Figure 1.

Various biotechnological approaches to combat agronomic insect pests. Chloroplast engineering strategies to develop insect pest-resistant crops using various molecular techniques, such as (a) homology-based recombination in chloroplasts, (b) chloroplast engineering mediated by RNA interference, (c) engineering chloroplasts by a CRISPR/Cas editing system, (d) RNA binding proteins (* designed pentatricopeptide repeat, PPR) to regulate gene expression in chloroplasts; (e) replicating plant mini chromosomes for chloroplast genome editing. When thrips feed on transplastomic plant mesophyll cells, they devour cellular content (sap) including chloroplasts, leading to their high mortality. This is due to designed molecules that inactivate/interfere with the target mRNAs necessary for their survival and development processes. CRISPR/Cas, clustered regularly interspaced short palindromic repeats/CRISPR-associated protein; CRISPRko, (knock out); CRISPRi, (interference); CRISRPa, (activation); ssRNA, single-strand RNA. Figure created with BioRender.com. https://www.biorender.com (accessed on 21 September 2023).