Cytoplasmic male sterility in Desmodium

Abstract

A type of male sterility found in two Desmodium plants of probably interspecific hybrid origin was cytoplasmically inherited. The cytoplasmic male-sterile character was incorporated in the tropical legume Desmodium sandwicense by backcrossing. In this genetic background pollen sterility was complete. The male-sterile character was not graft-transmissible, and it produced no detectable pleiotropic effects on growth and development.

Desmodium intortum gave restoration of pollen fertility in F_l hybrids with male-sterile lines of D. sandwicense. Restored F₁ hybrids produced apparently normal pollen, but tests of functional ability of the pollen disclosed that pollen fertility was less than that of Fl hybrids with normal cytoplasm. Incomplete restoration of fertility was not due to heterozygosity of fertility-restoring genes with gametophytic expression, since fertility-restoring genes were shown to act sporophytically.

The results established the occurrence in the legume Desmodium of a system of determination of the male-sterile, fertility-restored phenotypes that is similar to the cytoplasmic male sterility systems described in many other angiosperm plants.

A scheme utilizing the genetic stocks produced in this study for commercial production of the interspecific hybrid D. sandwicense x D. intortum as a cultivar is presented.