Improving the Method of in Vitro Regeneration and Gene Transfer to the African Violet (Saintpaulia ionantha)

African violet is a commercial ornamental plant with various colors. For direct regeneration, in the first experiment, the effect of leaf, node, petiole, root, petal and sepal explants of four African violet cultivars were evaluated on MS medium containing different concentrations of NAA+BAP and IBA+BAP hormones, which was performed as a factorial in a completely randomized design. In the second experiment, the tolerance threshold of leaf and petiole explants to Hygromycin and Kanamycin antibiotics was evaluated by culturing on selective media supplemented with different concentrations of given antibiotics. After determining the suitable concentrations of the antibiotics for selective medium, the transformation of AS1 and 4'CGT genes was conducted with Agrobacterium LBA4404 strain containing pCAMBIA1304 and pBI121 plasmids, respectively. PCR method was used for the detection of transgenic plants. First experiment revealed that the leaf explant was the best sample and MS medium containing 1 mg L-1 IBA+1 mg L-1 BAP was the best combination for in vitro regeneration of all genotypes. The results of the second experiment showed that the M4 medium (containing 50 and 75 mg L-1 Kanamycin and Hygromycin, respectively) completely inhibited the regeneration of non-transformed samples. Finally, transgenic plants were selected using PCR with specific primers for transferred genes.