Commercial delivery of genetic improvement to conifer plantations using somatic embryogenesis

Somatic embryogenesis of conifers has been the subject of intensive research by a number of organizations over the last 15 years. The maintenance, cryopreservation and production of embryos from embryogenic cultures of individual trees have been demonstrated for several commercial species. These attributes have enabled CellFor Inc. (a commercial provider) to develop and deploy over 4 500 clones in field tests. It is expected that selection of elite clones from such tests will result in gains of more than 40% in volume growth over population means. While individual elite parent trees may exhibit improvements in excess of 25%, seed orchards typically yield less than half this gain operationally. Hence the ability to deploy selected clones of elite families through mass production of somatic embryos has significant value. CellFor has developed a bulk embryo production and sowing methods to achieve this, with initial volumes of 2 million somatic seedlings annually.