Synthetic Biology in Crop Production: Emerging Strategies for Precision and Sustainability

Abstract

Synthetic biology is transforming the field of crop improvement by allowing the precise control of genetic circuits, metabolic pathways, and regulatory networks. Unlike the conventional transgenic approaches, which involve the alteration of single genes, synthetic biology involves the incorporation of multi-gene constructs, synthetic promoters, and programmable regulatory networks to control the physiological processes in crops. For instance, the engineering of photosynthetic genes such as SBPase and Rubisco activase resulted in the enhancement of carbon assimilation by 15 to 30 percent. Moreover, the rewiring of the nitrogen metabolic pathway and the incorporation of the microbial nitrogen fixation pathway resulted in the partial substitution of 10 to 25 percent. However, the performance is compromised to 5 to 15 percent in the field conditions. This is because the regulatory instability and environmental sensitivity reduce the performance. Synthetic gene circuits involving the regulation of stress regulators such as DREB and AREB resulted in the improvement of drought tolerance. However, the growth penalty is associated with the expression of these genes. Furthermore, the engineering of the microbiome using synthetic biology constructs is also facing challenges in terms of colonization stability.

Keywords: Synthetic Biology; Gene Regulatory Circuits; Metabolic Engineering; Nitrogen Use Efficiency; Plant-Microbe Interactions

Citation

Adeel Asghar. Synthetic Biology in Crop Production: Emerging Strategies for Precision and Sustainability. WebLog J Biotechnol Biomed Eng. wjbtbe.2026. i1207. https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.22842923