Unproven in the Field: Terrana’s RNA “Plant Vaccines” Deserve Serious Scrutiny
Updated
World Economic Forum contributor Noubar Afeyan, the billionaire who co-founded Moderna, has launched a company that plans to use “the language of nature to give plants new instructions.” Called Terrana Biosciences, the company will manipulate the vast ecosystem of self-replicating RNAs from across the plant world, rewriting them with unique instructions to make any desired trait and solve problems at any point in the plant’s lifecycle. Terrana—launched last July by Flagship Pioneering (the folks behind Moderna)—is all about “native” RNA-based tweaks for crops. The company calls it native because, with the help of AI, it insists it is simply mimicking, boosting, or tweaking what plants already do with their own RNAs. Ryan Rapp, Terrana’s co-founder and CEO, shared:
“We’re not changing the DNA. We’re speaking the plant’s language. With our RNA platform, we can activate traits or defense mechanisms on demand, during the growing season, in response to actual conditions in the field—not just projections months in advance.”
With $50 million in funding from Flagship Pioneering, Terrana plans to equip farmers with non-genetically modified tools to prevent disease, protect yields, and enhance plant traits, “all while adapting in real-time to an increasingly volatile climate.” In other words, under the guise of climate change. Yes, we have heard this before. According to the company, rather than editing plant genomes, it will leverage native-like RNA molecules that integrate directly into the plant’s existing biological systems. Thus, the platform can be used at any point in a plant’s lifecycle. It can be sprayed during a specific season or after stress has already occurred. Terrana notes that this flexibility offers something traditional agricultural tools often lack.
As an example of what is in store for the future of plants in Terrana’s world, which is currently in early research and development with no regulatory green lights to make this technology available, Rapp points to cherry orchards in the Pacific Northwest. Cherry trees require a specific number of “chill hours” (hours spent below 45 degrees F) to flower properly in the spring. As winters grow warmer due to a volatile climate, the chilling threshold for cherry trees becomes unpredictable. According to Rapp, this threatens the viability of cherry orchards, leaving today’s farmers with bleak choices. They can either relocate operations further north or replant their orchards with entirely new genetics. Both of these choices are costly and time-consuming. However, using Terrana’s RNA-based spray in the summer to modify the cherry orchard’s chill requirement would literally rewire the plant’s expectations of winter, “without touching the genome.” The same goes for heat-stressed crops in tropical zones.
Thus far, Terrana has developed three categories of RNA-enabled solutions. Rapp calls them the company’s “prevent, protect, and improve” pillars. Enabling in-season disease resistance without toxic synthetic chemicals, the “prevent” category performs like a programmable vaccine. Rapp noted that the prevent category concerns vaccinations and inoculations that train plants to recognize pathogens and destroy them before they become infections. Next, the protect class focuses on addressing existing problems, delivering anti-fungals and anti-bacterials. And the improve class centers around delivering RNA changes, such as drought-tolerant sheens, and tools to help with editing. With over 15 product candidates in development, the scope of the platform isn’t limited to crop protection. Rapp explained:
“We are starting with building the business around crop protection initially and that’s really focusing on getting the antivirals out the door as our first product and then coming quickly behind that in corn and soybean with products that can solve a broader range of problems. We can do a lot of things, like deliver drought tolerant genes. We can look for genes for wet and cold tolerance as well as deliver other tools to help in plant product development.”
Terrana’s RNAs—remember, RNA is a nucleic acid that copies genetic instructions from DNA and helps build proteins or carry out other cellular functions—are designed for resilience, plant mobility, and often heritability. Once sprayed, they enter the plant through microscopic leaf openings or wounds, where they remain long enough to perform their chosen function. The RNAs can also be applied as coatings to seeds and for post-harvest use. Highlighting how RNA therapies have “transformed what’s possible” in human health, Terrana states it is anxious to bring that same philosophy to plants. In other words, to the food we eat (another reason to grow your own food, shop local, and eat organic).
What could go wrong? Terrana hails its platform as precision-based, surpassing the limits of traditional chemistry and transgenes without modifying the plant genome. Terrana’s products differ from those of companies that currently use RNA interference (RNAi) for crop protection. As explained in C&EN, in 2024, the US Environmental Protection Agency allowed farmers to begin using an RNAi insecticide that remains on plant surfaces. When consumed by beetles, the RNAi silences a gene they need to survive. Again, in a fascinating platform shift for the Moderna founders, Terrana states its technology is not the same as RNAi. Yet, it also plans to redefine the chill requirements of a cherry tree.
OK, Terrana insists its current products don’t modify the plant genome. But will they in the future? Though not natural like the untouched RNA that already exists in plants, the company apparently wants us to believe our bodies will treat its RNA like junk mail and quickly trash it, so little to none of it reaches our cells intact. Yes, our stomachs are designed with enzymes specifically meant to break RNA down quickly. Many experts insist that RNA-based crop sprays, like those under development by Terrana, are not designed to function in the human body the way deadly medical mRNA technologies do because plant RNA and human gut bacteria don’t speak the same biological language. But has this been tested for confirmation?
This new AI-driven technology—which involves manipulating the genetics of plants that produce the foods we eat—warrants extreme transparency, ongoing research, and thoughtful discussion before being approved for use. And if it can help eliminate the use of toxic herbicides and pesticides, all the better.
