PAID ACCESS | Published on : 31-Dec-2024 | Pages: 175-181 |
Banana (Musa spp.) is one of the most important fruit crops of the tropics and subtropics, serving as a staple food, dessert fruit, and source of income for millions of people worldwide. Despite its economic and nutritional importance, genetic improvement of banana has been challenging due to sterility, polyploidy, parthenocarpy, narrow genetic base of cultivated varieties, and vulnerability to biotic and abiotic stresses. Conventional breeding approaches have achieved limited success, necessitating the integration of advanced breeding and biotechnological tools. This chapter provides a comprehensive overview of breeding approaches for genetic improvement in banana, encompassing conventional breeding, mutation breeding, polyploidy manipulation, tissue culture-based approaches, molecular breeding, genomics-assisted selection, genetic transformation, genome editing, and emerging omics technologies. Emphasis is placed on overcoming breeding constraints and developing high-yielding, stress-resilient, and quality-improved banana cultivars.
Conventional breeding, tissue culture, polyploidy, sterility, genome editing
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