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Tissue Culture of Plants from a Chimeral Mutation of Tobacco¹

Somatic mutations may contain genetic characteristics usable in plant improvement. Meristem tissue was cultured to obtain healthy plants from a chimeral mutation of a tobacco (Nicotiana tabacum L.) plant that was infected with tobacco vein mottling virus. Parts of some of the leaves originating from a narrow mutated strip on one side of the stalk exhibited a ruffled characteristic. The other leaves on the plant were smooth. Thin layers of cells from the meristematic domes of apical and axillary buds were excised from an axillary shoot (sucker) that originated at the edge of the mutated strip. The explants were cultured on a shoot regeneration medium. The regenerated plants included two that had ruffled and 59 that had smooth leaves. Regenerated plants of both leaf types had the normal somatic chromosome number, did not exhibit virus symptoms, were self-fertile, and produced abundant seed. Selfed progeny of the regenerated ruffled-leaf plants included some with smooth and some with ruffled leaves; whereas, all progeny of the regenerated smooth-leaved plants had smooth leaves. Selfed progeny of doubled haploids cultured from a ruffled-leaf haploid plant had ruffled leaves, and selfed progeny of doubled haploids cultured from a smooth-leaved haploid plant had smooth leaves. Recovery of somatic mutants using tissue culture offers a means of obtaining plants with potentially useful mutated characteristics.

Key Words: Nicotiana tabacum L. • Tissue culture • Plant regeneration • Tobacco vein mottling virus

² Plant physiologist, agronomist and research chemist, USDA, SEA, AR, Dep. of Agronomy, Univ. of Kentucky, Lexington, KY 40546; and research geneticist, USDA, SEA, AR, Tobacco Exp. Stn., Greeneville, TN 37743. Present address of C. L. Gupton is USDA Laboratory, P.O. Box 287, Poplarville, MS 39470.

Received for publication August 29, 1980.