How gene editing hopes to boost produce consumption

Pairwise, a food and agriculture company that uses gene editing and CRISPR technology to transform plants and production systems, recently partnered with Bayer to license its leafy-greens blend edited with CRISPR to improve its flavor. The company says it also developed the first seedless, thornless blackberry variety using CRISPR.

In this “Tip of the Iceberg” podcast episode, Pairwise co-founder and CEO Tom Adams talks about the role gene editing and CRISPR technology will play in the future of the fresh produce industry. (View the complete episode in the video player above.)

Adams explained that CRISPR and gene editing are different from genetically modified organisms. With GMOs, a gene from another organism with a desired trait — such as insect resistance — is added into the desired plant so that the plant then has that gene.

“Gene editing allows, without going through all the breeding process, ... directly [changing the desired trait] using this very precise enzyme that allows you to target the gene and change it,” he said.

Gene-editing tools such as CRISPR can be used to make changes to genes present with all variants of a species.

“CRISPR is a really interesting tool that allows us to do very precise changes to DNA and it really was derived from and something that was found in nature,” he said. “Bacteria use these tools — the CRISPR tools — to protect themselves from viruses just like we have immune systems that help protect us from viruses.”

The Nobel Prize-winning discovery was made when scientists found they could use the CRISPR tool and use to modify a piece of existing DNA and Pairwise co-founder David Liu found a way to subtly edit DNA, Adams says.

“We often see CRISPR described as scissors — so the original one would double-cut the DNA and fix it, and then it would be repaired and make changes,” he said.

One of the first available Pairwise innovations was in leafy greens. A researcher at Pairwise used CRISPR to eliminate the spicy taste of mustard greens to help make them more palatable for use in salads and more.

“We were thinking about things that could help with people's diets and nutrition and looking at the salad space,” he said. “We realized that people talk about eating kale, but they eat romaine and iceberg. Romaine and iceberg aren’t bad for you; they just don't carry a lot of nutritional value and kale carries. I don't mind kale, but it seems kind of tough ... I don't like the bitterness very much. We created this type of green very nutritious that's basically a new type of salad.”

Adams says the Pairwise team demonstrated the leafy greens at fairs in places like Seattle and Austin, Texas. He says the team probably gave away more than 6,000 salads and got a wide variety of consumers — from those skeptical of gene-editing technology to those who are more savvy. He says those who didn’t want to eat the salad often based that decision on how the greens were grown — conventionally instead of organic — as opposed to the use of gene technology.

He says Pairwise got more than 3,000 consumers to fill out surveys on the greens, with about 91% indicating a willingness to buy the new greens and giving high marks for the benefits of gene editing.

“I think the finding there is you can really win over consumers by creating a tangible product that does something for them,” he said. “What we didn't really do with the GMO product [I worked on previously], we were not really communicating to people with positive energy.”