Tag Archives: Mario Pezzotti

CRISPR Chardonnay – Italy Doubles Up

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The University of Verona’s edited vines are already in the field, and soon it could be the turn of the Edmund Mach Foundation and CREA-CNR. Once again, the focus is on Chardonnay, edited to resist downy mildew (with a double knock-out approach) or powdery mildew. I spoke with the key figures of this new chapter in Italian research: Mario Pezzotti, Sara Zenoni, Umberto Salvagnin, Riccardo Velasco, and Vittoria Brambilla. Returning to write for Nature Biotechnology is a joy for me, especially because this time, Italy is leading the way in innovation rather than holding it back, as in the past. Prosit!

CRISPR vines make their field debut in Italy

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Testing of Chardonnay edited to resist downy mildew starts today near Verona, while the prosecco variety awaits its turn in the greenhouse

The president of the influential farmers’ association Coldiretti, Ettore Prandini, formerly very hostile to GMOs, as he plants an edited vine with his own hands in the Verona experimental field on Sept. 30, 24
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A very special day for NGTs in Italy

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The fence bounds twenty-eight square meters of bare land in the middle of the Lombard countryside. Inside it a dozen researchers from the University of Milan are busy. The laptop resting on the ground shows the layout of the plots. A meter is unrolled to mark the coordinates on the ground.  Yellow tags are ready to be stuck into the clods: the inscription TEA (the Italian equivalent of New Genomic Techniques is “Assisted Evolution Techniques”) is used to mark rice that has been genetically edited for resistance to a fungal disease (rice blast), while the abbreviation WT indicates wild-type plants, which have not been modified and serve as a control group.

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CRISPR crops – Italy fires the starting gun

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A CRISPR/Cas9-modified rice variety may be planted in a test field in northern Italy as soon as this spring after a government rule change introduced in 2023. A University of Milan team was the first research group in the country to apply for a field test under a law change that streamlines procedures for field trials of plants developed through genome editing or cisgenesis. With several other groups also planning proposals, a new wave of agricultural genetics in Italy could follow. [Please see the details in my article for Nature Italy]

A tale of three Gs – grape, germs and genetics

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“There is more wit in these bottles than in all the books of philosophy in the world,” wrote Louis Pasteur in 1843, looking forward to the pleasure of toasting with a friend (Charles Chappuis). The French microbiologist, whose bicentenary of birth was celebrated last year, was one of the fathers of the science of wine, as well as of germ theory. I wonder what he would write today, knowing how much progress is being made by geneticists to preserve the spirit of ancient vines while protecting them from the evils of diseases.

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Field of CRISPR dreams in Italy

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You may have heard of the recent European Commission report on the New Genomics Techniques. But you probably don’t know how member states answered the related questionnaire. ““Could NGT-related research bring opportunities/benefits to science, to society and to the agri-food, medicinal or industrial sector?”. This and more in my news feature for Nature Italy.