Field Assessment of In Vitro Micropropagated NovaCane® Sugarcane (Saccharum spp. hybrids)

Abstract

Commercial sugarcane propagation is vegetative, using either whole sticks or stem sections known as setts for plantation establishment. Although simple and cost-effective, such multiplication takes a year to generate planting material and does not eliminate disease-causing viruses. In vitro micropropagation is an alternative, and the South African Sugarcane Research Institute has developed a process called NovaCane® to provide disease-free, true-to-type planting material. Field assessment of plants derived from in vitro culture for two cultivars, N41 and N48, showed no difference in stalk height, population, biomass and estimated recoverable crystal content when compared with conventional, sett-derived plants during the first year of cultivation (plant cane). However, differences were observed in stalk diameter, with cultivar N41 showing a significant reduction after all three in vitro treatments [(a) regular NovaCane® culture; (b) addition of an ethylene inhibitor, cobalt chloride (CoCl2); and (c) plants derived from a ‘secondary’ shoot meristem excision from in vitro plants] compared with conventionally produced plants. In the first ratoon crop, the only difference observed was in N41 stalk population where tiller number increased in NovaCane® plants after secondary meristem initiation. These results suggest that although there may be some genotype response to in vitro propagation using NovaCane®, overall yield is not compromised in either the plant or first ratoon crops.