De novo domestication: a new way for crop design and breeding

The impending global climate change presents significant challenges to agricultural production. It is imperative to find approaches to ensure sustained growth in food production while reducing agricultural input, in order to meet the needs of worldwide people for nutritious food supply. One of the effective strategies to address this challenge is still the development of new crop varieties with high yield, stable yield, environmental friendliness and rich nutrition. The creation of new crop cultivars depends largely on the expansion of genetic resources and the innovation of breeding techniques. De novo domestication is an innovative breeding strategy for developing new crop varieties. It involves utilizing undomesticated or semi-domesticated plants with desirable traits as founder species for breeding. The process involves rapid domestication of wild plants through the redesign of agronomic traits and the introduction of domestication genes to meet diverse human needs. In this review, we overview the history of crop domestication and genetic improvement, clarify the necessity of enriching crop diversity, and emphasize the significance of wild plants' genetic diversity in expanding the scope for crop redesign. Breeding strategy innovation is the key to accelerate crop breeding. We also discuss the feasibility and prospects of rapid developing new crops through de novo domestication.