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Ingestion of gluten proteins (gliadins and glutenins) from wheat, barley and rye can cause coeliac disease (CD) in genetically predisposed individuals. The only remedy is a strict and lifelong gluten-free diet. There is a growing desire for coeliac-safe, whole-grain wheat-based products, as consumption of whole-grain foods reduces the risk of chronic diseases. However, due to the large number of gluten genes and the complexity of the wheat genome, wheat that is coeliac-safe but retains baking quality cannot be produced by conventional breeding alone. CD is triggered by immunogenic epitopes, notably those present in α-, γ-, and ω-gliadins. RNA interference (RNAi) silencing has been used to down-regulate gliadin families. Recently, targeted gene editing using CRISPR/Cas9 has been applied to gliadins. These methods produce offspring with silenced, deleted, and/or edited gliadins, that overall may reduce the exposure of patients to CD epitopes. Here we review methods to efficiently screen and select the lines from gliadin gene editing programs for CD epitopes at the DNA and protein level, for baking quality, and ultimately in clinical trials. The application of gene editing for the production of coeliac-safe wheat is further considered within the context of food production and in view of current national and international regulatory frameworks.

A strict gluten-free diet is currently the only treatment for the 1-2% of the world population who suffer from coeliac disease (CD). However, due to the presence of wheat and wheat derivatives in many food products, avoiding gluten consumption is difficult. Gluten-free products, made without wheat, barley or rye, typically require the inclusion of numerous additives, resulting in products that are often less healthy than gluten-based equivalents. Here, we present and discuss two broad approaches to decrease wheat gluten immunogenicity for CD patients. The first approach is based on food processing strategies, which aim to remove gliadins or all gluten from edible products. We find that several of the candidate food processing techniques to produce low gluten-immunogenic products from wheat already exist. The second approach focuses on wheat breeding strategies to remove immunogenic epitopes from the gluten proteins, while maintaining their food-processing properties. A combination of breeding strategies, including mutation breeding and possibly genome editing, will be necessary to produce coeliac-safe wheat. Individuals suffering from CD and people genetically susceptible who may develop CD after prolonged gluten consumption would benefit from reduced CD-immunogenic wheat. Although the production of healthy and less CD-toxic wheat varieties and food products will be challenging, increasing global demand may require these issues to be addressed in the near future by food processing and cereal breeding companies.

Background: Single Nucleotide Polymorphism (SNP) panels recently developed for the assessment of genetic diversity in wheat are primarily based on elite varieties, mostly those of bread wheat. The usefulness of such SNP panels for studying wheat evolution and domestication has not yet been fully explored and ascertainment bias issues can potentially affect their applicability when studying landraces and tetraploid ancestors of bread wheat. We here evaluate whether population structure and evolutionary history can be assessed in tetraploid landrace wheats using SNP markers previously developed for the analysis of elite cultivars of hexaploid wheat. Results: We genotyped more than 100 tetraploid wheat landraces and wild emmer wheat accessions, some of which had previously been screened with SSR markers, for an existing SNP panel and obtained publically available genotypes for the same SNPs for hexaploid wheat varieties and landraces. Results showed that quantification of genetic diversity can be affected by ascertainment bias but that the effects of ascertainment bias can at least partly be alleviated by merging SNPs to haplotypes. Analyses of population structure and genetic differentiation show strong subdivision between the tetraploid wheat subspecies, except for durum and rivet that are not separable. A more detailed population structure of durum landraces could be obtained than with SSR markers. The results also suggest an emmer, rather than durum, ancestry of bread wheat and with gene flow from wild emmer. Conclusions: SNP markers developed for elite cultivars show great potential for inferring population structure and can address evolutionary questions in landrace wheat. Issues of marker genome specificity and mapping need, however, to be addressed. Ascertainment bias does not seem to interfere with the ability of a SNP marker system developed for elite bread wheat accessions to detect population structure in other types of wheat.

Background Single Nucleotide Polymorphism (SNP) panels recently developed for the assessment of genetic diversity in wheat are primarily based on elite varieties, mostly those of bread wheat. The usefulness of such SNP panels for studying wheat evolution and domestication has not yet been fully explored and ascertainment bias issues can potentially affect their applicability when studying landraces and tetraploid ancestors of bread wheat. We here evaluate whether population structure and evolutionary history can be assessed in tetraploid landrace wheats using SNP markers previously developed for the analysis of elite cultivars of hexaploid wheat. Results We genotyped more than 100 tetraploid wheat landraces and wild emmer wheat accessions, some of which had previously been screened with SSR markers, for an existing SNP panel and obtained publically available genotypes for the same SNPs for hexaploid wheat varieties and landraces. Results showed that quantification of genetic diversity can be affected by ascertainment bias but that the effects of ascertainment bias can at least partly be alleviated by merging SNPs to haplotypes. Analyses of population structure and genetic differentiation show strong subdivision between the tetraploid wheat subspecies, except for durum and rivet that are not separable. A more detailed population structure of durum landraces could be obtained than with SSR markers. The results also suggest an emmer, rather than durum, ancestry of bread wheat and with gene flow from wild emmer. Conclusions SNP markers developed for elite cultivars show great potential for inferring population structure and can address evolutionary questions in landrace wheat. Issues of marker genome specificity and mapping need, however, to be addressed. Ascertainment bias does not seem to interfere with the ability of a SNP marker system developed for elite bread wheat accessions to detect population structure in other types of wheat.