Micropropagation Protocol for Microspore Embryogenesis in Olea Europaea L

The Olive (Olea europaea L.) belongs to the family Oleaceae. The leaves are opposite. The flowers are borne in racemes which emerge from the axils of the leaves, and produce large quantities of pollen. The fruit is a drupe. Olive trees grow very slowly and rarely reach more than 15 m in height, but they may have a lifespan of hundreds of years. To date, modern molecular technologies in plant breeding have not been applied extensively in olive, but using biotechnology may provide profitable results. As has been demonstrated in other crops, biotechnological methods can improve the efficiency and increase the speed of breeding. Microspore embryogenesis through in vitro culture is a widely-used method to generate genetic variability by obtaining microspore-derived embryos and double-haploid plants, with many applications for plant breeding (Chupeau et al., 1998). Gametic and haploid regenerants are also very important in breeding because the single set of chromosomes allows the isolation of mutants and the production of homozygous doubled-haploids, through chromosome doubling.