Jiong Fu , Zhongmei  Hong

Hainan Provincial Key Laboratory of Crop Molecular Breeding, Sanya, 572025, Hainan, China
Author    Correspondence author
Molecular Plant Breeding, 2025, Vol. 16, No. 5   
Received: 01 Aug., 2025    Accepted: 06 Sep., 2025    Published: 21 Oct., 2025

This is an open access article published under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.

This study summarizes the role of epigenetic mechanisms in regulating lycopene accumulation in tomatoes, with a focus on DNA methylation, histone modification, and non-coding RNA, etc. It introduces the latest progress in their regulation of fruit development, ripening, and metabolism, and discusses the interactions between these epigenetic modifications and environmental factors as well as hormone signals. The potential mechanisms of their role in metabolic pathway regulation and fruit quality improvement were explained. By integrating new technologies such as high-throughput sequencing, multi-omics integration, and CRISPR/dCas9, the application prospects of epigenetic information in tomato molecular breeding, metabolic engineering, and precision agriculture were evaluated. This study aims to provide a theoretical basis and molecular strategies for increasing lycopene content and the nutritional quality of fruits.

Tomato (Solanum lycopersicum); Lycopene; Epigenetic regulation; DNA methylation; Histone modifications