Genetic engineering and genome editing in olive: past achievements, advances and prospects

Among the new plant breeding techniques (NPBTs), the CRISPR/Cas9 system is re-shaping plant biotechnology in agriculture since it is faster, easier, and cheaper than other gene editing techniques.
Due to its many benefits, and ease-of-use, it is becoming part of the commonly used methodologies for obtaining new cultivars.
Olive is one of the most economically important crops for the Mediterranean region, but it has not utilized many new genetic engineering technologies.
Classical breeding is hindered by difficulties related to high heterozygosity and the long juvenile phase of the species.
Olive breeding focuses on traits such as plant growth habits, juvenile period, and oil quality, which have been linked to several tested genes.
The difficulties related to de novo shoot regeneration and somatic embryogenesis is hampered by the use of tissue culture-mediated biotechnology in this species.
In fact, the recalcitrance of olive tissues to the in vitro manipulation is the main bottleneck, due to the genotype dependence and the availability of very few protocols.
In this brief report we describe some achievements of olive genetic transformation.
We discuss genome editing applications, currently still unexplored in this species, that if edited without introducing foreign DNA into cells, may alleviate regulatory concerns related to genetically modified plants and could represent an opportunity to develop DNA-free genome editing plant materials.

IX International Olive Symposium

C. Silvestri, G. Vaia, I. Narváez, J.Á. Mercado, V. Cristofori, E. Palomo-Rios

Olea europaea L., Agrobacterium-mediated transformation, de novo organogenesis, somatic embryogenesis, genome editing, protoplast technology

https://doi.org/10.17660/ActaHortic.2026.1446.3