Research Projects

Transgenic plants are key to basic scientific research, as well as low-input sustainable agriculture. Plant tissue culture is the biggest roadblock for plant transgenic technology. Time and skill required for plant regeneration via tissue culture, and genotype and species-specific recalcitrance to regeneration are the two rate limiting factors in plant tissue culture. If a transgene can be inserted into pollens, a transgenic plant can be generated rapidly by traditional crossing methods bypassing tissue culture-based regeneration. Recent success in transformation of pollens of large flowers (pumpkin and cotton) by magnetic nanoparticle-DNA conjugates has led us to propose similar efforts in this project. Here, we shall try pollen magnetofection in smaller dicot species important in Indian context, i.e., chickpea and peanut. Both legumes are difficult to work with when it comes to making transgenics. Albeit pollen magnetofection recently being shown to be ineffective in monocots, this method has potential to generate rapid, genotype-independent transgenic plants in dicots.