title: Sucrose preculture to simplify cryopreservation of banana meristem cultures.
abstract: A simple cryopreservation method is described for proliferating meristem cultures of banana (Musa spp.). It relies on a 2-week preculture on media containing 0.4 M sucrose followed by rapid cooling in liquid nitrogen. Different preculture media were screened for efficient protection of banana meristems against cryopreservation. Sucrose can be replaced by both fructose and glucose without significantly affecting post-thaw survival rates. A high BA concentration (0.1 mM) in the preculture medium results in less material available for cryopreservation, but does not affect cryoprotection. Culture in liquid media significantly improved post-thaw regeneration. The optimized cryopreservation protocol was applied on 36 banana accessions belonging to 8 different genomic groups. It is shown that post-thaw regeneration frequencies (ranging between 0 and 66 percent) are highly dependent on the genomic constitution of the banana cultivar.
authors.affiliation: Laboratory of Tropical Crop Improvement, Catholic University of Leuven, Kasteelpark Arenberg 13, 3001 Leuven, Belgium. bart.panis@agr.kuleuven.ac.be
authors.forename: Bart
authors.initials: B
authors.lastname: Panis
authors.forename: Hannelore
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Strosse
authors.forename: Sofie
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Van Den Hende
authors.forename: Rony
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Swennen
mesh_terms: D015925:Cryopreservation / Q000379:methods*; D003470:Culture Media; D046508:Culture Techniques / Q000379:methods*; D018519:Meristem / Q000166:cytology*; D028521:Musa / Q000166:cytology*; D013395:Sucrose / Q000008:administration & dosage*
chemical_list: D003470:Culture Media; D013395:Sucrose