Hudson

River

and

Plantik

Partner

to

Enhance

Heat

Tolerance

in

Strawberries

Tackling the growing threat of rising global temperatures to strawberry yields, the partnership offers breeders a route to heat-tolerant varieties without building the discovery or editing capabilities in-house

Plant genome-editing technology company Hudson River and plant engineering company Plantik today announced a partnership to bring heat tolerance into commercial strawberries. The programme combines heat-tolerance targets identified and validated by Plantik in tomato with the transgene-free strawberry genome-editing methods developed by Hudson River to translate trait discoveries into improved strawberry varieties.

Increasing and intensifying heatwaves across the globe threaten both the productivity and quality of crops. Strawberry is among the most exposed to high temperatures, disrupting its flowering and fruit set, reducing yield and negatively impacting fruit quality. Plantik brings demonstrated expertise in engineering heat tolerance - validated in tomato across multiple genetic backgrounds with field demonstrations currently under way across multiple locations in the US and Europe. This is combined with Hudson River’s proprietary, transgene-free genome-editing method, already tailored to strawberry and well suited for complex traits such as heat tolerance. Together, the two companies plan to improve heat tolerance in strawberries and help breeders protect both productivity and marketable fruit quality given increasingly challenging growing conditions.

"Heat tolerance has become a must-have trait for many crops across the globe. Plants' ability to withstand increasingly intensified and repeated heatwaves while preserving yield will continue to be a top priority in the coming years,” said Ying Shao, Co-Founder and CEO of Plantik.

The partnership brings together unique technologies developed by each company. Plantik’s ATLANTIS platform offers proprietary discovery capabilities to identify high-potential targets for engineering complex traits without compromise. Hudson River’s BioMaas platform enables breeders to access its advanced genome-editing capabilities without having to build the R&D and technology in-house.

Throughout this collaboration, BioMaas will act as a bridge between trait innovators and breeders – helping trait companies translate their discoveries into crop-specific applications, while giving breeders an accessible route to valuable new traits. Through BioMaas, strawberry breeders will be able to access unique and proprietary traits from specialized discovery companies such as Plantik, helping them expand and accelerate their innovation pipelines. The partnership will tackle the heat tolerance challenge in strawberries as a starting point before applying it in other crops.

“This collaboration is a perfect example of how trait knowledge can be leveraged from one crop to another, without the trait needing to be present in the breeder’s germplasm or lengthy backcrossing and selection. With BioMaas, we introduce the desired trait directly into elite germplasm, creating material ready for commercialisation in a single generation,” said Lotte Westerhof, CSO of Hudson River.

Validation trials are already underway between the two companies, who are welcoming trait challenges from companies looking to implement these into their strawberry varieties.