Mesophyll conductance, or the ease with which CO2 can diffuse through a leaf’s cells before reaching the location where it undergoes carbon fixation, plays a key role in photosynthesis. CO2 faces barriers as it moves, including cell walls. Now, researchers have increased permeability by reducing the thickness of cell walls, resulting in an increase of CO2 diffusion and uptake of CO2 in a model crop.
This work is published in the Plant Biotechnology Journal in the paper, Greater mesophyll conductance and leaf photosynthesis in the field through modified cell wall porosity and thickness via AtCGR3 expression in tobacco. The work was done by researchers from the Realizing Increased Photosynthetic Efficiency (RIPE) program, led by the University of Illinois, who are engineering crops to be more productive by improving photosynthesis, the natural process all plants use to convert sunlight into energy.