Camelina sativa, an oilseed at the nexus between model system and commercial crop

Abstract

The rapid assessment of metabolic engineering strategies in plants is aided by crops that provide simple, high throughput transformation systems, a sequenced genome, and the ability to evaluate the resulting plants in field trials. Camelina sativa provides all of these attributes in a robust oilseed platform. The ability to perform field evaluation of Camelina is a useful, and in some studies essential benefit that allows researchers to evaluate how traits perform outside the strictly controlled conditions of a greenhouse. In the field the plants are subjected to higher light intensities, seasonal diurnal variations in temperature and light, competition for nutrients, and watering regimes dictated by natural weather patterns, all which may affect trait performance. There are difficulties associated with the use of Camelina. The current genetic resources available for Camelina pale in comparison to those developed for the model plant Arabidopsis thaliana; however, the sequence similarity of the Arabidopsis and Camelina genomes often allows the use of Arabidopsis as a reference when additional information is needed. Camelina's genome, an allohexaploid, is more complex than other model crops, but the diploid inheritance of its three subgenomes is straightforward. The need to navigate three copies of each gene in genome editing or mutagenesis experiments adds some complexity but also provides advantages for gene dosage experiments. The ability to quickly engineer Camelina with novel traits, advance generations, and bulk up homozygous lines for small-scale field tests in less than a year, in our opinion, far outweighs the complexities associated with the crop.

Metabolic Engineering a Model Oilseed Camelina sativa for the Sustainable Production of High-Value Designed Oils

“…Many of the shortcomings associated with model species, discussed later, can be overcome with camelina, as it has the ability to be both an experimental model system and recognized oilseed crop. Currently, camelina is getting the rising interest and increasing expanding of cultivation across the world (Gugel and Falk, 2006;Mcvay and Khan, 2011;Guy et al, 2014;Malik et al, 2018). A number of lipid metabolic engineering in seeds of C. sativa in recent years were summarized in Table 1.…”

“…However, this model plant has poor agronomic traits such as small seed yield and unable large-scale field cultivation, which has limited the functional testing of the modified oil. In contrast, Camelina sativa (L.) Crantz, an important oilseed crop in the family Brassicaceae, possesses a number of valuable agronomic traits that recommend it as both a new model system and an ideal crop platform for lipid metabolic engineering (Zubr, 1997;Kagale et al, 2014;Ruiz-Lopez et al, 2015;Bansal and Durrett, 2016;Malik et al, 2018). Camelina has a relatively short life cycle, low water and fertilizer requirements.…”

“…Camelina seed yield is comparable to other oil seed crops, particularly under stress conditions. It's simple, effective transformation system, combined with the availability of abundant transcriptomic and genomic data, has allowed the generation of engineered camelina lines capable of synthesizing high levels of novel oils or UFAs, further enabling subsequent field testing of such traits at a large scale Nguyen et al, 2013;Ruiz-Lopez et al, 2014;Malik et al, 2018).…”

Aldoxime Metabolism Is Linked to Phenylpropanoid Production in Camelina sativa

“…Due to its high levels of oil and unique oil composition with over 90% unsaturated fatty acid in its seeds, it is a valuable industrial oil crop for making jet fuel and biodiesel (Kagale et al, 2014). In addition, its seed meal is used as animal feed because of its residual essential fatty acids (Malik et al, 2018). Camelina produces glucosinolates and phenylpropanoids including sinapine (Russo and Reggiani, 2012).…”

Genome-wide identification and functional characterization of Camelina sativa WRKY gene family in response to abiotic stress

“…aviation fuel and biodiesel), and other high-value industrial products [7]. Numerous studies have focused on camelina seed yield and oil quality [8,9]. For example, over-expression of microRNA167A in C. sativa seeds reduced α-linolenic acid content and increased the seed size [10].…”