Ribeiro, Joana A.Varanda, CarlaMateratski, PatrickCampos, Maria DoroteiaAlbuquerque, AndréPatanita, MarianaOsa, NicolásFélix, M.R.2024-01-102024-01-102023-06Ribeiro, J.A.; Varanda, C.; Materatski, P.; Campos, M.D.; Albuquerque, A.; M. Patanita; Garrido, N. & Félix, M.R. (2023) "CRISPR/Cas13 system: A technology for the successful control of plant viruses". Trabalho apresentado em Science CHANGing Policy, 2nd June, Évora, Portugal. Book of abstracts, p.101.978-972-778-331-1http://hdl.handle.net/10400.15/4686Apresentação em painelViruses are among the most important causal agents of infectious diseases, having relatively small genomes that comprise RNA or DNA. They have the ability to rapidly replicate and spread throughout a crop, being very difficult to monitor and causing devastating diseases in many agricultural systems. These can lead to significant losses in crop quality and yield, resulting in extreme economic impacts worldwide and threatening the provision of adequate nourishment for a continuous growing population. There are no efficient chemical products that can eliminate an infecting plant virus without perturbing host cells. Therefore, preventive sanitary measures, such as the use of viral resistant or tolerant plants, are usually the only options. Conventionally, these resistant/tolerant plants were generated through a very time- consuming classical breeding process. However, nowadays, molecular plant breeding plays a key role to prevent and control plant viruses. Clustered regularly interspaced short palindromic repeats (CRISPR) and CRISPR-associated (Cas) proteins systems allowed the development of a new technology that paves the way towards a new horizon for crop improvement. The first CRISPR/Cas systems studied were very useful for DNA-targeting, however, more recently identified types, such as CRISPR /Cas13, can specifically cleave single- stranded RNA in eukaryotic cells. Therefore, CRISPR/Cas13 is a promising tool for engineering plant immunity against a broad range of RNA viruses, which are the most abundant class of viruses in plants. The present work aims to bring together the most up-to-date information on CRISPR/Cas13 system to control plant viruses, discussing the limitations and future challenges for its application to produce virus resistant plants towards a more sustainable agriculture.engconference object