Oil palm biotechnology: progress and prospects

Today, a range of biotechnological approaches, from somatic embryogenesis t o biomolecular research, play an increasingly important role in breeding st rategies for oil palm (Elaeis guineensis Jacq.). Clonal micropropagation. Methods of cloning by in vitro culture led to the development of a micropropagation technique for oil palm based on somatic e mbryogenesis which was tested at the pilot stage on elite genotypes, thus e nabling the production of high oil yielding clones. This phase allowed the identification of limiting factors associated with scaling-up, with respect in particular to the scale of mass production required to meet the needs o f planters and to the problem of ensuring genetic fidelity in the regenerat ed plant material. These two concerns led researchers to look further into the underlying physiological and/or molecular mechanisms involved in somati c embryogenesis and the somaclonal variation events induced by the in vitro cloning procedure, Structural and functional genomics. Marker-assisted breeding in oil palm is a long-term multi-stage project including: molecular analysis of genetic d iversity in both E. guineensis and E. oleifera germplasms; large scale deve lopment of PCR-based microsatellite markers, and parallel development of th ree genome mapping and QTL detection projects studying key agronomic charac ters. Post-genomics. In order to tackle the problem of the mantled flowering abno rmality, which is induced during the micropropagation process, studies of g ene expression have been carried out in tissue cultures as a means of estab lishing an early clonal conformity testing procedure. It is important to as sess what kind of methodology is the most appropriate for clonal conformity testing by comparing RNA, protein and DNA (PCR) based approaches. Parallel studies on genomic DNA methylation changes induced by tissue culture sugge st that the latter may play an important role in the determination of the m antled abnormality.