CABBI researchers use robots to genetically engineer plants to produce more oil

In Illinois, as the global population grows, the demand for food and energy is increasing even as extreme weather events make crops more vulnerable to stress. While traditional breeding takes years to develop more resilient crops, plant bioengineering offers a faster, more precise way to improve traits for higher yields and better stress tolerance.

But engineering plants to enhance their helpful traits is a complex process demanding significant time and labor. In a major breakthrough, a team at the Center for Advanced Bioenergy and Bioproducts Innovation (CABBI) found a way to accelerate this process using robots. Researchers deployed a biofoundry—a laboratory integrating robotics, computer-aided design, and informatics—to make genetically engineered plants and used it to boost oil production in plant cells and even whole plants.

This fast, automated, scalable, high-throughput pipeline for plant bioengineering, or FAST-PB, can be scaled up to improve the speed and productivity of synthetic plant biology, genome editing, and metabolic engineering. The advance will help scientists quickly improve valuable plant traits, such as increasing oil production and optimizing photosynthesis.