Abstract
BackgroundThe breeding and large-scale adoption of hybrid rice is an important achievement in modern agriculture. Mechanized seed production is urgently needed for widespread adoption of hybrid rice because it can compensate for the shortage of manual labor to meet the growing food demands in China.ResultsHere, we report the development of a mechanized hybrid rice seed production method using a female sterile rice. In this method, three closely linked gene expression cassettes were introduced into female sterile rice. The three expression cassettes are: 1) a rice female fertility gene expression cassette; 2) a pollen-lethal gene expression cassette; and 3) a red fluorescence protein gene expression cassette. During the self-fertilization process of a heterozygous transgenic rice plant, pollen grains carrying the transgene die off and cannot participate in fertilization; pollen grains not carrying a transgene can normally fertilize the female gamete, leading to fructification. By means of fluorescence-assisted sorting, homogeneous female sterile rice seeds are sorted out from other seeds carrying the transgene and are used for mechanized hybrid rice seed production; heterozygous seeds carrying the transgene can then be used in the multiplication of female sterile rice.ConclusionsThis technology solves the difficulty of multiplying female-sterile rice, allows for mechanized production of hybrid rice seed, and will prove especially valuable in systems using a mixed-planting, mixed-harvesting approach. Moreover, it uses transgenic technology that has not yet been employed in a seed production process in which the output is non-transgenic seeds.
Highlights
The breeding and large-scale adoption of hybrid rice is an important achievement in modern agriculture
We developed a system for reproduction of female sterile plants and explored its potential application in mechanization of hybrid seed production
The calli expressing Red Fluorescence Protein (RFP) protein produced an increasingly strong red fluorescence signal with prolonged incubation. This result showed that only part of each callus was expressing the DsRed gene cassette, indicating that the red fluorescence signals were derived from stable transformation and integration of the transgene and not from transient expression
Summary
The breeding and large-scale adoption of hybrid rice is an important achievement in modern agriculture. There are several methods available for mechanization of hybrid rice seed production: 1) Utilization of bentazon-sensitive and Basta-resistant genes (Fu et al 2001; Wang et al 2009; Zhang et al 2008; Zhang, 2010; Zhu, 2010). This entails introduction of a bentazon-sensitive gene into the paternal line (restorer line) or a resistance gene against Basta herbicide into the maternal line (male sterile line).
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