Agrobacterium-Mediated Transformation of Rice using Cyanobacteria fld Gene

Abiotic stresses such as drought, salt, high temperature, chemical toxicity and oxidative stress are considered serious to agriculture and adversely affect the growth and reproduction of crops. Production of transgenic rice was studied utilizing Agrobacterium-mediated strain EHA105 and p6-ubi vector. This vector contains spectinomycin resistance gene as bacterial selectable marker, hygromycin resistance gene as plant selectable marker and flavodoxin (fld) gene. Flavodoxin has similar role to ferredoxin function and during abiotic stress acts as an antioxidant by preventing conflicts in the electron transport chain and forms reactive oxygen species. In this study embryogenic calli of rice Hashemi cultivar were used for gene transformation. Putative transgenic calli were transferred to regeneration medium containing 0.2 mgl-1 NAA, 2 mgl-1 kinitin and 50 mgl-1 hygromycin. For rooting 0.2 mgl-1 NAA was used in rooting medium. Regenerated plants were placed in yoshida solution. PCR analysis using fld specific primers showed at least one copy of fld gene in putative transgenic plants genome. The results of PCR related to virG gene confirmed lack of bacterial contamination. Transgenic plants developed during the course of this study are currently being grown in greenhouse for seed production.