Buy Tobacco Leaf Online | Whole Leaf Tobacco

N. Tabacum x N. Rustica

Status
Not open for further replies.

ChinaVoodoo

Moderator
Joined
Sep 1, 2014
Messages
7,166
Points
113
Location
Edmonton, AB, CA
There's some wild research out there. Stigmaless transgenic tobacco?

Petunia is in the same family (Solanaceae) as Nicotiana. The final paragraph of your quote seems to suggest to me that the "stigmaless" plants are simply missing an essential signaling chemical that is commonly secreted from the stigma of more than one genus of solanaceous plants.

Bob
Yeah, I think the reasoning is that the stigmas provides more than hydration to the pollen, or that the pollen needs to be hydrated in just a certain way, depending on plant family.
The gist I got was that the lack of stigmas was an unpredicted consequence of the first cross. There's these water crystals, and lipid exudates that are normally provided by the stigma to hydrate the pollen that were therefore absent, pretty much making the hybrid near-sterile. So, in the event that Tutu gets a cross, if it results in the first generation having deformed flowers, it appears that he could work around it.
 

Tutu

Well-Known Member
Joined
Jun 9, 2016
Messages
732
Points
63
Location
Dominican Republic
In the event of getting a hybrid lacking a stigma I could still use the hybrid as the male parent for generation F[SUB]2[/SUB], by using its pollen, as it is the female part that is sterile in this scenario. I think you might be right that they stumbled upon this non-self-fertile cross unanticipated. Then again, talk of this sterile cross is before the section where they state that "to this point, only events occurring in self-pollinated species have been considered here". That leads me to think it was a N. tabacum x N. tabacum cross. I can not be sure.

But let's take a leap here and assume that perhaps this is exactly what occurs with hybrids of N. rustica x N. tabacum. We know that there there are reported cases of people growing a hybrid that is not self-fertile. If that is indeed caused by the stigma not being present, you could indeed use the cross as the male parent for next the next generation, as I was suggesting above. It seems as if the limited possibilities may steer you in that direction.

If that is what happens to the N. rustica x N. tabacum cross, it would be interesting to consider the reciprocal. Although it's close to impossible to make one in a natural way, let's consider that one might, by finding a N. tabacum variety with a relatively short stylus. Would the same thing happen? Would it also be self-sterile? Would there not be a stigma?

Interestingly this article was written at the University of Nijmegen, 35 km from where I grew up. Maybe I should have been looking for this stuff closer to home. Anyway...

So a few more things taken from this article. Happy to see you post it China. It says that "tobacco pollen tubes, for instance, [FONT=&quot]take ∼26 to 30 h to reach the ovary, at a distance of 4 cm from the stigma. This makes the speed of pollen tube growth ∼1.7 mm/h." [/FONT]I thought it'd be interesting to compare with the research in the article I posted previously, the ne called The diversity of interspecific pollen-pistil incongruity in Nicotiana. There we see in Fig. 4 that the pollen of self-fertilising N. tabacum grows 36 mm in 24 hours. This is a speed of [FONT=&quot]∼1.5 mm/h, which is not to dissimilar from what ChinaVoodoo's article says.

[/FONT]I was pleasantly surprised to find that the current article actually refers to the one I posted earlier, which I mentioned just now. Actually, it completely summarizes it. When we go to the heading of Interspecies Pollen Rejection, we read the following:

[FONT=&quot]An interesting study of incongruity was performed by Kuboyama et al. (1994)[/FONT][FONT=&quot]. They used the SC tobacco as the female parent in distinct crosses with three other SC species, [/FONT]N. repanda[FONT=&quot], [/FONT]N. rustica[FONT=&quot], and [/FONT]N. trygonofilla[FONT=&quot]. Pollen tubes of these latter species arrested in three different places in the mature pistils of tobacco. Figure 3 [/FONT][FONT=&quot]shows pollen tubes of [/FONT]N. rustica[FONT=&quot] arrested halfway in the style of tobacco at ∼20 h after pollination. Pollen tubes also curl and wind and in some cases bend back toward the stigma (A.M. Sanchez and C. Mariani, unpublished results). In the reciprocal cross, using [/FONT]N. rustica[FONT=&quot] as the female parent, tobacco pollen tubes easily reach the ovary. Interestingly, when the three types of incongruous pollinations were performed on immature tobacco pistils, all pollen tubes reached the ovary (Kuboyama et al., 1994[/FONT][FONT=&quot]). This finding suggests that, if the arresting factor is determined by the pistil, it is most likely produced during pistil maturation. It could be argued that the arrest of pollen tubes is caused by the longer distance they have to grow in the tobacco pistil compared with their own pistil (i.e., 3.6-cm tobacco style versus 1-cm [/FONT]N. rustica[FONT=&quot] style). We used [/FONT]N. rustica[FONT=&quot] pollen on the pistil of [/FONT]N. sylvestris[FONT=&quot] and the tubes grew 3.2 cm, which is approximately the length of the tobacco style (A.M. Sanchez and C. Mariani, unpublished results). This finding indicates that [/FONT]N. rustica[FONT=&quot] pollen tubes are capable of growing longer than the length of their own styles.[/FONT]

They interpret the results of the Japanese and Korean researches pretty much the same way as I did a couple of posts before. I should be using very young female pistils. But so far no-one has mentioned looking for N. tabacum varieties with short pistils. I have to thank Bob for that one.
 

ChinaVoodoo

Moderator
Joined
Sep 1, 2014
Messages
7,166
Points
113
Location
Edmonton, AB, CA
What if you took stigma tissue from a different flower on the same plant and placed it lower down on the pistil so the pollen tubes wouldn't have to travel as far after being hydrated?
BlossomDiagram_400.png
 

Tutu

Well-Known Member
Joined
Jun 9, 2016
Messages
732
Points
63
Location
Dominican Republic
If you'd have the right means to work that out, probably. But you can't just put some stigma on the pistil anywhere you'd like. Pollen tubes shoot into the two carpels. I don't think it works sideways and I don't think you can cut it up. So I reckon I'll just stick to may natural way of transfering pollen to stigma. And if it doesn't work, well, probably need to give it another hundred shots, if not more
 

ChinaVoodoo

Moderator
Joined
Sep 1, 2014
Messages
7,166
Points
113
Location
Edmonton, AB, CA
Overall, this is cool, and I'm going to give it a try. I've ordered some Isleta Pueblo rustica seeds from Skychaser. Curiosity more than anything. I'm happy with what I got already. This is play, yet paradoxically serious.
 

Tutu

Well-Known Member
Joined
Jun 9, 2016
Messages
732
Points
63
Location
Dominican Republic
It's nice to have something to play with. You have crossed N. tabacum x N. tabacum previously right? I've seen you ask questions in How to intentionally cross tobacco varieties. I usually do bag the flowers after taping them up. That way I intend to minimalize other factors. Picking the other flowers of would work too, but since you're going to have to use a lot of them you might as well keep them on. You're gonna need a fair amount of pollen too.
 

ChinaVoodoo

Moderator
Joined
Sep 1, 2014
Messages
7,166
Points
113
Location
Edmonton, AB, CA
It's nice to have something to play with. You have crossed N. tabacum x N. tabacum previously right? I've seen you ask questions in How to intentionally cross tobacco varieties. I usually do bag the flowers after taping them up. That way I intend to minimalize other factors. Picking the other flowers of would work too, but since you're going to have to use a lot of them you might as well keep them on. You're gonna need a fair amount of pollen too.

I tried to cross Pergeu with Japan 8, but the tape fell off, if I recall.
 

deluxestogie

Administrator
Staff member
Joined
May 25, 2011
Messages
23,931
Points
113
Location
near Blacksburg, VA
Here's a nearly unreadable bit of research with a truly simple conclusion about pollen tube growth, when the pollen and ovary are of the same species:

https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-017-01323-8.pdf [9 pages; published NOV 2017]

SUMMARY: The plant ovary secrets a chemical that fits (think "lock and key") a unique chemical produced by the pollen of only that species, which steers the pollen tube's growth toward the ovary. If the pollen and ovary are of different species, then the lock and key don't match, and no steering of pollen tube growth occurs. It does not discuss the effect in closely related species, such as N. tabacum x N. rustica.

Bob
 

ChinaVoodoo

Moderator
Joined
Sep 1, 2014
Messages
7,166
Points
113
Location
Edmonton, AB, CA
I topped all but one of my Isleta Pueblo (rustica) a couple weeks ago and expected more flowers to arrive. Hopefully I get more before summer's end. As it sits, for Nicotiana, the only flowers I have are Samporis, so that's what my first attempt at cross pollination is with.

IMG_20180725_080652342~2.jpg
 

deluxestogie

Administrator
Staff member
Joined
May 25, 2011
Messages
23,931
Points
113
Location
near Blacksburg, VA
Which direction are you crossing? N. rustica pollen to N. tabacum female may require scores (maybe a hundred or more) instances, in order to maybe get some seed. The other direction (N. tabacum pollen to N. rustica female) has a much higher, though still small, probability of success.

Bob
 

ChinaVoodoo

Moderator
Joined
Sep 1, 2014
Messages
7,166
Points
113
Location
Edmonton, AB, CA
Which direction are you crossing? N. rustica pollen to N. tabacum female may require scores (maybe a hundred or more) instances, in order to maybe get some seed. The other direction (N. tabacum pollen to N. rustica female) has a much higher, though still small, probability of success.

Bob

It is Samporis male to Isleta Pueblo female (or shall we say Isleta Puebla?). I only had one open Samporis flower, so I made the two attempts. I plan on retrying with other Nicotianas as they become available.
 

Tutu

Well-Known Member
Joined
Jun 9, 2016
Messages
732
Points
63
Location
Dominican Republic
On my first try earlier this year I got some seeds by using a female rustica and a male tabacum, but the seeds were small and not viable.
I'm also planning on giving it another go, but my plants are still in a very early phase.
Wish you the best of luck with this given that you keep giving us updates!
 

ChinaVoodoo

Moderator
Joined
Sep 1, 2014
Messages
7,166
Points
113
Location
Edmonton, AB, CA
I imagine if you are looking to crossbreed Tabacum and Rustica you are looking for a smoother smoke with a high nicotine punch. I was looking for that kind of tobacco product then a friend introduced me to dokha tobacco. You guys may want to look into it. It's an Arabic strain of Tabacum that kicks like a mule. probably because of growing conditions and selective breeding over the centuries. It seems to be a very unique strain and I've been trying to get more information on the genetics of it. As far as whether it's originally from a brightleaf, oriental, orinacco.[/url]

To be honest, it's mostly due to curiosity that I do this. However, I'm more interested in, if lucky, creating a rustica that's larger, and has less nicotine, and more flavor, but retains the shorter growth cycle.

And trust me, I already have enough nicotine.
 
Last edited:

Tutu

Well-Known Member
Joined
Jun 9, 2016
Messages
732
Points
63
Location
Dominican Republic
Very nice! You are likely to get only very small seedpods. Hopefully you'll get something that is viable!
 

ChinaVoodoo

Moderator
Joined
Sep 1, 2014
Messages
7,166
Points
113
Location
Edmonton, AB, CA
IMG_20180826_010307901~2.jpg This is a tiny seed pod. The only one I got from the two crosses I made. It contained 20ish seeds. They are small, like Nicotiana seeds. I'm planning on hail marrying these in the spring to see if I can get at least one viable plant. Thoughts and prayers, lol.
 
Last edited:

CobGuy

Well-Known Member
Joined
Dec 22, 2015
Messages
1,041
Points
113
Location
Central Arizona
Fascinating stuff!

I remember taking Genetics and spending hours crossing varieties of Drosophila (fruit flies).
The outcome, while somewhat predictable, always had some mutations from the norm.
As a side note, I'm pretty sure I inhaled way too much FlyNap in the process. :)

~Darin
 
Status
Not open for further replies.
Top