title: High frequency production of doubled haploid plants of Brassica napus cv. Topas derived from colchicine-induced microspore embryogenesis without heat shock.
abstract: This report describes a very high genome doubling efficiency of Brassica napus cv. Topas plants, derived from microspores induced to undergo embryogenesis with a colchicine treatment, without the use of a heat treatment. The plants showed normal growth and development, and 90% were fertile. In contrast, only 6% of the plants derived from heat-induced embryos were fertile diploids. All cytological analysis of the progeny of fertile plants showed 2n=38 chromosomes. These results show that colchicine can simultaneously induce microspore embryogenesis and double the ploidy level to produce doubled haploid plants.
authors.affiliation: Department of Biology, Queen's University, Kingston, Ontario, Canada.
authors.forename: J
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Zhao
authors.forename: D H
authors.initials: DH
authors.lastname: Simmonds
authors.forename: W
authors.initials: W
authors.lastname: Newcomb