Cut–dip–budding delivery system enables genetic modifications in plants without tissue culture

•Gene delivery is the biggest hurdle in plant genetics research and breeding.•Current delivery methods rely on tedious and costly tissue culture process.•Current delivery methods can be applied to only a very small number of plants.•The cut-dip-budding (CDB) delivery method is tissue-culture free and does not need sterile condition.•The CDB method is extremely simple and potentially applicable to many plants. Of the more than 370 000 species of higher plants in nature, fewer than 0.1% can be genetically modified due to limitations of the current gene delivery systems. Even for those that can be genetically modified, the modification involves a tedious and costly tissue culture process. Here, we describe an…