Effect of genome, induction medium and temperature pretreatment on green plant production in durum ( Triticum turgidum var. durum ) x bread wheat ( Triticum aestivum L. em Thell) crosses

The recalcitrancy of durum wheat (Triticum turgidum var. durum) to anther culture, was attempted to be overcome by transferring the responsible genes form bread wheat B-genome to the respective on durum wheat, determining an appropriate induction medium and clarifying the necessity of cold pretreatment. For this, three durum wheat cultivars were crossed to two bread wheat (Triticum aestivum L. em Thell) cultivars. The resulting F₁ plants and their original cultivars were grown in the field and anthers at the appropriate microspore stage were cultured on potato-2 and W₁₄ media with and without low temperature pretreatment. No green plants were produced from the parental durum wheat cultivars. In contrast, green plants were produced from the F₁ plants. The best results in three of the four F₁ hybrids were recorded when potato-2 was used as induction medium. A more variable response of the examined genotypes was noticed with respect to temperature pretreatment. Regarding green plant production, a negative effect of cold pretreatment was observed in two of the F₁ hybrids when they were cultured on potato-2. Chromosome counts on root tips from the resulting green plants revealed that they all carried D-genome chromosomes. The last observation could suggest that D-genome chromosomes are necessary for anther culture response in wheat. Yet, the production of one green plant with 15 chromosomes may indicate that the development of extracted durum genotypes from bread wheat genotypes with good response to in vitro anther culture might be possible. Further work however, is needed for this to be verified.