Abstract
The olive is a fruit tree species economically very important in countries of the Mediterranean basin. Somatic embryogenesis is a powerful in vitro technique with multiple uses in different fields, including breeding programs performed by both classical and innovative procedures. Thus, somatic embryogenesis enables the application of biotechnological methods such as genetic transformation, somaclonal variation, somatic hybridization, germplasm cryopreservation, in vitro mutagenesis or in vitro selection. This editorial paper presents a special issue focused on “Somatic embryogenesis in olive”. In this manuscript, the conceptual framework of the special issue is established and the contributions are summarized and put into context. Finally, the main bottlenecks limiting the practical applicability of somatic embryogenesis in this species are identified and the future research prospects are discussed.
Highlights
The olive is a tissue culture recalcitrant species [18] and, as in other trees, somatic embryogenesis is the main method for adventitious plant regeneration [19,20]
The results obtained revealed that the droplet-vitrification method optimized by Bradaï et al [32] for the cryopreservation of olive somatic embryos did not negatively affect somatic embryogenesis executed following the protocol described by Sánchez-Romero [23]
Much progress has been accomplished in olive somatic embryogenesis in the last years [20], some drawbacks still limit its practical applicability in this species
Summary
Olive has been cultivated in the Mediterranean basin from ancient times [5], increased interest in olive products has led to worldwide expansion of olive tree plantations. New countries such as Argentina, Chile, Mexico, USA, Japan, China, New Zealand, Australia, and South Africa have introduced its cultivation in the last years [6,7] and the cultivated area has increased from 8,351,779 ha in 2000 to 10,578,246 ha in 2019 [8], making olive one of the most extensively cultivated fruit crops in the world [9].
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