Tissue Culture Based Sugarcane Farming

Modern commercial sugarcane varieties are obtained through a multi-stage selection scheme requiring over a period of approximately 10 years through identification of a few elite clones from a very large population of hybrid seedlings. Lack of suitable multiplication procedure and perpetuation of systemic diseases are the serious problems in multiplying an elite genotype of sugarcane conventionally in the open field. Due limited availability of seed cane of a new variety at the time of its release and slow multiplication rate by conventional means, it takes a further period of about 10-12 years to cover the desired area for commercial cultivation. By the time the variety starts deteriorating due to biotic and abiotic stresses. It has also been realized that the growing demand of seed cane of newly released varieties cannot be fulfilled timely by the conventional methods of plant multiplication. Therefore, the use and exploitation of new biotechniques are quite essential for faster multiplication of newly released varieties. Micropropagation is currently the only realistic means of achieving rapid and large scale production of disease free planting material of newly developed varieties in order to speed up the commercialization process in sugarcane. Thus, plant tissue culture has now become the major component of biotechnology. Genetic engineering and molecular biology can be used for crop improvement through the application of various technique developed in the field of biotechnology. Several exciting developments have taken place in sugarcane biotechnology during the last 5 decades. The first edition of this book entitled "Tissue culture based sugarcane farming" is being brought out as an introductory text covering plant regeneration in vitro using cell, tissue and organ culture. Basic aspects such as large scale micropropagation, cell culture, cellular totipotency, somatic embryogenesis and various aspects of sugarcane cultivation have also been included. In this book, comprising 29 chapters, various protocols have been described in very simple manner. The language of the text is simple and the subject matter is fully illustrated. No other book is available with such an approach covering basic to applied aspects of plant tissue culture. I hope this book will prove to be of a great use within the classroom as teaching/learning material and in the laboratory for practical and research purposes for the scientist as well as professionals in the fields of sugar industry.