Title : Improving the efficiency of wheat and triticale androgenesis: the starch story.
Abstract:
Androgenesis is an important tool for plant genetics and breeding, since androgenic embryos can germinate into completely homozygous doubled haploid plants. The stress-induced reprogramming of microspores precedes the induction of andogenesis. Most of the genes identified to be differentially expressed during stress treatment to induce androgenesis are involved with stress hormones, cellular protection from stress, proteolysis and sucrose–starch metabolism. Our findings provide ultrastructural and molecular evidence to support the hypothesis that the repression of starch biosynthesis may play an important role in blocking gametophytic development during androgenesis induction in wheat and triticale. Further, our studies aimed to identify structural changes in proplastids at different stages of androgenesis that prevent chloroplasts formation and results in albinism of androgenesis-derived plants. The expression pattern of selected genes related to sucrose–starch metabolism directly corresponds to internal changes in the plastids. These changes are limited to accumulation of starch grains, typical for plastids that continue to function in the same manner as during normal formation of pollen. Finally, we found that light-emitting diode (LED) irradiation at some particular wavelength could reduce the ratio of albino to green seedlings. The illumination system provides light in the spectral region that is involved in photosynthesis and in the photomorphogenic responses, therefore the probable regulatory mechanisms adjusted by LED were identified.
The work was supported by PBS3/A9/37/2015 project operating within the Applied Research Programme of the National Centre for Research and Development.
