Orchid Biotechnology for Indonesian Orchids Conservation and Industry.

Modern biotechnology for orchid breeding, especially in vitro culture and transgenic technology for mass propagation has developed. Due to its attractive flower, Indonesian native orchids such as moth orchids Phalaenopsis amabilis (L.) Blume, Black orchid Coelogyne pandurata Lindley, Vanda tricolor Lindley are often taken from their natural habitat to be traded, or domesticated as a hobby. So the existence of orchids in Indonesia continues to decline. Modern technology integrated with classical breeding will support the orchid conservation strategy as well as the commercial orchid industry. Especially production of the somatic embryo and shoot formation as much as possible directly from explant or indirectly through callus that emerges from explant and regenerates into plants in the culture medium with an additional appropriate concentration of growth regulators cytokinin and auxin. In a model plant, Arabidopsis thaliana, AtRKD4 is a key gene for embryo initiation and KNAT1 gene for the initiation of shoot apical meristem for producing shoot. These two genes can be used to induce somatic embryogenesis and shoot development in orchid by inserted the genes into orchid genomes mediated by Agrobacterium tumefaciens. This strategy effectively increased the production of both native and hybrid orchid plants through somatic embryogenesis and shoot development, that hopefully the regenerated plants will meet commercial demand and support the conservation of the native orchids. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]