Cultivated rice varieties are all diploid, and polyploidization of rice has long been desired because of its advantages in genome buffering, vigorousness, and environmental robustness. However, a workable route remains elusive. Here, we describe a practical strategy, namely de novo domestication of wild allotetraploid rice. By screening allotetraploid wild rice inventory, we identified one genotype of Oryza alta (CCDD), polyploid rice 1 (PPR1), and established two important resources for its de novo domestication: (1) an efficient tissue culture, transformation, and genome editing system and (2) a high-quality genome assembly discriminated into two subgenomes of 12 chromosomes apiece. With these resources, we show that six agronomically important traits could be rapidly improved by editing O. alta homologs of the genes controlling these traits in diploid rice. Our results demonstrate the possibility that de novo domesticated allotetraploid rice can be developed into a new staple cereal to strengthen world food security.

栽培的水稻品种都是二倍体，水稻的多倍体化因其在基因组缓冲、活力和环境鲁棒性等方面的优势而备受期待。然而，一条可行的路线仍然难以捉摸。在这里，我们描述了一个实用的策略，即野生异源四倍体水稻的从头驯化。通过筛选异源四倍体野生稻库存，我们确定了一种高水稻（CCDD）基因型、多倍体水稻 1（PPR1），并为其从头建立了两个重要资源驯化：（1）高效的组织培养、转化和基因组编辑系统；（2）高质量的基因组组装，可区分为每个 12 条染色体的两个亚基因组。有了这些资源，我们表明可以通过编辑控制二倍体水稻中这些性状的基因的O. alta同源物来快速改善六个重要的农艺性状。我们的研究结果表明，从头驯化的异源四倍体水稻可以发展成为一种新的主​​食谷物，以加强世界粮食安全。