New, scalable approaches to capture significant amounts of atmospheric carbon (on the scale of gigatons per year [Gt/yr]) are urgently needed to slow, and perhaps even reverse, global warming. Living organisms—plants, microbes, and fungi—are excellent targets for a scalable solution, having both an immense potential to capture carbon from the atmosphere and store it in stable biomass that covers the surfaces of continents.Our approach leverages world-class expertise at UC Davis and UC Berkeley's Innovative Genomics Institute in plant biology, genome editing, genome-resolved metagenomics, transcriptomics, and metabolomics, stable isotope carbon tracing, and sophisticated analysis of multi-omics data. Our strategy will integrate modification of root architecture with optimized