Editorial: Doubled Haploidy in Model and Recalcitrant Species.

Abstract

Doubled haploid (DH) technology is a powerful tool in plant breeding to reduce the time and costs needed to produce pure lines, the cornerstone of hybrid seed production. This biotechnological alternative to classic methods allows for a reduction of the typical 7–8 inbreeding generations needed to fix a hybrid genotype to only one in vitro generation. It is therefore much faster and cheaper, being the principal advantage of DH technology in plant breeding, but not the only. Indeed, DHs are also useful for genetic mapping of complex qualitative traits, for linkage studies and estimation of recombination fractions, to unmask recessive mutants, to avoid transgenic hemizygotes, or for reverse breeding, among others (Forster et al., 2007; Dunwell, 2010; Dwivedi et al., 2015). These are some of the advantages that make DH technology one of the most exciting fields of present and future plant biotechnology.