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Rice blast: strategies and challenges for improving genetic resistance

Abstract:

Rice blast, caused by the fungus Pyricularia oryzae L., is considered one of the main threats to world rice production. The development of resistant cultivars is one of the best and sustainable control alternatives. Plant breeding efforts have been accelerated by genetic mapping (linkage and associative) and marker assisted selection. On the other hand, genomic editing techniques, such as meganucleases (MNs), Zinc-finger nucleases (ZFNs), Transcription Activator-like Effector Nucleases (TALENs) and Clustered Regularly Interspaced Short Palindrome Repeats/CRISPR-associated protein 9 (CRISPR/Cas9), can be used to promote specific genetic modifications. Likewise, transgenics can also be used to manipulate specific genes. In this sense, this work aims to characterize rice blast and elucidate available biotechnological alternatives to accelerate the development of improved rice cultivars resistant to rice blast.

Keywords:
Abiotic stress; biotechnology tools; Oryza sativa L.; Pyricularia oryzae L.

Crop Breeding and Applied Biotechnology Universidade Federal de Viçosa, Departamento de Fitotecnia, 36570-000 Viçosa - Minas Gerais/Brasil, Tel.: (55 31)3899-2611, Fax: (55 31)3899-2611 - Viçosa - MG - Brazil
E-mail: cbab@ufv.br