A New Era of CRISPR Technology to Improve Climate Resilience in Rice

Plants face significant climatic challenges such as salinity, drought, and heat stress that pose a threat to their growth and yield. Such fluctuating climatic conditions primarily affect stress-sensitive crops such as rice. Rice is a staple diet worldwide, and its productivity must be enhanced to accomplish the “zero hunger” goal. Various molecular mechanisms that activate the stress-specific candidate genes have been identified and characterized through conventional and molecular breeding approaches such as mutagenesis, overexpression, or knockout. Recently, a novel gene disruption method, namely, clustered regularly interspaced short palindromic repeat (CRISPR)-mediated gene editing helps precisely edit the genome with higher efficiency and ease in a cost-effective manner. Targeting the candidate genes through knockout mutations or manipulation of single-nucleotide bases has facilitated crop improvement. Thus, in this chapter, we focus on the implementation of advanced CRISPR/Cas9 technology, an effective tool for gene modification, to augment the stress-resilient trait in rice for prolonged sustainability and enhanced global food security.