b'We have identified successful traits in over 25 plants by now, Wendt notes. That might not be a record, but consideringWe have identified successful traits in over 25 plants that we have done it in less than four years, its pretty impressiveby now. That might not be a record, but considering I think.Traitomic is now poised to launch TraitSource, a platform thatthat we have done it in less than four years, its pretty gives scientists direct access to specific traits in over 20 different crops.impressive I think. Its an attempt to share FIND-IT to a broader community, Toni Wendtand we are excited to see how TraitSource will be welcomed, says Jan Gottlieb, Commercial Lead at Traitomic. Hopefully it provides an opportunity for scientists that have a great trait idea, but dont have access to a proper toolbox for developing it. New Life to Conventional BreedingHambraeus notes that plant breeding is one of the most criti-cal means by which agriculture can meet the nutritional needs of our growing population without exhausting the planet. To successfully convert ideas to impact, however, a range of trait development technologies will be needed.The Traitomic team believes there conventional breeding technologies and classic screenings have a critical place in plant breeding. Gene editing has been on everyones lips even before Jennifer Doudna and Emmanuelle Charpentier were awarded the Noble prize for their breakthrough research on CRISPR technol-ogy in 2020, but broad implementation of the technique may not be as straightforward as sometimes wished, Hambraeus says. A 2023 review by Teodoro Cardi et al. in Trends in Plant Science concludes that there are still many bottlenecks and challenges with the CRISPR/Cas system in plants, which slow down the commercial impact of genome editing in breeding. Technological challenges arent the only challenges to new breeding techniques. Some consumer groups remain resistant to gene-edited food, and the European Union has not yet agreed on how to manage these modern trait development technolo-gies. Hambraeus says that while these technologies are particu-larly attractive for crops grown in geopolitical areas with restric-tive GMO legislation, they also are the bestand sometimes the onlybreeding option for certain breeding projects (for example, for plants in which transformation protocols are not available). As Wallace Cowling, a plant breeder at the University of Western Australia, recently stated in the journal Science, FIND-IT is a brilliant example of how modern technology canWhile traditional mutation libraries span about 3,000 to 5,000 improve outcomes from plant breeding without the need forplants, Traitomics FIND-IT populations each span several hundreds genetic modification.SW of thousands of plants and involve large-scale cultivation. 32/ SEEDWORLD.COMJANUARY 2024'