TALEN-mediated genome-editing approaches in the liverwort Marchantia polymorpha yield high efficiencies for targeted mutagenesis

Background The liverwort Marchantia polymorpha occupies a crucial position in land plant evolution and provides the opportunity to investigate adaptations to a terrestrial plant life style. Marchantia reverse genetic analyses have thus far been conducted by employing a homologous recombination approach, which yields an efficiency of around 3%. Availability of the characterized and suitable endogenous MpEF1α promoter prompted us to establish the TALEN gene targeting technique for Marchantia.