Double Haploid Breeding

What distinguishes breeding with double haploids from conventional breeding?

When developing and breeding new and improved plant varieties, breeders try to fix desired traits in new genotypes in the shortest possible time via inbreeding. This process is time-consuming and labour-intensive. With the help of double haploid breeding (DH breeding), characteristics of plants can be genetically fixed much faster. This ensures in the breeding process that the genetic make-up of each subsequent generation of this genotype is consistent and homogeneous.

Thus, the breeder can select for desired breeding goals in DH populations very early, very safely and very quickly. With the help of double haploid breeding, 100% pure heredity (homozygosity) can be achieved within one generation. This allows the breeder to start the process of variety approval much faster, where genetic stability of the variety candidates is a prerequisite for success. In conventional breeding, it takes many generations of targeted inbreeding to achieve almost complete homozygosity.

In practice, to create double-haploid lines, germ cells of the crop plants are isolated and cultivated in tissue culture using a wide variety of methods. The chromosome set of a plant cell is usually diploid, whereby each trait (allele) can be present in two different expressions. In germ cells (pollen or egg cells) of diploid plants, however, chromosome sets are single (haploid) and can be doubled by specific treatment, so that each allele of the resulting cell is double but in a uniform form – the plant is double haploid.

In a subsequent reproduction, therefore, only this one trait form can be inherited and expressed. In this way, homozygous lines with the desired trait are obtained.

At Phytowelt we produce thousands of DH plants for our customers every year, e.g. barley, wheat, triticale or carrots. In our technology description you will find information about our entire range!