Eggplant (Solanum melongena L.) as a Model Plant for Tissue Culture and Genetic Transformation Studies

Eggplant (Solanum melongena L. ,) is used as both vegetable as well as medicinal plant for the treatment of several diseases, including diabetes, arthritis and liver complaints. Eggplant is susceptible to a number of diseases and pests capable of causing serious crop losses. This problem has been addressed by hybridizing eggplant with wild resistant Solanam species, which are the sources of useful agronomic traits. Non availability of resistance sources in cultivated species, cross-incompatibility with wild relatives and linkage drag of undesirable genes are the problem in conventional breeding methods. The application of in vitro methodologies has resulted in considerable success. Eggplant is highly responsive to various tissue culture techniques. Direct organogenesis and somatic embryogenesis are widely studied protocol in this crop, but potential of regeneration varies with genotype, explant and culture media supplemented with various growth hormones. Among growth regulators, auxin and cytokinin are of more significance as their ratio determines callogenesis, rhizogenesis, embryogenesis and regeneration in eggplant. Eggplant tissue present a high morphogenetic potential that is useful for developmental studies as well as for establishing biotechnological approaches to produce improved varieties, such as embryo rescue, in vitro selection, somatic hybridization and genetic transformation. The potential of this species as a model plant for studying various aspects of plant genetics and morphogenetic potential is also discussed. In the present study, important factors that affect in vitro regeneration as well as genetic transformation are analyzed.