional plant breeding and selection can take decades to introduce new beneficial traits, as it relies on random genetic mixing over multiple generations.
The researchers will use engineering biology to establish synthetic plant chromosome (synPAC) technologies that have the potential to provide powerful new ways of rapidly introducing novel traits to plants. In what is a far more precise, controllable and predictable approach, it maintains the plant’s existing characteristics whilst producing essential nutrients or increased pest resistance.
Professor Anthony Hall, Head of Plant Genomics and project co-lead at the Earlham Institute, said, “Climate instability, changes in land use and global conflicts are creating increasing demands on our farmland. This requires us to rethink how we develop new crops to feed our growing populations, replace fossil fuels and provide new platforms for biomanufacturing.
“These technologies have the power to remove breeding bottlenecks that have stymied development of new and improved crops. We want to establish a robust, flexible and reproducible engineering ecosystem to allow the targeted programming of plants at a scale that can transform food security and open up new areas of biomanufacturing.”
Prof Anne Osbourn, Group Leader and Deputy Director of the John Innes Centre, said, “This vital funding means we can begin to programme and engineer plants at scale, creating and testing custom-built plant chromosomes to help crop resilience against disease and climate change, and to make crops more nutritious.
“This innovation has the potential to transform plant science, breeding and agriculture, allowing fast and large-scale improvements at a genetic level, to support farmers and food security in the UK and worldwide.”
Roz Bird, CEO of Anglia Innovation Partnership, said, “The ARIA awards are important because they recognise next generation science. The fact that the science community at Norwich Research Park is involved in two out of a total of nine awards, in their first year, is a signal to investors, start-ups, high-growth companies and large corporates, operating in our global markets, that the future of the innovation-led economy is here at Norwich Research Park using engineering biology to transition and grow the economy. We like to say we’re world class, here’s more evidence.”
