Development of a Haploid-Inducer Mediated Genome Editing System for Accelerating Maize Breeding

Crop breeding aims to generate pure inbred lines with multiple desired traits. Doubled haploid (DH) and genome editing using CRISPR/Cas9 are two powerful game-changing technologies in crop breeding. However, both of them still fall short for rapid generation of pure elite lines with integrated favorable traits. Here, we report the development of a Haploid-Inducer Mediated Genome Editing (IMGE) approach, which utilizes a maize haploid inducer line carrying a CRISPR/Cas9 cassette targeting for a desired agronomic trait to pollinate an elite maize inbred line and to generate genome-edited haploids in the elite maize background. Homozygous pure DH lines with the desired trait improvement could be generated within two generations, thus bypassing the lengthy procedure of repeated crossing and backcrossing used in conventional breeding for integrating a desirable trait into elite commercial backgrounds. We report here the development of a novel approach, termed Haploid-Inducer Mediated Genome Editing (IMGE), that combines haploid induction and genome editing technologies to create genome-edited haploids and doubled haploids, so so to accelerate crop breeding.