Shunya Hirata (Supervisor: Hidetaka Kaya, Associate Professor), a first-year student in the doctoral course of the United Graduate School of Agricultural Sciences, won the “Outstanding Student Presentation Award” at the 41st Annual Meeting of the Japanese Society for Plant Biotechnology held at Tohoku University from August 30 (Friday) through September 1 (Sunday), 2024.
This award is given to students who give oral presentations, which are evaluated based on three criteria: research content, presentation, and question-and-answer. This year, 13 presentations were selected from a total of 91 entries.
Award-winning title and overview
“Development of DNA methylation editing technology in Arabidopsis thaliana”
DNA methylation is the addition of methyl groups (-CH3) to DNA (mainly cytosine). In this study, by applying genome editing technology, a fusion protein that combines the Cas9 protein with DNA methyltransferase or DNA demethylase and a guide RNA were coexpressed in Arabidopsis thaliana, a model plant, to successfully control the addition and removal of methyl groups to the DNA in the target region. Notably, this research suggested that the extent to which DNA methylation and demethylation can be controlled is more precise than previously reported. In the future, this technology will be applied to major agricultural products in Ehime Prefecture, such as rice and mandarin orange, with the aim of establishing it as a new breeding technology that “does not alter the DNA sequence”.
＜The United Graduate School of Agricultural Sciences＞