The federal government has awarded University of California-Davis $6.2 million to breed new strawberry varieties that are more resistant to diseases and pests.

The four-year grant, awarded this October, comes from USDA’s National Institute of Food and Agriculture as part of a larger Specialty Crop Research Initiative program.

This $6.2 million grant will fund Davis researchers to develop stronger, more sustainable strawberries using enhanced plant breeding, gene editing and other technologies.

The ultimate goal is to produce more resilient, disease-resistant cultivars.

If the research is successful, it could benefit strawberry growers across the U.S.

Against a backdrop of climate change and possible future restrictions on chemical use, UC-Davis leaders say this research is critically important.

“We need to have the technology so that we can deal with the challenges strawberries face around the world,” said Steve Knapp, director of the Strawberry Breeding Center and professor in the Department of Plant Sciences. “Can we use genetic knowledge to change the DNA in a specific way to get the resistance we need?”

One priority within the research grant is to identify whether changing DNA molecules can improve disease resistance — and if so, what technologies would be needed to accomplish that.

As part of the research, scientists will likely analyze what happens when strawberry plants express some genes while suppressing others.

“We’re trying to build in natural resistance to pathogens through the genes that already exist but could be modified with this knowledge,” said Knapp. “If we were able to edit a gene that improves disease resistance, people would want us to use that in breeding.”

Another goal of the research project is to identify better ways to diagnose, prevent and manage disease in strawberry crops.

Leaders on this project will include UC-Davis plant pathologist Gitta Coaker and plant scientists Mitchell Feldmann, Marta Bjornson and Juan Debernardi.

Scientists from California Polytechnic State University, UC Agriculture and Natural Resources, UC Berkeley, the University of Florida and USDA’s Agricultural Research Service will also participate.

This latest research builds on a longstanding foundation of strawberry research out of the university. Plant scientists have been breeding strawberry varieties at UC-Davis since the 1930s and have already developed more than 60 patented varieties through the breeding program.