Cultivation of fruits is a cropping system that helps in improving biological productivity, nutritional standard and also assists in maintaining ecological sustainability. Fruit production is gradually becoming important to national and global economics. Inspite of remarkable increase in production of different fruits following conventional improvement methods and improved management practices, some inherent problems with conventional breeding of woody perennials like long juvenile period, heterogeneity, fength of evaluation period, self-incompatibility, parthenocarpy and inability of sexual system to incorporate variations from unrelated sources are causing impediment in further improvement of yield and quality in different fruits. The problem is further compounded by dependence on relatively few selected genotypes for commercial reasons, extreme sensitivity of human palate to flavours and tastes in fruits and fruit products, and fixation of desirable characters by vegetative method of propagation in fruit crops. The post-second world war period has witnessed a gift of several epoch-making technologies to the world and biotechnology is one of them. Novel strategies emanating out of advances made in plant biotechnology, viz. embryo rescue, somaclonal variation, haploidy, protoplast fusion, in vitro conservation of germplasm and recombinant DNA technology (also known as Genetic engineering) offer tremendous potential to overcome some of the limitations of sexual hybridization. This text-cum-Reference book is aimed to set the agenda for role of plant biotechnology in improvement of fruit crops in complementarity with conventional improvement methods in 21st century. The text is divided into two parts. Part I deals with Potential Biotechnologies and, in Part II, their application to important fruit crops, viz. Mango, Citrus, Banana, Papaya, Guava, Grapes and Apple is discussed with emphasis on limitations of conventional improvement methods and possible biotechnological resolutions. A separate chapter in Part II (Chapter 16) is devoted to Biosafety systems for Novel Bioengineered Fruit Crops and Patenting, hotly debated subjects amongst environmentalists and entrepreneurs in corporate world. Though it is difficult to review all the literature in this rapidly expanding field, every effort has been made to include that is latest and relevant in this area. It is hoped that this book will find its place among students, researchers as well as teachers associated with plant biotechnology at UG and PG level.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR Atul Kumar
Dr. Atul Kumar received his M. Sc. Degree in Plant Physiology with minor specialization in Biochemistry (1977) and Ph. D. Degree in Horticulture (1983) from G.B. Pant University of Agriculture and Technology, Pantnagar. He was recipient of C.S.I.R. research fellowship during Ph.D studies. He served as Assistant Professor (Horticulture) at Birsa Agril. University, Ranchi (Bihar) for four years (1982-1986) and Jr. Research Officer (Horticulture) at Hill Campus of G.B. Pant of Ag. An Tech. At Ranichauri for nine years (1988-1995). Presently, he is serving as Associate Professor (Plant Physiology) and incharge, Department of Basic Sciences at College of Forestry and Hill Agriculture at Hill Campus, Ranichauri. He is associated with teaching of UG and PG courses in Plant Physiology, Plant Growth and Development, and Plant Biotechnology and is engaged in guiding students for their research work. He has been working on different aspects of in vitro culture of temperate fruit, vegetable, and ornamental crops, and stress physiology of plants for the past 14 years. He is life member of India. Dr. Kumar has contributed two text-cum-Reference books on Plant Biotechnology and Tissue Culture, and three chapters in edited books. He has presented research papers in national and international symposia and has over 70 publications to his credit.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR Vandana A. Kumar
Dr. Vandana A. Kumar received her M. Sc. Degree in Biochemistry from G.B. Pant University of Agriculture and Technology in 1978. She did her Ph. D. in Biochemistry from the same university in 1984 with minor specialization in Microbiology and worked on “Purification and Characterization of Goat Pancreatic Ribonuclease†for thesis research work. She has been the recipient of Senior Research Fellowship of I.C.A.R. during Ph. D. studies and has specialized in the field of Nucleic acids and Enzymology. After serving as Lecturer in 1984-85 in a constituent college (Y.S.N. Mahila Mahavidyalaya) of Ranchi University, presently, she is serving as Assistant Professor (Biochemistry) and Incharge, Tissue Culture Section in College of Forestry and Hill Agriculture at Hill Campus of G.B. Pant University of Ag. & Tech. at Ranichauri. She has received DBT sponsored advanced training on “Use of Tissue Culture Techniques in Crops and Tissue-cultured Techniques in Crop Improvement†at Central Patato Research Institute, Simla (HP) in 1993. in 1999, she participated in another ICAR-sponsored short-duration advanced training on Green House Technology for Horticultural Crops and Tissue-cultured Plants at University of Agricultural Sciences, Dharwad (Karnataka). Dr. Vandana is teaching courses on Biochemistry, Biotechnology and Plant Physiology to UG and PG students. She is also engaged in guiding PG students of their research work on tissue culture and biotechnology aspects. Dr. Vandana is a member of Indian Science Congress Association for the past 5 years. She has been instrumental in establishing Tissue Culture and Plant Biotechnology Laboratory at Hill Campus and conducting research on different aspects of tissue culture of important temperate species for the past 12 years. She has co-authored two Text-cum-Reference books on Plant Biotechnology and Tissue Culture and contributed three chapters in edited books. She has published over 30 research papers and popular articles in different national and international journals.
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