ARS | Publication request: Pollen as a means of international transfer of germplasm

Submitted to: Journal of Semi-Arid Tropical Agricultural Research (Journal of SAT Research)
Publication Type: Peer Reviewed Journal
Publication Acceptance Date: April 15, 2007
Publication Date: August 1, 2007
Citation: Mallikarjuna, N., Mcgrew, S.L., Rynearson, S., Rajest, P.N., Coyne, C.J., Muehlbauer, F.J. 2007. Pollen as a means of international transfer of germplasm. Journal of Semi-Arid Tropical Agricultural Research (eJournal of J.SAT Agric. Res. 3(1):www.icrisat.org/Journal/chickpea_pigeonpea3.htm.

Interpretive Summary: The wild species of Cicer include 8 annual and 34 perennial species and constitute a valuable genetic resource for the cultigen. However, they have largely remained under-utilized due to crossability barriers. Only two wild Cicer namely Cicer reticulatum and C. echinospermum are crossable by conventional hybridization techniques. With the development of hormone-aided pollinations, embryo rescue and tissue culture techniques, avenues to cross incompatible Cicer is becoming a reality. Our research work shows that it is possible to use preserved pollen as a means of international transfer of germplasm in situations where seed transfer is not possible for particular accessions or wild species that do not produce flowers due to differences in environmental conditions, as has been observed for perennial Cicer species at ICRISAT.

Technical Abstract: Pollen collected from WSU-ARS, Pullman, USA were used in the crossing program at ICRISAT, India. Cultivated chickpea ICCV 10 and ICCV 92318 were used as the female parents and pollinated with C. oxyodon, C. microphyllum, C. nuristanicum and C. macranthum. All pollinations were hormone aided (GA 50 mg/l + NAA 10mg/l + KN 10 mg/l), without the application of hormones pod set was not observed. The number of pod set varied depending on the male and female parent used in the crossing program. In general crosses with C. nuristanicum and C. oxyodon gave rise to higher percent pod set (61% and 60 %) on ICCV 2 than the other two perennial Cicer species. None of the pods had mature seeds, but immature seeds less than 2 mm were obtained.