Asymmetric Somatic Plant Hybridization Status and Applications.docVIP

American Journal of Plant Sciences, 2013, 4, 1-10 1 /10.4236/ajps.2013.48A001 Published Online August 2013 (/journal/ajps) Asymmetric Somatic Plant Hybridization: Status and Applications Lakshmanan Prabhu Shankar , Eeckhaut Tom , Deryckere Dieter , Van Bockstaele Erik , 1,2 1 1 1,2 Van Huylenbroeck Johan 1 1 2 Institute for Agricultural and Fisheries Research (ILVO), Plant Sciences Unit, Applied Genetics and Breeding, Melle, Belgium; Department of Plant Production, Faculty of Bioscience Engineering, Ghent University, Ghent, Belgium. Email: johan.vanhuylenbroeck@ilvo.vlaanderen.be Received May 12 , 2013; revised June 13 , 2013; accepted July 15 , 2013 th th th Copyright ? 2013 Lakshmanan Prabhu Shankar et al. This is an open access article distributed under the Creative Commons Attribu- tion License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited. ABSTRACT To create asymmetric somatic hybrids, the genome of the so-called donor protoplast is fragmented prior to protoplast fusion. As a result, only a limited amount of the donor genome is transferred to the fusion product. This technique can circumvent some commonly observed problems related to symmetric fusion and offers a practical breeding tool for asexual hybridization. Genomes are typically fragmented by irradiation, microprotoplast production or application of metabolic inhibitors such as iodoacetamide. Irradiation and microprotoplast production fragment the nuclear genome, whereas iodoacetamide inactivates the cytoplasmic genome. It can therefore be used to introduce cytoplasmic male ste- rility, an important practical application. For hybrid verification and genome characterization, molecular markers and cytogenetic techniques are