Skip to main content

Climate Change Genomics

Guest editor: Justin Borevitz

Global climate change will not only have devastating effects on humans but also to the plants, animals, and microbes that surround us and that we depend on for survival. Advances in genomics allow scientists to better understand how organisms are influenced by and can adapt to the impending climate change. While we must also do our best to stop climate change, we must also use our resources and knowledge to better understand the future consequences, as well as use genomic resources to better adapt to the changing environment. Genome Biology presents a special collection of articles on climate change genomics. 


  1. Drought is a major environmental disaster that causes crop yield loss worldwide. Metabolites are involved in various environmental stress responses of plants. However, the genetic control of metabolomes underl...

    Authors: Fei Zhang, Jinfeng Wu, Nir Sade, Si Wu, Aiman Egbaria, Alisdair R. Fernie, Jianbing Yan, Feng Qin, Wei Chen, Yariv Brotman and Mingqiu Dai
    Citation: Genome Biology 2021 22:260
  2. Understanding the genetic architecture of temperature adaptation is key for characterizing and predicting the effect of climate change on natural populations. One particularly promising approach is Evolve and ...

    Authors: Kathrin A. Otte, Viola Nolte, François Mallard and Christian Schlötterer
    Citation: Genome Biology 2021 22:211
  3. Drought threatens the food supply of the world population. Dissecting the dynamic responses of plants to drought will be beneficial for breeding drought-tolerant crops, as the genetic controls of these respons...

    Authors: Xi Wu, Hui Feng, Di Wu, Shijuan Yan, Pei Zhang, Wenbin Wang, Jun Zhang, Junli Ye, Guoxin Dai, Yuan Fan, Weikun Li, Baoxing Song, Zedong Geng, Wanli Yang, Guoxin Chen, Feng Qin…
    Citation: Genome Biology 2021 22:185
  4. Elevated temperatures can cause physiological, biochemical, and molecular responses in plants that can greatly affect their growth and development. Mutations are the most fundamental force driving biological e...

    Authors: Zhaogeng Lu, Jiawen Cui, Li Wang, Nianjun Teng, Shoudong Zhang, Hon-Ming Lam, Yingfang Zhu, Siwei Xiao, Wensi Ke, Jinxing Lin, Chenwu Xu and Biao Jin
    Citation: Genome Biology 2021 22:160
  5. How species can adapt to abrupt environmental changes, particularly in the absence of standing genetic variation, is poorly understood and a pressing question in the face of ongoing climate change. Here we lev...

    Authors: Pierre Baduel, Basile Leduque, Amandine Ignace, Isabelle Gy, José Gil Jr, Olivier Loudet, Vincent Colot and Leandro Quadrana
    Citation: Genome Biology 2021 22:138
  6. To meet increasing global food demand, breeders and scientists aim to improve the yield and quality of major food crops. Plant diseases threaten food security and are expected to increase because of climate ch...

    Authors: Syed Shan-e-Ali Zaidi, Ahmed Mahas, Hervé Vanderschuren and Magdy M. Mahfouz
    Citation: Genome Biology 2020 21:289