CLASSIC METHODS AND BIOTECHNICAL TOOLS IN LEMON BREEDING: PRELIMINARY RESULTS

Spain is the most important lemon-producing country of the Mediterranean basin. The aim of lemon improvement is the selection of lemon trees giving excellent quality and productivity and the production of seedless lemons having the features demanded by consumers. In the spring of 2008 and 2009 we carried out 600 crossings between different lemon cultivars. We obtained about 34% fruit set. Four months after pollination fruit were harvested and immature embryos rescue was carried out. About 280 plants were recovered. The plants of 2008 were analysed by flow cytometry and ten triploid and one tetraploid plant were selected. The plants of polyembryonic seeds will be analysed by molecular markers to select zygotic plants. Also, we have made several sowings of seeds and about 1800 seedlings of different lemon cultivars were analysed by flow cytometry: 24 triploid and 10 tetraploid plants were selected. The triploid and tetraploid plants will be cultivated in the field for their evaluation and the tetraploid plants selected could be used to obtained triploid plants through crossing with diploid plants.