Correction to “Reduced Susceptibility to Phytophthora in Non‐Transgenic Cacao Progeny Through CRISPR –Cas9 Mediated TcNPR3 Mutagenesis”

Guiltinan, M.J., Landherr, L., Maximova, S.N., DelVecchio, D., Sebastian, A. and Albert, I. (2026) Reduced Susceptibility to Phytophthora in Non-Transgenic Cacao Progeny Through CRISPR–Cas9 Mediated TcNPR3 Mutagenesis. Plant Biotechnology Journal 24: 442–454. https://doi.org/10.1111/pbi.70365 In the originally published article, the line designated GM-249 was identified as the cacao genotype Scavina-6 (Sca-6) and was used as a non-edited reference in the transcriptome analysis and as the pollen parent in one of the reported crosses. Whole-genome sequencing of the experimental genotypes has since established that GM-249 is the cacao clone ICS-1, not Scavina-6. The misidentification originated as a labeling error on the source plant and was detected only once genome-scale data became available; the corrected identity has been confirmed by whole-genome sequence comparison. The correction changes the genotype label of GM-249 from “Scavina-6 (Sca-6)” to “ICS-1” in Table 1, the relevant figures and the supplementary materials, and in the description of the cross in which GM-249 (ICS-1) served as the pollen parent. A corrected Table 1 accompanies this correction. This reassignment does not alter the study's principal conclusions. The most strongly supported and reproducible differential-expression signal derives from comparisons among lines in the PSU-Scavina-6 background, which do not involve GM-249 and are therefore unaffected. The corrected identity indicates that comparisons involving GM-249 span a more genetically divergent background than originally stated, which is consistent with, and reinforces, the paper's caution that genetic-background heterogeneity contributes substantially to the observed transcriptional variation. No quantitative result, figure, or conclusion other than the GM-249 genotype label requires revision. We apologize for this error.