Hybrid potato breeding for improved varieties

Description

Hybrid potato breeding promises to create new cultivars within a few years. This would facilitate the introgression of genes by marker-assisted selection. In addition, hybrid cultivars can be made available as true seeds, free of soil-borne pathogens, quick to multiply and easy to transport and store. Self-incompatibility and inbreeding depression were previously thought to be prohibiting factors for hybrid potato breeding but have recently been overcome: nearly homozygous diploid inbred lines have been generated and the first experimental hybrids have been evaluated in the field. In this chapter, we review the scientific basis for hybrid potato breeding and highlight the features of our strategy for creating a hybrid breeding system in potato including propagation through seed. We discuss the recent progress made towards the development of useful hybrid varieties, and consider how the hybrid potato breeding technology platform will need to be adapted and optimized for different production systems.

Table of contents

1 Introduction 2 The scientific basis for hybrid potato breeding 3 The state of the art of hybrid potato breeding 4 Production and commercialization of hybrid seed cultivars 5 Inbred lines for genetic research 6 Cropping systems based on true seeds 7 Case studies 8 Conclusion 9 Where to look for further information 10 Acknowledgements 11 References