Genetic manipulation of anti-nutritional factors in major crops for a sustainable diet in future

Abstract

The consumption of healthy food, in order to strengthen the immune system, is now a major focus of people worldwide and is essential to tackle the emerging pandemic concerns. Moreover, research in this area paves the way for diversification of human diets by incorporating underutilized crops which are highly nutritious and climate-resilient in nature. However, although the consumption of healthy foods increases nutritional uptake, the bioavailability of nutrients and their absorption from foods also play an essential role in curbing malnutrition in developing countries. This has led to a focus on anti-nutrients that interfere with the digestion and absorption of nutrients and proteins from foods. Anti-nutritional factors in crops, such as phytic acid, gossypol, goitrogens, glucosinolates, lectins, oxalic acid, saponins, raffinose, tannins, enzyme inhibitors, alkaloids, β-N-oxalyl amino alanine (BOAA), and hydrogen cyanide (HCN), are synthesized in crop metabolic pathways and are interconnected with other essential growth regulation factors. Hence, breeding with the aim of completely eliminating anti-nutrition factors tends to compromise desirable features such as yield and seed size. However, advanced techniques, such as integrated multi-omics, RNAi, gene editing, and genomics-assisted breeding, aim to breed crops in which negative traits are minimized and to provide new strategies to handle these traits in crop improvement programs. There is also a need to emphasize individual crop-based approaches in upcoming research programs to achieve smart foods with minimum constraints in future. This review focuses on progress in molecular breeding and prospects for additional approaches to improve nutrient bioavailability in major crops.

Approaches to Use Anti-nutritional Factors Containing Plant Based Protein-rich Aquafeeds

“…Breeding programmes involved in eliminating antinutritional are also compromising in terms of yield. Therefore, advance molecular such as techniques genomics-assisted breeding, gene editing etc emphasized on individual crop-based approaches may help in to reducing the concentration of the antinutritional factors and produce foods with minimum constraints in future [25].…”

Commercial Cultivation of Edible Halophytes: The Issue of Oxalates and Potential Mitigation Options

“…This can be accomplished by either down-regulating genes that are involved in the synthesis of the compound or, conversely, up-regulating genes that are involved in the degradation of the compound. This approach opens the opportunity to produce crops in which negative anti-nutritional traits are reduced or even eliminated, allowing for crop-specific strategies and the production of "smart foods" [65]. While no evidence was found for specific cases where this approach has been carried out with edible halophytes, several studies have looked into reducing oxalate levels in vegetables through metabolic engineering.…”

Feeding Value of Lupins, Field Peas, Faba Beans and Chickpeas for Poultry: An Overview

“…Older cultivars of grain legumes are known to contain high concentrations of various ANFs, which severely limit their inclusion in animal nutrition. The levels of these constituents have been considerably reduced in modern cultivars through well-planned plant breeding technologies and this has enhanced the usefulness of grain legumes in animal feeding [303].…”